Only a few days old, Freddie Figgers was left next to a
dumpster in rural Florida. A passerby noticed him in distress and called the
police. Freddie was checked into a hospital where he stayed for 2 days to
recover from his minor injuries.
Once stable, Freddie was placed into the foster care system.
He was taken in by Nathan and Betty Figgers who lived in nearby Quincy, Florida
and already had a daughter of their own.
The Figgers, regular foster parents, quickly decided to
adopt Freddie.
Growing up, Freddie was bullied by other kids in elementary
being called the “dumpster baby.”
“It’s a rural area, so after it happened, everybody heard
about it,” said Figgers, now 30. “My parents told me the truth about what
happened as I grew older. I thought about it a lot as a kid, and I’d have to
say it was embarrassing when I was younger.”
However, it was also during his elementary school years that
Freddie found his passion for computers. His dad, Nathan, bought Freddie an old
1989 Macintosh at a thrift store for $25 to tinker with.
“He thought that a computer might help to keep me out of trouble,”
said Figgers.
It worked. At just 9-years-old, Freddie disassembled and
reassembled the computer multiple times. Next, he figured out how to use some
old radio parts to fix the Macintosh so it would power up.
“I still have it,” Figgers said about that first computer.
“It’s what sparked my interest in technology.”
By 13, Freddie was so good at tinkering with computers the
city of Quincy started hiring him to fix their computers. By 15, he started his
first company out of his parents’ living room called Figgers Computers. He
specialized in fixing computers and helping clients store data on servers he
created.
“I wouldn’t recommend my path to everyone,” said Figgers
referring to dropping out of college. “But it worked for me. When I was 17, I
had 150 clients that needed websites and storage for their files. I just kept
building from there.”
By Freddie’s early 20’s, Nathan Figgers developed
Alzheimer’s. Before Nathan passed in 2014, Freddie had invented a GPS tracking,
two-way communication device to help find and keep track of his dad when he
would wander off confused.
“I created a device that I could insert in his shoe that
would allow me to track him, plus talk to him through his shoe,” said Figgers.
“It was difficult to watch him decline—it’s something you never forget. I’ve
always been so grateful to him and my mom. They taught me not to let my
circumstances define who I was.”
In spite of this difficult circumstance, Freddie was able to
sell his GPS tracking invention to an undisclosed company for $2.2 million in
2012 at age 23.
His privately-owned company, Figgers Wireless which sells
smartphones and data plans, was appraised in 2017 at more than $62 million.
Figgers is proud of his business, but he says that he is still passionate about
combining technology with health care and safety.
“The best thing any human being can do is influence another
one,” said Figgers.
He sells a wireless blood glucose meter for people with
diabetes that allows patients to download and share glucose levels through
Bluetooth technology. And he is working on a project similar to his “smart
shoe” technology to help families stay in touch with loved ones experiencing
homelessness.
“That could be me on the streets—I could have been homeless
or dead if I hadn’t been found by the dumpster after I was born,” he said.
Freddie learned when he had grown up that his birth mother
was a prostitute with a drug addiction. He has not met her and says he has no
interest in doing so.
“My parents adopted me and gave me love and a future,” he
said. “They did their best to make the world a better place, and now that’s all
I want to do, too.”
lightworkers.com
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