New Year Honours: Exam failure didn't put millionaire off education

Tony Falkenstein helped start up a business school. Photo / Dean Purcell

A multimillionaire businessman who failed University Entrance twice, Tony Falkenstein, has been made an officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit for his services to business.

Tony Falkenstein passed School Certificate but was stuck for two years in the lower sixth form at Onehunga High School.

Yet once he was out in the business world he revealed a strong philanthropic respect for the value of education.

Back in 2003 Falkenstein established Onehunga Business School, New Zealand's first high school for business. He also advocated and contributed to the teaching of business as a subject in the New Zealand school curriculum. His association with business education has continued, with him donating two million Just Water shares to the Onehunga School and University of Auckland Business School and Unitec. He established the Onehunga Construction High School in 2004.

The Listener reported his fax rental company, Red Eagle Corporation, which he started in the gloom of 1987, grew into a $200 million business. Just Water International went public in 2004.