beacons of entrepreneurship. One such person, whose innovative nature came to full-fruition recently, is hip-hop mogul Dr Dre.

Andre "Dr Dre" Young grew up in Compton, CA. He was an uninspired pupil and was rejected from an apprenticeship program because of his poor grades. He took this as a sign that he would never excel in academia and decided to entirely concentrate on his music career. It proved to be an excellent decision. Dr Dre has since moved from the music booth to the board room and has never looked back. He continues to evolve and conquer on his path from hip-hop superstar to Apple board exec.

When living in LA, Dr Dre was frequently on my playlist. His music and albums were a soundtrack for many people, and Iwas no different. Back then, who would have thought that the rapper who spent his days with Snoop Dogg would become a world-beating entrepreneur before his 50th birthday?

Dre founded Beats by Dre in 2008 as a reaction to the rise of the mp3 (ironically, which was popularised by Apple's I Pod). He recognised that the move from the CD to the mp3 meant the audio quality of music had deteriorated for the sake of convenience. Dre realised that the tide had turned. People would not go back to using CD's just because of the superior sound. In true entrepreneurial fashion, he tackled the problem from a completely different angle- by vastly improving the quality of headphones available on the market.

When Apple acquired Beats for a figure believed to