Michael Dell

Founder, chairman and chief executive of Dell Technologies, which he started in a University of Texas dorm room in 1984.

Direct from Dell explains the direct-sales and build-to-order model that let the company run on negative working capital and undercut reseller-based competitors on price - one of the clearest worked examples of a cash conversion cycle as a competitive weapon. Play Nice But Win covers the 2013 leveraged buyout that took Dell private, the proxy fight with Carl Icahn, and the EMC purchase and VMware tracking stock that followed.

2 books of their own