W ang Chuanfu is a self-made Chinese billionaire and the founder, chairman, and CEO of BYD Company, a global powerhouse in electric vehicles and rechargeable batteries. A chemist by training, he founded BYD in 1995 as a small manufacturer of rechargeable batteries for mobile phones, with seed capital provided by his cousin, Lu Xiangyang. He built the company into a dominant global producer of batteries, competing with Japanese giants.

In 2003, in a move that was widely questioned at the time, he pivoted the company into the automotive industry with the audacious goal of building electric vehicles. This prescient move has since made BYD one of the world's largest and most successful electric vehicle manufacturers, famously surpassing Tesla in global EV sales. The company is vertically integrated, producing its own batteries, semiconductors, and other key components. Wang is a hands-on, engineering-driven leader, and his vision has transformed BYD into a major force in the global green energy transition. He is also famous for having won the early backing of Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway.