Steve Jobs: Apple

In 1985, then-Apple CEO John Sculley fired Steve Jobs, co-founder of the tech company. When Jobs returned as CEO in 1997, Apple was nearly bankrupt.

Jobs sprung into action by brokering a deal with Microsoft to buy $150 million in nonvoting stock and to keep making its Office software for Macintosh. To streamline the company, he cut the number of Apple products by 70 percent, which led to approximately 3,000 employee layoffs. One year later, the company generated a $309 million profit.

Sadly, Jobs succumbed to pancreatic cancer in October 2011. Now led by Tim Cook, Apple is one of the most successful corporations in the world, and analysts expect it to be the first company to reach a market cap of $1 trillion.

Don't Miss: The Richest Entrepreneur in Every State