Nazim Khan left home aged 16, changed his name and eventually started business life working from a “broom cupboard” in the most prestigious space on the Monopoly board.
The Den’s least volatile Dragon, who took the same name as Hollywood legend James Caan, has a net worth more than £70m. The Pakistan-born tycoon made his breakthrough when he set up a recruitment company and now runs a mid-market private equity corporation.
Early ambition
In 1962, the Khan family emigrated to East London and Nazim’s father set up a leather jacket manufacturer on Brick Lane, where the youngster first learned the basics of business. Conforming to entrepreneurial type, he prospered selling his father’s jackets to his classmates but left school at 16 without any qualifications and left home soon after to forge his own career path, with setting up his own business the ultimate goal.
Far from applauding the entrepreneurial streak he’d bequeathed to his son, Khan senior couldn’t hide his disappointment, but – belatedly – he eventually acknowledged his success. “He never understood why I didn't join the family business,” recalls Caan. “But when I opened the 100th global office of my company he said it maybe was the right thing for me to do,” he adds wryly.
Caan says he learnt a lot from watching his dad work long hours, seven days a week, to ensure his textile company found success
Nevertheless, his father should be proud of his role in shaping Caan’s destiny, even if his control over it ended so early. Caan says he learnt a lot from watching his dad work long hours, seven days a week, to ensure his textile company found success.
Caan aged 18, landed a job as a recruitment apprentice and quickly developed a persuasive sales patter to win over clients and plenty of commission.
It was at this time that The Godfather fan decided to change his name. “I was called Nazim Khan and it suddenly struck me that I could spell my surname in a different way,” he says.
“I mentioned this to my friends and they started calling me James Caan as a joke. Then I had some business cards printed with my ‘new’ name on for fun – and somehow the name stuck.
Once again, the young Khan, or rather Caan as it now was, disappointed Khan senior.
“Presenting myself as James Caan was a great opener with potential clients, so I used it all the time, eventually changing my name by deed poll some years later, much to my father’s disapproval.”
Status
In 1985, after several years of investing in his wife’s chain of boutiques Caan started Alexander Mann, his recruitment company. Mindful of the importance of perceptions in business Caan sacrificed space and facilities for the prestige of a Mayfair address. “The only space I could afford was a former broom cupboard in Pall Mall with no window – but I was thrilled,” he recalls.
As the company progressed Caan appointed a right-hand man so he could develop other investment interests, and 14 years down the line he sold a minority stake in the business for £25m. Financially secure and a dab hand in the recruitment sector, Caan co-founded an executive headhunting firm in 1993. In time, Caan and his business partner grew the company to more than 147 offices in 30 countries and also launched a trade magazine.
In 2002 the recruitment chief did an abrupt volte face and sold all three of his companies, Humana International, Recruitment International and Alexander Mann. The knowledge-thirsty entrepreneur decided to take a gap year and study an advanced management course at Harvard.
Dragon’s Den
In 2003, Caan set up a mid-market private equity company, Hamilton Bradshaw, and his personal commitment was particularly considerably. “One of the things that makes Hamilton Bradshaw quite unique is that, unlike a lot of private equity firms... my company only invests my own money,” he says. “So the good thing is that when they work, all the return is mine. The sad thing is when they don’t work, unfortunately, I lose all my money.”
In 2007, Caan took a deserved place on the Dragon’s Den panel as an amiable counterbalance to the impatient, easily affronted Peter Jones, Theo Paphitis, Deborah Meaden and Duncan Bannatyne. Any investments Caan shakes on in the Den are managed by Hamilton Bradshaw and by 2009 the company’s assets had increased by 82%.
Caan approached the first series with the mindset of an addictive gambler rather the multimillionaire entrepreneur without a single failed venture to his name: “I had a feeling the time had come... I decided that I was going to invest in the first thing that came into the Den that day,” he admits.
The other dragons were understandably incredulous when Caan then agreed to invest in a treadmill for dogs. However, Caan was vindicated as the Fit Fur Life business not only survived but is now thriving.
Caan is unsurprisingly emboldened by that success, and his attitude seems rather less hard-headed than his fellow dragons. “Most of my investments in Dragon’s Den are probably the most demanding [...] but to a large extent, that is one of the fun parts in investing in Dragon’s Den.”
James Caan is keen to support and nurture entrepreneurism in the UK. Not only has he worked with Business Link in an advisory capacity and with Enterprise UK, a group that provides resources to young entrepreneurs, but he has also founded an eponymous business academy.
He has also penned a number of successful business books, including The Real Deal: My Story from Brick Lane to Dragons’ Den and Get the Job You Really Want.
