All of 2020 and half of 2021, I was working until 2 a.m. every day because I was writing the code that runs the company,” says Grant Petty, CEO and founder of Blackmagic Design. The 53-year-old billionaire isn’t kidding. He despises outsourcing, so he literally writes all the SQL programs that run internal processes at his 1,500-employee, $576 million (revenue) Melbourne, Australia-based company. He’s also known for starring in hour-long instructional videos for Blackmagic products like the Ursa Mini Pro 12K digital cinema camera. When the pandemic struck, Blackmagic (which manufactures all 209 of its products itself, unheard-of in the hardware business unless your name is Samsung or Sony) needed to share parts among its three factories in Australia, Singapore and Indonesia. Rather than hire someone, or even delegate the task internally, Petty rewrote the workflow software connecting inventory databases.
formerly Mad Cornish Projectionist.