Will Leitch, writing for Inc magazine, has a business oriented profile of Shaquille O’Neal.

And to be sure, O'Neal's approach to business, at least until recently, has looked like a holdover from an earlier era of celebrity business that was rooted in sponsorships, endorsements, and licensing deals. But a new model has appeared in recent years--led by LeBron James and carried forward by Kevin Durant, Patrick Mahomes, and others--that's less about being a smiling pitchman and more about building empires. Durant's venture-capital firm, 35 Ventures, was one of the earliest investors in Postmates and Coinbase. James's production company, SpringHill, has a $725 million valuation. The conventional wisdom holds that O'Neal, by comparison, is just cashing checks.

But then you take a closer look. Con­sider the sheer number of companies that O'Neal owns a piece of, often a substantial one: Papa Johns, Five Guys, Krispy Kreme, Auntie Anne's. The connected doorbell company Ring, well before Amazon acquired it in 2018 for north of $1 billion. Even Google, all the way back in 1999, long before its IPO, when it was valued at only $100 million. (Guess he didn't lose it all on that one.) O'Neal has opened more than a hundred franchises--car washes, health clubs, restaurants--around the country. He founded a film production company, Jersey Legends, and won an Oscar with a documentary about women's basketball great Lusia Harris. He founded a marketing agency called Majority that has created campaigns for clients including Sprite, GM, and the CDC.

I had no idea about some of his investments. I always saw Shaq as a spokesperson and not really that invested in the companies he “shilled” for, and I was wrong. I love the Starbucks story and what he learned.