Li Dongsheng

By Matthew Forney/Beijing

When the pressure of running the world's biggest television maker weighs heavily on Li Dongsheng's shoulders, he reflects on his years in the muck. During China's Cultural Revolution, when Chairman Mao Zedong ordered high school graduates to learn from the peasantry, Li spent three years raising fish and rice. Today his company, TCL, based not far from the old commune in Guangdong province, is looking far beyond the paddies. The goal: to transform TCL into a worldwide household name. "When I hit problems along the way," says Li, 47, "I think, This is nothing like what I faced down on the farm."

Li's success at TCL has mirrored China's rise. After economic reforms took hold about 1980, Li noticed the popularity of imported tape recorders. With government investment, he helped form what he says was China's first cassette-tape company. As incomes rose, telephones caught on, and Li's company became China's biggest phonemaker. Black-and-white TVs came next, in 1981; color in 1992. Today TCL is China's second biggest producer of mobile phones, and Li wants to become No. 1 in air conditioners. But competition remains fierce among Chinese electronics firms. To stay ahead, Li last year paid $560 million for control of the TV arm of the French consumer-products giant Thomson, which owned the RCA brand. The next step won't be easy. Thomson's TV operations lost $130 million last year, and Li acknowledges that RCA is known as "the TV that old people watch." In the third quarter of this year, TCL's profits dipped 69%. Li hopes he can inject some Chinese go-getter spirit into the Thomson business. "They think 5% growth a year is great, and we think it's miserable," the CEO says. "We're used to growing at 40%." Li will need all the patience he learned feeding fish in the commune's paddies. --By Matthew Forney/Beijing