Craig T. Bouchard
Craig Bouchard is a New York Times Top Ten Best Selling author, a Barnes & Noble #1 Best Selling Author, and an Amazon #1 Best Selling Author.
Craig’s “The Caterpillar Way. Lessons in Leadership, Growth and Shareholder Value” released in October of 2013, reaching #1 on the Barnes & Noble Best Seller List, and #7 and #8 on two New York Times Best Seller lists. (McGraw Hill.) It is widely read still today in business schools and in businesses and Wall Street training programs.
This past year, Craig’s novel “Soul Ties of Spies” was published in Romania, then Russia, and debuted in the US and fifty countries around the globe in late-2023. “Soul Ties of Spies” reached #1 on the Amazon Best Seller lists both in the categories of Espionage and Technothrillers.
Craig’s hobby is his businesses.
Craig is a Founder and Executive Chairman of the Ecolution Power Company (www.ecolutionpower.com). Ecolution technology converts kinetic energy in moving vehicles into an electric micro-grid, in the process making a train station the e-mobility center of its town. The company’s patented intellectual property enables truck/trailers, trains, and subway cars to become a power plant transporting energy to where it is most needed.
Co-Chairman of the Board, The Space Railway Corporation, (www.spacerailway.com). The Space Railway will pave the way for sending cargo into space in larger amounts and at a vastly lesser cost than currently feasible, and bringing material amounts of cargo back on the same space ships. Space Railway Patent No. US 12,037,144
Chairman of the Board, The Run Productions, LLC (www.therunproductions.com).
Craig founded three companies that achieved roughly $1 billion of revenue within 18 months. He has won three hostile proxy contests on Wall Street. Craig was a finalist for the prestigious Platts/S&P “CEO of the Year” award in the global metals industries for the year 2018. He is currently the Executive Chairman of the Ecolution Power Company and Co-Chairman of the Space Railway Corporation.
Craig innovated the first hostile reverse tender merger in Wall Street history in 2007.
His first company’s revenues grew from $4 million in 2003 to $3.5 billion in 2008. The company was sold in 2008 for an enterprise value of $1.25 billion after becoming the highest appreciating stock on either the NASDAQ (ESMK) or the NYSE (for the full year). Craig chronicled the story in his first book, “America For Sale, How the Foreign Pack Circled and Devoured Esmark.” Copyright 2009 Craig T. Bouchard and James V. Koch, (ABC-CLIO.)
In 1985, the bank moved Craig to Hong Kong to become the Head of Commercial Banking for Hong Kong and China. During that time Craig headed the 100 bank unsecured creditors committee for the Overseas Orient (OOCL) bankruptcy, the largest bankruptcy in Asian history at that time. This story is partially chronicled in “Soul Ties of Spies.”
In 1992, Craig returned to Tokyo, as Area Head of Asia Pacific and Managing Director of CCI Finance LTD, a merchant bank in Beijing, China. CCI Finance was a joint venture between the Bank of China, the Industrial Bank of Japan, and Craig’s company First Chicago.
Craig did not let business get in the way of his passion. His novel “The Adventures of Ai” became one of the world’s most popular children’s book projects in 2014. The book was translated into Japanese, Mandarin, Spanish, and Arabic, with the accompanying Adventures of Ai video game, achieving over 300,000 downloads globally on Apple iTunes, Google Play, and Samsung. The project benefited 18 children charities around the world.
Craig holds a bachelor’s degree from Illinois State University (1975), a master’s degree in Economics from Illinois State University (1977), an Honorary Doctor of Science from Illinois State University (2018), and an MBA from the University of Chicago (1981). Craig has been a member of the Board of Trustees of Boston University and the Foundation of the University of Montana. He is currently a member of the leadership board of the Department of Athletics, Duke University. Craig is an alumnus of Leadership Greater Chicago and was a finalist for the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year award (Illinois) in 2005.
Craig was elected to the Hall of Fame of the Illinois State University College of Arts and Sciences in 2008. He is a member of the Hall of Fame of Hinsdale Central Township High School. Craig holds the United States Patent 4,212,168, Power Producing Dry-Type Cooling Systems.
He is married to Melissa N. Bouchard and is the proud father of six children.