Soy Sauce Scientist

Peggy Cherng built PANDA EXPRESS into the McDonald's of Chinese food by using her engineering background and big data to exponentially spice up sales-making her a multibillionaire along the way.

- Chase Peterson-Withorn

The sweltering heat of July in Los Angeles isn’t slowing Peggy Cherng down. The 75-year-old billionaire cofounder of Panda Express is strolling between the sleek research buildings and Japanese Zen gardens that frame the 100acre City of Hope hospital campus, where she’s funding a $100 million program for blending Eastern and Western medicine practices. “It’s all about how we can bring the best we have as Asian-Americans to the West,” she says.

Cherng should know. She emigrated from Hong Kong in the 1960s, got a doctorate in electrical engineering in the 1970s, then promptly quit a promising career developing software to use her STEM skills in an altogether different industry: fast food, creating the perfect mix of Chinese cuisine for American palates.

Four decades later, what began as a single restaurant in a Southern California shopping mall has grown into a 2,400store juggernaut, dishing out more than $5 billion worth of chow mein, Beijing beef and orange chicken every year in food courts, airport terminals and drive-thru windows across the nation.

Most Americans grab their Chinese food from one of two places: the mom-and-pop joint around the corner—or Panda Express, which has eaten up 43% of the Asian takeout market and has ten times as many locations as its closest competitors, sit-down chain P.F. Chang’s and hibachi grill Sarku Japan.

But Panda Express’ secret sauce isn’t the sweet and sour; it’s Cherng’s technical prowess and methodical mind. “A lot of people in the restaurant business aren’t educated as engineers,” she says. “I have an advantage.”