Oscar De La Hoya is one of the greatest fighters boxing has seen and, if the evidence of his Golden Boy Promotions firm is any guide, he has the business brain to match. He is well on course for boxing domination all over again.

Oscar De La Hoya’s pedigree in the boxing ring is not in question. In a professional career that began in 1992 and ended in April this year, the Mexican-born American won 39 fights – 30 by way of knockout – and lost only six. There were ten world titles, attained in seven different weight classes and, in his early days as an amateur, an Olympic gold medal. Without doubt, it is the record of one of the all-time greats of the ring.

But he has also proved to be a one-man cash machine for the sport of boxing. By the time he called time on his fight career in April, the 19 pay-per-view bouts in which he had been involved had generated US$696.4 million in gross revenues – his career coinciding with the launch of the pay-per-view business model that is now the norm at the top end of the sport.

Furthermore, his personal fortune is estimated to be in the region of US$500 million – a huge figure for a sportsman, even in today’s world. Much of that is down to the remarkable success of the company he founded midway through his career. Golden Boy Promotions came into being in 2001 with a mandate to recruit, develop and retain the best young boxers in the world, as well as to promote bouts and the sport in general around the world. It is highly unusual for a boxer to turn promoter whilst his boxing career is in progress; it is even more rare for such a venture to be so successful.

Golden Boy has a stable of around 50 boxers and promotes around 50 bouts a year. For even the most casual of boxing fans, its roster of fighters makes for impressive reading: Bernard Hopkins; Marco Antonio Barrera; Shane Mosley; Jhonny Gonzales; Israel Vazquez; Joan Guzman; as well as a host of young prospects. Its range of broadcast partners is equally impressive and includes HBO, Showtime, ESPN and a host of Hispanic channels.

By concentrating largely on the USA’s Hispanic market, where boxing remains perhaps the most popular sport of all – with the possible exception of soccer – the company has been able to stem the tide of boxing’s diminishing worldwide popularity. As confusion and a lack of star names continues to render the heavyweight division almost academic, De La Hoya the promoter has virtually taken control of the lower weight categories. As a mark of its dominance in the boxing industry, Golden Boy was responsible for 95 per cent of all pay-per-view boxing in the United States in 2007.

That level of success is all the more remarkable given that, during his fight career, De La Hoya was only able to devote a certain amount of time to his expanding business empire. Now, age 36, following his retirement from the ring, he is able to concentrate fully on Golden Boy Promotions for the first time. It threatens to leave every other boxing promoter – including the legendary Bob Arum and Don King – trailing.

The inevitable came in April when, at a typically lavish press conference entirely in keeping with the traditional showmanship of professional boxing, De La Hoya announced that he was retiring from the fight game. “It was a very emotional and difficult decision for me to make,” he said at the time.

“It’s not easy to even talk about it because every time I think about it, every time I mention it, it reminds me that this was my life for the last 32 years. And to know that I will not be lacing up the gloves again, to know that I won’t be feeling that same adrenaline and rush that one feels when they fight, is difficult. But I thought it was only fair to myself. I thought it was only fair to my fans that I make this decision because it hurts me that I cannot compete at the highest level anymore. It kills me inside that, every time I step inside the ring now, it’s not me. It’s not the person, the fighter, that people grew up watching. And therefore that was one of the reasons I decided to retire. So I am firm on this decision. I am convinced that I’ll never ever come back and I am glad we can now focus on something else that also has to do with boxing – and that is, being involved and promoting fighters. So it is a bittersweet moment for me but I truly feel I’ve made the right decision.”

It was quite a speech and certainly one befitting a great champion. But the bitter pill of retirement was clearly sweetened by the knowledge that Golden Boy Promotions is already perhaps the most successful – and certainly, because of De La Hoya, the most recognisable – boxing promotion company in the world. Indeed, De La Hoya confirmed what many suspected in April when he said that, but for the fallback of Golden Boy, he “probably wouldn’t be here today announcing [his] retirement.” He added at the time: “Having Golden Boy Promotions makes it a bit easier for me to say, ‘hey, I’m going to hang ‘em up for good.’”

De La Hoya grew up on the East side of Los Angeles where, like many subsequent professional fighters, he honed his skills on the streets. His amateur career was nothing short of spectacular: 223 wins, including 163 by way of knockout. After several national championship victories in the United States between 1989 and 1992, the highlight of his amateur days came in Barcelona at the 1992 Olympic Games. His victory in the lightweight category was the United States’ only gold medal in boxing during the Games – the Golden Boy tag that became his trademark comes from that victory.

It also heralded the end of his amateur days and the beginning of what turned out to be a 17-year career as a pro.

His first professional fight happened in November 1992, after he had signed a US$1 million – though he only ever saw US$75,000 – deal to fight in Los Angeles. Soon after, De La Hoya signed with the legendary boxing impresario Bob Arum and was earning US$1 million per fight which, for a recently turned professional, was very nearly unprecedented. De La Hoya won via a technical knock-out. By his 12th fight, he was WBO junior lightweight world champion. Further world titles followed in the lightweight class, in 1994, and the light welterweight class, in 1996. If ever there was any doubt about his credentials, they were waved away in style when he beat Julio Cesar Chavez for the WBC light welterweight crown in the third round. His subsequent title defence against Miguel Angel Gonzalez was equally emphatic.

De La Hoya then stepped up to face Pernell Whitaker, the man at the time considered world’s best pound-for-pound boxer. It was De La Hoya’s toughest fight yet but he won the judges’ decision after 12 rounds and was confirmed as the number one boxer on the planet. His earnings at the time were at least US$30 million a year, bolstered by his status as a Hispanic hero and numerous spin-offs including product endorsements. But it was at welterweight level, following seven successful defences of his title, that De La Hoya suffered his first defeat, losing controversially on points to Felix Trinidad in 1999. The bout was a huge worldwide pay-per-view event, even if the judges’ verdict is still questioned to this day by many a boxing pundit.

But for De La Hoya it proved a more significant moment than simply a blot on his previously unblemished record. He was growing increasingly suspicious of the vague manner in which promoters explained where the money generated from his bouts was ending up. It was a point particularly rammed home when Arum and Don King, promoting De La Hoya’s opponent, had combined to promote the Trinidad fight. While De La Hoya apparently claimed nearly US$25 million for that fight, he was astonished to find that Arum took home almost half that – around US$12 million. It turned out to be the catalyst for Golden Boy Promotions. De La Hoya hired Richard Schaefer, a private banking executive, to run day-to-day operations, a role he still performs to this day. After a messy split with Arum – De La Hoya successfully sued to extricate himself from his deal – De La Hoya was free to manage and promote the rest of his career himself and to earn what he felt he was due.

In 2001, whilst at the peak of his athletic powers, he founded Golden Boy Enterprises, the promotional arm of which became known as Golden Boy Promotions. The years that followed saw the business record double-digit growth annually, while De La Hoya racked up more world titles. By 2007 he was the new master of fight promotion. His own fight career, however, was beginning to wind down. Almost through necessity – mindful that his prowess as an athlete was vital to the continued growth of his business – he continued to fight.

In 2007, De La Hoya agreed to fight the outstanding WBC welterweight champion Floyd Mayweather in Las Vegas. Tickets sold out in minutes, with US$19 million being made at the gate of the MGM Grand Garden. Revenues of US$120 million were taken from HBO’s pay-per-view broadcast across the United States – 2.15 million people bought the fight at a cost of US$54.95. Thanks to a very generous contract, De La Hoya scooped US$45 million, the highest individual purse for a boxer in the history of the sport. Overall, through Golden Boy, he received well over US$60 million.