by Karen Wong

FROM driving a taxi to running a multi-million dollar company. Mr John Federoff might just be the perfect definition of a late-bloomer, having gone back to complete his studies when he was 39.

Six years later, when he was 45, the father of three graduated with two degrees and a Master of Business Administration.

Now at 60, when most people may be making retirement plans, Mr Federoff considers himself at the peak of his career. He is expanding his mining equipment business, making plans to hire more people and seeking new clients and new markets.

It was in 1988, when he was 39 years old, that Mr Federoff went to a college in Perth to complete his education.

Born in Queensland, Australia, to a father who was a sugarcane cutter and a mother who was a housewife, Mr Federoff had dropped out of school at 14 to become a sugarcane cutter. He later took a series of odd jobs.

When he hit the books again, he said it took him 'about six months to get 50 per cent, and a year to scrape by, with just enough marks to get into the Asian studies degree programme' at the University of Western Australia (UWA), after college.

After the first year in the Asian studies course, he did well enough to transfer to do a bachelor's degree in commerce, which was his original plan.

Studied while driving cab

To support his family, he drove a taxi.

He was married to a nurse and had three children. He said: 'I would be driving eight hours a night and I would take my books with me. When I was waiting for people, I would be reading.'

He did that for over six years, he said, until he graduated.

The seed for his business plan was planted during university. He had recalled the trials of his earlier job, when he was working as a technician on mine sites and oil rigs in Indonesia, that they needed a lot of technical support.

The idea became a coursework project in university. He and his classmates scored top marks for it. When he was all ready to start his business, his classmates chipped in and lent him some seed capital as he was 'dead broke'.

One lawyer gave him A$15,000 ($18,000) on condition that if the business succeeded, he would be paid back three times that amount. If it failed, then they would call it quits.

Mr Federoff said: 'I paid him back A$45,000 after two years. All the other investors were paid back within three years of the business starting.'

He said that the turnover for his Indonesian-registered company, PT AsiaRep, was US$8 million ($11.4m) last year and he expects that to grow.

He is taking on new mine sites in Laos and even Africa, and he is looking to employ more people.

Apart from providing technical support at the mines, the company also manufactures electrical equipment - such as work lamps, operator fatigue detection devices. He now has 200 employees, including two Singaporeans.

His university lecturer, Professor Roger Smith, who is in the business faculty of UWA, said that he has invited Mr Federoff to talk to other students to 'show what can be achieved by commitment, motivation and vision'. He added: 'John did it the hard way, but got there. I might say that many new start-ups in Indonesia by Australians have failed, but John has succeeded by having the courage and tenacity to stick things out during the downturns.

'He also took the trouble of learning the language and the business culture so you could say he continued his education after finishing the MBA.'

Looking back, Mr Federoff said, the most frustrating part of his life was being in a 'rut'. His family was poor and he was caught in the vicious cycle, he said.

'I had to make a concerted effort to break the hold. I did it for my children, or the cycle will never end.'

His eldest daughter now runs a business developing real estate, his son is a sales engineer and his youngest daughter is a ski instructor.

He is divorced and remarried to leading Indonesian lawyer Meri Girsang.

Of his achievements, Mr Federoff, who revealed that he has assets worth over US$5 million, said: 'A person's future depends on his mindset. Determination, hard work, sacrifice and a positive attitude can raise most people above their circumstances.'

This article was first published in The New Paper on September 2, 2008.