People to Watch in International Business

By Nellie Huang; William Han

SIMON WOODROFFE

Innovator

Raw fish, conveyor belts and robots serving drinks hardly seem the makings of a hit restaurant, but maybe that's why it worked out so spectacularly in 1997 when Woodroffe invested $275,000--his life savings--to open YO! Sushi in London. "We had a line down the block," says Woodroffe, 52. Today there are 21 YO! Sushi restaurants in Britain, Greece and Dubai. Woodroffe's newest project is a hotel: combine a Japanese capsule hotel (tiny rooms, windows onto a corridor) with the plush service of a first-class airplane seat, and you've got YOTEL, a five-star inn at two-star ($130 a night) prices. (Think luxury cabin on a yacht.) The designs are done; all Woodroffe needs now is a central London spot to build it. His inspiration: a night in first class on a flight home from Kuwait. "As I lay on the bed with the comforter and the pajamas, and the [flight attendant] tucked me in," he says, "I had a eureka moment." --By Nellie Huang

KEVIN DUNDAS

Strategy Man

Dundas, 43, was managing director of Charlotte Street--that's Saatchi & Saatchi-speak for the advertising firm's London headquarters--when the office won the prestigious Cannes Agency of the Year award in 2002. In 2003 came Advertising Age's and Adweek's Network of the Year awards for obtaining new business--and Dundas was named Charlotte Street's CEO. Now Dundas is stepping up again, taking on a new role as Saatchi's worldwide strategy director. "We have globally a fantastic creative product and strategic view," says Dundas. "My job is to pull the two together." He will log a lot of miles as strategy director; Saatchi has 134 offices in 84 countries. But Dundas loves to fly. He's a licensed pilot and flies his Piper Arrow "any time I can get." --N.H.

JORGEN VIG KNUDSTORP

Toy Builder

Wouldn't it be fun to run Lego, the Danish icon of the toy industry? Maybe not: sales have dropped between 25% and 30% since 2002, and losses for 2004 (including book-value declines) will be some $300 million. Lego is being battered from all sides. Today's children increasingly prefer Xboxes to plastic blocks; sales in Japan and the U.S. have been unexpectedly sluggish; and the company suffers from overcapacity in a low-growth industry. Trying to refocus on its core business, the 72-year-old company is even considering selling such assets as the Legoland parks. CEO Kjeld Kirk Kristiansen, grandson of Lego's founder, has had enough. He is handing the reins to Knudstorp, 35, a business economics Ph.D. who has been with Lego for only three years. His charge: to restructure the company and guide it back to profitability. Let the games begin. --By William Han

DAWN LEPORE

Web Pharmacist

Drugstore.com is the only online health-products retailer to survive the dotcom bust. It has, alas, never posted a profit--and in September announced it would miss third-quarter sales and profit forecasts. Enter Lepore, 50, as new chairwoman and CEO. Lepore knows plenty about the Web's peril and potential: she was chief information officer and then vice chairwoman of online broker Charles Schwab, which flew high in the 1990s but suffered when the stock market sank. She is predictably optimistic about her new company, which has seen sales grow from $110 million in 2000 to an estimated $300 million this year. "There are many trends working in our favor," Lepore says, including "an aging population, an increasing number of people on long-term medication." Now all the new CEO has to do is turn those trends into profits. --W.H.