Building a multi-million empire

Having been in the ornamental fish business at the tender age of 14, entrepreneurship was nothing new to Barnabas Huang, alumnus of NYP�s School of Business Management and now Managing Director of NutriFirst Pte Ltd, but after working in the industry for three years, he realised it wasn�t his true calling so he decided to change his career path.

Back when he was a second year Business Management student in NYP, Barnabas met his gym trainer who was selling sports supplements. He seized the opportunity to buy over his sports nutrition business when his gym trainer decided to concentrate on his other business ventures. With $3,800 worth of stock that Barnabas acquired from his gym trainer, NutriFirst.net was born.

While studying for his diploma in NYP, he took on many modules like Entrepreneurship, Marketing, Statistics and Finance which helped sharpen his vision and hone his analytical skills. Barnabas also underwent work attachments over a span of nine months, on-campus as well as with an external company, where he gained valuable experiences in supply chain management, retail operations and IT. All these were critical to the development of his e-commerce business; they gave him the opportunity to see things from different angles, enabling him to make the right decisions.

11 years later, NutriFirst is Singapore�s largest sports supplement online store with annual sales of five million dollars. Barnabas credits his alma mater, NYP, for developing his skills in problem-solving, critical thinking and communications.

Although success is already in the bag, Barnabas continues to strive for more. He hopes to make it to the Forbes list and aims to create the biggest logistics chain in Asia.

Aspire to become a successful entrepreneur like Barnabas? Take a step closer to your dream by choosing your own adventure at NYP. Visit NYP Open House from 8 to 10 Jan 2015!

Published in the January 2015 Issue of Teenage Magazine. Reproduced with Permission.