Entrepreneur and TaqTyle founder announces new book documenting thirty years of building international businesses
Mark Erjavec bought his first company three days after graduating high school. He was eighteen years old. That acquisition set in motion a thirty-year career that would span five continents, multiple industries, and some of the hardest lessons an entrepreneur can learn.
His upcoming book, Ground Work: Building Real Businesses Across Borders, is the story of what happened next.
From the Iron Range to International Operations
Erjavec’s roots are in northern Minnesota, where his Slovenian ancestors settled after coming through Ellis Island. They worked the mines on the Iron Range—hard, dangerous work that built character before it built wealth. That grit, Erjavec says, shaped everything that followed.
After acquiring Mesaba Finance at eighteen, Erjavec spent years in consumer lending and distressed debt. He learned by doing—knocking on doors, making collections, structuring deals. The education was brutal but effective.
By the 2000s, he’d moved into real estate finance and international investment. Relationships with Eastern European investors led him to the Republic of Georgia, where he built Golden Neva—a 1,500-hectare agricultural operation that pioneered export infrastructure and equipment leasing in the region.
From there, the portfolio expanded: aerial application services in Brazil and the United States through Aero Fleet One, agricultural investment funds spanning North and South America, and eventually the launch of TaqTyle—a holding company focused on tangible investments in agriculture, aviation, and finance.
Building Systems That Scale
Erjavec’s approach has always been about identifying inefficiencies and building systems that work. From consumer lending to international agriculture, he’s focused on creating infrastructure that scales across borders.
“Most people chase the headline,” he says. “I chase the system. If you build something that works, the rest follows.”
His philosophy is simple: show up, build relationships, and focus on what’s tangible. “Relationships drive everything,” he explains. “The people who see you show up consistently are the ones who help you build the next chapter.”
Documenting the Future of Agriculture
Today, Erjavec’s focus is on precision agriculture and ag tech. In 2024, he founded the TaqTyle Podcast Network to capture conversations with the operators, innovators, and system builders reshaping modern farming. In 2025, he launched the TaqTyle Institute for Precision Agriculture and Sustainability—a think tank that issues field notes on developments in robotics, automation, and precision farming technology.
“Agriculture is changing faster than most people realize,” Erjavec notes. “Autonomous robots, laser weeders, precision aerial application—these aren’t experiments. They’re operational tools changing how farming gets done. Someone needs to document it.”
The podcast and the Institute serve as both documentation and analysis—capturing what’s happening in real time and making sense of what it means for U.S. farmers competing globally.
What Ground Work Is Really About
Ground Work isn’t a how-to manual. It’s not a blueprint for success. According to Erjavec, it’s something more fundamental: a record of what actually works when you’re building across borders, industries, and decades.
“Most people think success is about the big wins,” he says. “It’s not. It’s about repetition. Discipline. Staying focused when others get distracted.”
The book is aimed at operators—people building and scaling operations. Entrepreneurs who know that consistent execution compounds. Anyone who understands that real work happens at the table, not in the press release.
For Erjavec, the through-line is simple: build real things, stay close to the operators, and keep moving forward.
“That’s what my ancestors did,” he reflects. “They didn’t come to Ellis Island to play it safe. They came to build something that lasted.”
Thirty years in, he’s still building.
Ground Work: Building Real Businesses Across Borders will be available soon on Amazon.
About Mark Erjavec:
Mark Erjavec is an entrepreneur with over thirty years of experience in finance, distressed assets, and international agriculture. He is the founder of the TaqTyle Podcast Network and the TaqTyle Institute for Precision Agriculture and Sustainability. He currently operates through TaqTyle, a holding company focused on tangible investments in agriculture, aviation, and finance.
