Bill Gates

"Nobody has ever before measured activists’ passion. It sounds odd, but it’s totally OKR. So you’re passionate—how passionate? What actions does your passion lead you to do? And now when Bill Gates asks tough questions at our board meeting, we can bring out our OKRs and say, “Here is what we’ve done, and this is the impact it’s had.”"

"Steve Ballmer has similarly demonstrated the difference between billionaire-style risk taking and owning a diversified stock portfolio. In March 1989, Microsoft received an unfavorable ruling in its ongoing liti¬ gation with Apple Computer. The software company’s stock plummeted as investors fretted that Microsoft would be blocked from using certain Macintosh-like features in future versions of its Windows operating sys¬ tem. Sales chief Ballmer, who correctly foresaw that Apple would not ulti¬ mately prevail, shelled out $46 million to add to his existing large holdings of Microsoft stock. Three years later, he followed Bill Gates and Paul Allen into the billionaire ranks. By then, the Microsoft shares that Ballmer had purchased for $46 million at a low point in the company’s fortunes were worth more than $350 million."

"D ominating a market is a highly effective strategy for accumulating wealth. It has produced both the first self-made billionaire, John D. Rockefeller Sr., and the first self-made centibillionaire, Bill Gates. In both cases, as well, market dominance has prompted calls to break up the com¬ panies that made them rich, Standard Oil and Microsoft. Developing a thick skin is an especially important principle if you pursue this path to fortune. Market dominance is not synonymous with monopoly. Complete elimination of competition is the ultimate form of dominance, but it is not a realistic objective. Moreover, dominating a particular market does not confer unlimited economic power, given the interdependence of sup¬ pliers, producers, and customers."

"Bill Gates It’s possible, you can never know, that the universe exists only for me. If so, it’s sure going well for me, I must admit.10"

"Bill Gates’s intensity extends beyond the workplace. When he was dating Ann Winblad, another pioneer in the computer software industry, the couple chose motifs for the brief vacations they could spare the time to take. On a physics-themed vacation, for example, they read as many books on the subject as they could pack and listened to recordings of a lecture series by Richard Feynman.6"

"Competitive Advantage When we look back at the last twenty years, it is obvious that a number of large companies were so set in their ways that they did not adapt properly and lost out as a result. Twenty years from now, we’ll look back and see the same pattern. —Bill Gates, NUTS!"

"In fact, after acquiring COMDEX, as long as he claimed to be “COMDEX President Masayoshi Son,” everyone was willing to interact with him. This also allowed the president to quickly strengthen his network with Bill Gates of Microsoft and other business leaders and industry figures in the IT world."

"Just as the legal attack on Microsoft was ending Bill Gates’s dominance, Steve Jobs’s return to Apple demonstrated the irreplaceable value of a company’s founder. In some ways, Steve Jobs and Bill Gates were opposites. Jobs was an artist, preferred closed systems, and spent his time thinking about great products above all else; Gates was a businessman, kept his products open, and wanted to run the world. But both were insider/outsiders, and both pushed the companies they started to achievements that nobody else would have been able to match."

"Malcolm Gladwell says you can’t understand Bill Gates’s success without understanding his fortunate personal context: he grew up in a good family, went to a private school equipped with a computer lab, and counted Paul Allen as a childhood friend. But perhaps you can’t understand Malcolm Gladwell without understanding his historical context as a Boomer (born in 1963)."

"A short while later, I was on the *Ragtime* boat cruising with Larry Romrell and a couple others, taking it up the East Coast to Maine, when I got an urgent message to call the office. Because of spotty service, we headed into a port in nearby Cape May, New Jersey, and I jumped on land to make a call on the nearest pay phone when we got to a marina. When my right hand, Marty, picked up the phone, she said, “Bill Gates desperately needs to talk to you.” So I called Bill. When he answered, I could tell he was perturbed."

"The large end-to-end groundbreaking deal with Microsoft never materialized, though we managed to strike smaller deals with Bill later. Bill Gates remains a friend, and I am still in awe of his intellect, energy, and relentless curiosity. Some of my favorite memories are of spending time with Bill and his team, including Craig Mundie, chief research and strategy officer, and Nathan Myhrvold, the chief technology officer—while traveling to Washington State for Cellular One board meetings. Cable stocks started to climb higher after the Microsoft investment in Comcast, and the entire market started to heat up for internet companies and online businesses. But while I chased the next big thing, I missed the cracks forming beneath our core business. Satellite had finally found its footing by the mid- 90s, peeling away our subscribers week by week. Customer service issues dragged on, and we were bleeding money on consultants and campaigns. The old guard was stepping back, and a wave of new leadership was stepping in. Somewhere along the way, we stopped moving with purpose—and started chasing too many things at once."

"“Let me tell you the whole story,” he began. The reason Paul Allen wanted to sell his block of AOL was to avoid a conflict of interest: Microsoft was about to come out with a new operating system that would directly compete with AOL. Bill cited Microsoft’s 90 percent share of the PC software market and said, “We will soon have our own web portal. It’s gonna be called The Microsoft Network—MSN—and it will be a dial-up internet service provider (ISP) tucked inside the release of Windows 95.” And then Bill Gates issued the real warning he wanted to convey: “And when we release this, it’s gonna be very difficult for customers that upgrade to Windows 95 to be able to find AOL… and we think Microsoft Network is gonna be a huge success. “So, you know, I don’t want you making the mistake of putting your money into something that we’re gonna put out of business.” This was rather brass knuckles of Bill, and sometimes this was his way; it is how you get to 90 percent market share of anything."

"The box delay continued to eat at me, so in the summer of 1996 I called one of the few people who could grok the box issue: Bill Gates. “Bill, I know we can build this digital set-top box for three hundred dollars in volume—cable operators can afford that if it meets our CableLabs specs. “But there are engineers at some of the vendors, namely Scientific Atlanta, saying this could be five years out now, and cost at least $600. Keep in mind, I am trying like hell to avoid a major rebuild of the entire TCI footprint with fiber—and to use digital compression to get channel expansion at an affordable price.” Vendors would point to the all-digital, interactive Full Service Network whose astronomical costs made it impractical, and they’d say the same thing: “Well, we can demonstrate it technologically, but it is far too expensive as a consumer product.” But I also knew Moore’s Law meant processing power would keep doubling every two years, so it was only a matter of time before the tech caught up. I’d run the numbers and think, “Why should these components cost so much?” “John, I am absolutely certain that that we could build such a device and deliver it at or below a three-hundred-dollar target price. Why don’t you bring ’em up here and we’ll have a discussion. And I’ll tell them myself—Microsoft will build what you want for three hundred bucks—any volume you want—and we’ll guarantee it.”"

"Bill Gates was also shocked to see the same photo"

"Masayoshi Son carried this photo in a transparent folder for about half a year, and at night, he placed it beside his pillow while sleeping. Later, it would become known that Bill Gates, the genius from Microsoft, said: “I also saw ‘Popular Electronics’ magazine at the same time and couldn’t contain my excitement.” Hearing this, Son re-confirmed that his intuition was not wrong. Masayoshi Son was blessed with a sharp sensibility from birth. The frontal lobe, which controls creativity within the brain, works sufficiently when the brain is filled with information. The inspiration, which is the function of the sixth sense, is induced by information and evokes emotions. For this, one must always be alert and sharpen the keen sensibility to catch top-notch information."

"Was it ever, moreover, for Antoine Bernheim? When he is not at his office on Boulevard Haussmann, he devotes most of his leisure time to his "second life": his bridge tournaments in Biarritz or Crans-Montana, Switzerland... A way to stay "in the loop" by indulging in the favorite game of American billionaires Warren Buffett or Bill Gates."

"Charlie Munger, Bill Gates, Ajit Jain, Debbie Bosanek, and Carol Loomis."

"He floored Mohnish by saying that he’d sent the report to Charlie Munger and Bill Gates. Indeed, when Buffett spoke to Fox News about our lunch, he specifically mentioned Mohnish’s charity, remarking, “He thinks as well about philanthropy as he does about investments."

"I’d started to play bridge around 2007, prompted by Mohnish, who is an ardent player, and by the example of Buffett, Munger, and Bill Gates, all of whom are bridge fanatics. Initially, I joined the Manhattan Bridge Club and started taking lessons. Once I’d learned the basics, I quickly realized that bridge was not only a pleasurable diversion but would help to hone my skills in life, not to mention investing."

"McCaw's actions are often difficult to explain. In this instance, there was a point to his behavior. He didn't want his company getting too comfortable. In that sense, it was the same ethic that Bill Gates brought to Microsoft: Be adaptive. Run scared. Never assume a franchise is permanent."