Great Tech Entrepreneurs:
A Conclusion
Steve Jobs (Apple), Bill Gates (Microsoft),
Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook), Elon Musk (Tesla Motors, SpaceX, Solar City), Larry
Page & Sergey Brin (Google), Steward Butterfield (Slack), Nolan Bushnell
(Atari), Evan Williams (Twitter), Jeff Bezos (Amazon), Marc Cuban
(Broadcast.com) what do these fantastic personalities in the tech field have in
common? Is it genetical? The education, the experience? How can we know what
motivates them, what is their driver? Do they even have similar stories? Some
things do come to mind though:
- The US has produced the largest amount of
millionaires in the last few decades.
- They are all Caucasians[1].
- They all have competitive personalities, they
believe in their projects and never quit (or know when to call it quits, something
very important as well).
- They belonged to middle-class or
well-accomodated families. Nobody started from the bottom-bottom.
- They were all visionaries, and risk takers.
Again, the issue of inequality arises:
non-caucasians have a harder time. In Silicon Valley, only 2% of the workforce
is African-American[2].
Even having a good education system and equal opportunities does not seem
enough. What would be the reason though, is it more difficult for minority
groups to open doors, or do they lose hope by not finding representatives,
people like them, amongst successful people? That appears as a challenging
question, but once more I can conclude that for good or for bad, culture
matters. The same could be said about women, there are not that many in the
Forbes billionaire list[3]
and represent a minority. The business world is mainly dominated by white men.
Consider the changes the world economy is going
through. Whereas before Networks and Contacts were important, today their
weight is slowly becoming less. The Knowledge Based Economy is opening doors
for those who master a specific and unique knowledge, and learn how to
capitalize it. Jeff Bezos (Amazon) turned a simple concept like selling books
online into a billion dollar business. Larry Page & Sergey Brin (Google) optimized
search engines and conquered a market dominated by giants like Yahoo!. Mark
Zuckerberg (Facebook) turned a University project into the largest platform to
connect with people. Evan Williams (Twitter) differentiated by creating a Media
Channel. And Marc Cuban (Broadcast.com) surfed his way to the top by
broadcasting online. They seem like simple concepts, easy to replicate, but
they are not. Once again, all of them understood the importance of building a
Brand and a Business AROUND the main concept. So ideas matter, but not that
much. Many of them didn't even have the idea themselves, but they did have to
acknowledge or recognize the "idea maker".
Consider the impact of Entrepreneurship and
Wealth Creation in the region as a whole. Having the largest amount of
millionaires quite clearly is a huge advantage: they create jobs, they pay
their taxes, they drive growth... However, incentives to keep the millionaires
in the country must be made as well. It is actually often that the rich move to
other countries, be it for lower taxes, easier labor laws, or simply to avoid
inspection from the Government. As I mentioned in a previous post, it could be
difficult to succeed as an entrepreneur with the Government on your tail.
Successful entrepreneurs are not only
economically driven, but that doesn't mean that money doesn't matter.
Intelligent entrepreneurs always keep an eye on the Cash Flow. Quantifying the
value of a company can be a challenge as well, especially when it comes to the
Technology Field which is Knowledge based. Eventually it is best to take
similar companies as a benchmark. Google improved what the other Search Engines
at the time (Yahoo!, Altavista, etc) where offering, surpassed them and became
a billion dollar business. Entrepreneurs are not politically engaged, and look
for solutions. Adding value is crucial, as I have explained in my chapter
"The 4 Keys to Value Creation"[4]. A
successful entrepreneur looks for simple solutions to complex problems. And
then of course tries to make a profit out of it. If you don't believe me, check
out the following video where our beloved Doc from Back to the Future uses garbage
as fuel in the year 2015 (wasn't that LAST year?). Who will come up with the solution to replace fossil fuels? I would make my bet on Elon Musk. And no, where we are going we
don't need any roads:
Cristian Bøhnsdalen
CMO/CFO & Co-Founder @ITRevolusjonen
