“Sam Got is pure 21st-century innovation. Its success comes down to technological innovation, relentless focus on customer experience, and mastery of globalised logistics.” That sentence could be written about Amazon or some of the other eCommerce giants that have emerged in the past two decades. Instead it has been written about Sam Got, aka the Company, aka the largest drug syndicate in history.
Forget ideas of El Chapo, Mexican cartel-style drug syndicates. At its peak, El Chapo’s cartel was estimated to be bringing in $3 billion a year. According to the UN Office of Drugs and Crime, Sam Got was bringing in $21 billion a year – the same annual revenue as Citibank. And forget the violence of El Chapo, who personally claims responsibility for 3,000 murders. The leaders of Sam Got were more commodity trader than gangster. As this article explains, “He achieved the size of Sam Got not by murder and torture, but by industrialising his business, reducing the cost per unit, providing an excellent product at a fair price, and establishing well-maintained networks of key partnerships.”
This article looks at Tse Chi Lop, the biggest drug lord in history, but a name most people would never have heard before. In the 1990’s, it all started with a set of simple observations. It was hard to smuggle drugs by water into the US. It was easy to smuggle them by water into Canada. It was then easy to smuggle drugs from Canada into the US. And the US is the biggest narcotics marketplace in the world. From those simple observations, the world’s largest drug syndicate grew. This article tells that story and shares some insight into the business of drugs in the 21st century – forget organised crime and violence, the business of drugs today is customer service, supply-chain efficiency and price competition.
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