Anthony Edwin Falkenstein - ONZM

1 Nov

Tony Falkenstein was an average student at Aucklands Onehunga High School. He passed School Certificate but failed University Entrance twice and started work as a pastry cook.

More than 40 years later Falkenstein, the son of hard-up German-Jewish refugees who had fled the Nazis, is the toast of entrepreneurs and the hero of his old school.

His company, Red Eagle Corporation, grew into a multimillion-dollar business. His water company, Just Water International, went public in 2004. But Falkenstein was barely known to the wider public until 2003 when Red Eagle underwrote $300,000 to establish Onehunga High as the country's first business secondary school – a role model for enterprise education nationwide.