Lifestyle

Dreams Of Hope: The Life & Times Of The Clinical Champion Michael Thuan Tran

Published

4 years ago

January 2, 2021

Michael Thuan’s parents had to travel and cross freshly fallen snow from Vietnam to Thailand. It was the 3rd voyage, a successful one after the six-year imprisonment of Michael’s father. Michael’s parents had been saving enough money that enabled them to flee the endless wars that had given the communists victory.

Michael was born on July 6, 1981, in a refugee camp in Chon Buri, Thailand. His parents lived a poor life. He realized this one day when Michael’s sisters were speaking at a funeral for their godmother, they said that Michael never had shoes on. Michael’s parents had moved to the states with nothing. His father worked landscaping while his mother was a maid. But how did Michael manage to overcome all of this to achieve success?

Education Is Power

Michael graduated from Dulles High School in 1999. He went to Texas Tech and majored in Business Management. He later worked dry cleaning for a year before re-enrolling in Texas Tech for a major in Spanish and interdisciplinary studies. Michael then applied to Dental school while doing an MBA in Finance and Real Estate. Michael was accepted into the Howard College of Dentistry. He loved the profession. He moved to Houston Advanced Education in General Dentistry AEGD where he became the president.

Michael received the smartest resident award for critical thinking. But still, he wanted something. He wanted to focus on as many ambitions as possible, something that he did very well. He also did well on live surgery parts, and LIVE surgery implant courses were now done at his office. He was put on Hiossen AIC faculty. Michael’s interaction with experienced doctors has equipped him with great knowledge.

The Clinical Journey

Michael wanted to own an office. He found a FLOSS City Centre office. However, he wasn’t able to get funding for the City Centre office because it was hard to get funding for a million-dollar practice as a graduate. However, Michael found help from Dr. Clint Herzog, who found him a closed office down in Magnolia, TX that had a failed partnership.

Michael started working there and built up the practice quickly in Magnolia. He also purchased the office. Michael and his wife had an intense 3 years in Dental startups because they intended to run the two main offices- Midtown and Magnolia. Because of the old FLOSS debranding, they decided to re-establish a footprint starting with the Houston Area. Michael later opened West Oaks office, and Kingwood office which he sold right before Covid and a franchise opened up FLOSS Katy last year.

Michael is a good clinician and enjoys working. He is opening offices in Georgia, The British Virgin Islands, and Ohio. He plans to focus solely on implants and larger cases. This move will buy him more free time as he hires more associates.

Michael’s Achievements

Michael received an award for being a top Invisalign producer. It is worth noting that historically, FLOSS is the #2 provider of Invisalign as a GP in the US. This was awarded from the AACA, American Academy of Clear Aligners in 2018 and 2019. What has propelled Michael to even greater heights is the desire to grow. He loves the healthcare field with a passion. Michael chose his career field with an understanding that medicine was a tough career. You often have to get different consultants to figure out the problem. The best thing about it is that dentistry is still independent, even though it is changing rapidly. Michael started and ran the Business of Dentistry Facebook Group with his good friend Christopher Hoffpauir. They have 22,000 members that are vetted as dentists only, which makes the group unique.

Therefore, if you are traveling up the path of success, don’t give up. Keep the faith. Be patient and persistent and let the sky be your limit. Success is not something you merely pursue, but it is something you attract by the person you become.

Lifestyle

Derik Fay: The Quiet Architect of Impact-First Entrepreneurship

Published

17 hours ago

May 8, 2025

Michelle Langton

In an era where noise often overshadows results, Derik Fay is quietly shaping a different kind of legacy — one built not on showmanship, but on undeniable substance. For more than two decades, Fay has engineered the rise of over 30 companies across industries as diverse as real estate, technology, healthcare, and entertainment. Yet his name rarely leads headlines — not because he hasn’t earned it, but because he never needed it to validate his success.

Growing up in Rhode Island, Fay learned early that the world rarely hands out opportunity; it must be seized, created, and multiplied. While many of his peers pursued traditional paths, he took a risk that would define the rest of his life: at just 22, he founded 3F Management, a venture firm with an entirely different mission — to build companies that would outlast trends, outperform markets, and, most importantly, out-impact their competition.

Instead of obsessing over short-term wins, Fay approached entrepreneurship like a craftsman. Much like Henry Ford, who famously said, “A business that makes nothing but money is a poor business,” Fay built companies that weren’t just profitable — they were purposeful. Every venture was designed to create real, sustainable value, both for shareholders and for the communities they served.

Through his relentless focus on structure and leadership, Fay’s ecosystem of businesses now touches thousands of lives daily — from employees finding new opportunities to entrepreneurs gaining the mentorship they never had before. But unlike typical moguls who boast about headcounts, Fay views every job created as a ripple in a larger mission: empowering individuals to write better futures for themselves.

Where others have scaled fast and crashed harder, Fay’s model thrives on foundations few are patient enough to build anymore. His method is slower, smarter, and almost surgical: find what others overlook, fix what others fear, and grow what others abandoned too early. It’s this principle that led him to not just build companies — but to resurrect them, reimagine them, and sometimes even walk away if the mission no longer aligned with the impact he envisioned.

Fay’s philosophy extends far beyond boardrooms. Philanthropy isn’t a checkbox at the end of his success story — it’s embedded into the way he scales. His ventures are built with giving back written into their DNA, from local community initiatives to broader mentorship platforms that help emerging entrepreneurs get their first real shot at success. His life’s work is proof that wealth and generosity are not mutually exclusive — they are, in fact, essential partners.

Today, while newer generations of entrepreneurs hustle for likes and magazine covers, Fay’s name is whispered in rooms where real power moves. His reputation — built quietly but relentlessly — is that of a man who delivers, builds, and elevates without the need for public validation.

In a business world increasingly built on spectacle, Derik Fay reminds us that the most lasting legacies are forged not in the glare of the spotlight, but in the thousands of lives changed quietly along the way.

For more insights into Derik Fay’s ventures and philanthropic efforts, visit www.derikfay.com and follow him on Instagram @derikfay