Dang Le Nguyen Vu


Đặng Lê Nguyên Vũ, better known as Chairman Vu, is a Vietnamese entrepreneur and businessman. He is the founder, president and general director of Trung Nguyên Group. He has been described by National Geographic and Forbes as "Zero to Hero", "Vietnam Coffee King" and "Philosopher-King". He is also an activist and philanthropist.

Early life and background

Vũ was born on 10 February 1971 in Nha Trang, Khánh Hoà, into a poor peasant family. In 1979, his family moved to M'Đrăk District, central western Vietnam province of Dak Lak. In 1990, he went to Tay Nguyen University. During the time, he began to study and research coffee. In 1996, he founded the Trung Nguyen Coffee Company in the city of Buon Ma Thuot.
In 1998, Trung Nguyen opened its first coffeehouse space in Phu Nhuan district, Ho Chi Minh City, expanding its business operation under a franchising model that was "revolutionary at the time". Since then, franchise coffeehouses have been launched countrywide. Since 2003, due to the rapid development of instant coffee brand G7, Trung Nguyen has been leading Vietnam's coffee market. In the year, Trung Nguyen's G7 coffee which's lead by Dang has taken a high position in local market, with a 38 per cent share for 9-years", according to AC Nielsen 2012 survey. G7 won over Nestlé instant product in a 2003 blind test, that's usually cited as "an example of 'David' against 'Goliath'",
in which the participants' votes with high percentage which recorded by the press and observers. Nielsen data showed, the product has becoming the 'top trending brand in the local 3-in-1 coffee market segment in 2003–2012 in terms of market-share, revenue, and sales volume'.
In August 2012, Forbes called Vu 'Vietnam's Coffee King'. He has afterward been called the 'King of Coffee' by the press. In October 2012, he was named 'Pioneer of the Year' in a public vote by vnExpress readers. In March 2013, he was granted the title of 'Forever worthy of the descendants of Lạc Hồng' in the programme of 'The Divine Root 2014' held by National Assembly's Committee for Culture and Education, Club of Patriot Business of Vietnam and Society of Historical Science of Vietnam.
Dang is known as an "idea-generating man" due to his "Doctrine of Coffee" whereby he has developed a semi-secular philosophy and zen named 'Coffeeism', including 'Coffee Zen'. It's described as an 'all-comprehensive, all-dimensional, all-global', 'holofractal' approach to healing, success, fortune, well-being and enlightenment; in which "Coffee is the 'Treasure of Earth and Heaven', Heritage of Humankind and Solution to the Future".
In late 2014, Dang and his 18 fellow-men went on a 49-day fasting and zen journey.
He has been called "frank but pretty unfriendly" in some speeches on Starbucks coffee.

Honours and awards

On 27 April 2011, the brandname "Trung Nguyen Coffee" appeared in the Financial Times as a major case study on a successful enterprise model in which the company was voted as one of the most prevailing organizations.
In 2012, Dang was honoured as 'Coffee King', officially, by National Geographic.
In August 2012, Forbes magazine portrayed him as 'Vietnam coffee king', and described him as a figure of "Zero to Hero". Since then, local and world press and society has mentioned him as the Coffee King.
In October 2012, he was selected as a 'Pioneer of the Year' in a public vote by VnExpress readers. The vote's introduction reads "Chairman Vu who has been titled as 'Vietnamese Coffee King' has 'belled the cat' in developing franchising model in Vietnam".