Kyle Veazey/The Commercial Appeal

Robert Pera's Ubiquiti Networks had humble beginnings, as evidenced by this photo of the company's original headquarters in San Jose, Calif.

Kyle Veazey/The Commercial Appeal

Ubiquiti Networks, founded by Pera, has grown and is now headquartered in a two-story building near the San Jose airport.

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Robert Pera's fast climb to amass the cash to buy the Memphis Grizzlies began here, in Silicon Valley, in a run-down, two-story office building across from the county courthouse.

It was 2005, and the Grizzlies were ending their second consecutive trip to the NBA playoffs. The scrappy electrical engineer, then 27 and renting a tiny apartment, left Apple to launch a lean little electronics firm. His timing was perfect -- precisely when villagers in Paraguay, urban dwellers in Mumbai and the new industrial hordes of Shenzhen were craving cheap and reliable wireless Internet access.

From that tired office on a street dotted with bail bondsmen, Pera birthed a money machine. Ubiquiti Networks Inc., which has since moved into a tony San Jose office park across the parking lot from electronics giant Toshiba, designs inexpensive gear for wirelessly accessing the Internet.

Sales neared $200 million last year, when the company went public and Pera's shares put his net worth near $1 billion.

Earlier this year, the young basketball enthusiast sought out Grizzlies owner Michael Heisley. On June 11, he entered into a purchasing agreement to buy the team. The NBA is evaluating whether to approve the sale, a process that should be complete by the end of the summer.

Pera's wealth

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Wired for success: Potential new Grizzlies owner Robert Pera known as driven