WORK IN PROGRESS
1981: Back then, he is simply Tony Mandl: a wine rep with a flair for marketing. In 1981, Mandl and two partners take control of Mission Hill Winery and help put Okanagan wine on the global map. He's added a couple of syllables to his name–now Anthony von Mandl– and several millions to his bank account, thanks to one big former investment: Mike's Hard Lemonade.
1983: Don Mattrick is 17 when he co-founds Distinctive Software Inc. and starts creating games for the Apple II computer. Electronic Arts Inc. buys Distinctive in 1991, and Mattrick becomes president of EA'S worldwide studios, establishing Vancouver as a gaming giant. The Burnaby native, who's since had stints at Microsoft Corp. and game developer Zynga, makes news in 2015 with the $51-million sale of his Point Grey manse.
1983: A giant of B.C.'S forestry industry–canadian Forest Products, privately held by the Prentice and Bentley families–goes public and changes its name. Canfor remains the second-largest producer of dimensional lumber in Canada, while B.C.'S richest man, Jim Pattison, is its largest shareholder.
1988: One of the wealthiest men in Asia, Li Ka-shing, pays $320 million for the site of Vancouver's 1986 World's Fair. The purchase of the Expo lands is widely considered the deal (or steal) of the century, with Concord Pacific Developments Inc. generating billions from the ensuing construction. Combined with the British handover of Hong Kong in 1997, Concord Place (as it becomes known) helps usher in a new era of Asian investment in B.C. 1988: Think Pac-man, but for utilities: Inland Natural Gas buys the Lower Mainland gas division of BC Hydro and changes its name to BC Gas. After becoming the province's dominant distributor of natural gas and gobbling up rivals, BC Gas rebrands itself as Terasen Gas; Texas titan Kinder Morgan purchases Terasen in 2005, then sells it to Fortis Inc. two years later. It's Fortisbc Energy Inc.– for now. 1989: Forbes magazine labels the Vancouver Stock Exchange the “scam capital of the world.” While local lights defend the VSE as an important source of seed money, the international spotlight on its less savoury aspects–money laundering, shady promoters–proves fatal. Ten years later, the VSE disappears, rolled into the Toronto Stock Exchange.