KEY POINTS:
At 25, Alex Dunayev has a thriving software company, double degrees in commerce and science, and in two years' time, a Stanford University MBA.
The Auckland University graduate has been awarded one of this country's most valuable scholarships - the US$100,000 ($133,175) Fulbright-Platinum Triangle Scholar in Entrepreneurship.
The award will enable Mr Dunayev, who migrated with his family to New Zealand from Ukraine when he was 14, to complete an MBA at Stanford in California, one of the world's top universities.
He said the scholarship was not entirely unexpected. "I guess if you plan for success, everything you do helps you get there."
But he credits the support of his parents and his tutors at the Auckland Business School as crucial.
"Self-support is one thing but I've had a lot of people contribute to this and keep it achievable."
His father, Sergei, an avionics engineer, is his role model. "He's really an inspiration to me."
His father's job meant the family moved constantly and they arrived in New Zealand in April 1996. He went to Pakuranga College before doing his sixth and seventh form at Tauhara College in Taupo, where his father maintained the fleet of Russian helicopters used for logging kauri.
Mr Dunayev moved back to Auckland to further his studies but confesses that business was not his first choice.
Instead, he started off doing computer science. "I've always had an engineering mindset at heart."
While studying, he worked part-time as a computer programmer, where his interests started moving towards the people side of technology.
He finished his first degree and embarked on a conjoint degree in management and employment relations. That got him on the path towards entrepreneurship. "I got the bug in a big way."
Mr Dunayev was a founding member of the Spark Entrepreneurial Challenge, a student-run business plan competition which encourages participants to develop businesses.
He set up the software business AXI Web Solutions in 2004. On graduating, he moved the business into the Icehouse, the Auckland Business School's start-up business incubator.
When Mr Dunayev moves to the US in September, he will leave his company in good stead. During the past three years, it has grown to employ 12 staff and serve more than 30 clients.
He plans to return to New Zealand after his MBA to set up a global technology company. "Everything that I've done so far has shown me that New Zealand is a great place for software companies. [It has] a fantastic environment to develop software - from a business perspective and a personal perspective."
