Seattle

"Greg’s girlfriend worked at Apple and had a few encounters with her boss, Steve. Perhaps feeling as if Steve’s gaze was saying “Why are you guys here?” they eventually began visiting the store on Fridays when Steve was less likely to appear. Greg at one point said, “I’m having more business trips to Seattle.” Amazon has a subsidiary in Silicon Valley responsible for research and development. They were making the Kindle there, but he often also visited the Seattle area where the headquarters are located."

"At the end of 1979 came the turning point in Kjell Inge Røkke's life. The two Ålesund shipowners, Erik Breivik and John K. Sjong, bought a decommissioned supply boat from the Gulf of Mexico and transformed it into the state-of-the-art trawler "Arctic Trawler." They wanted to try their hand at cod fishing along the Pacific coast northward from Seattle. It was quite a daring venture, but the reason the shipowners took the chance was that they had no competitors. In Seattle, there were no major trawlers to speak of, so the two sunnmørings bet that they could make a catch. The problem, however, was that it was almost impossible to find proper professionals in Seattle. Sjong was big on crab fishing, and his people could not be used. Therefore, they agreed that Breivik should try to scrape together the best he could find in Ålesund. There, there were plenty of youths who would eagerly jump at this opportunity, they rightly assumed."

"When the "Arctic Trawler" went over to Seattle, Kjell Inge was on board. Kari stayed back home in Norway. They had agreed that Kjell Inge should go over first and check out the conditions. There wasn't much free time to speak of either, and that suited Røkke and the other Norwegian young men just fine. They didn't earn anything on land, and since all of them were interested in earning money in the form of percentages of the catch, they wanted to be at sea as much as possible. And should they be so unlucky to spend a few weeks on land in Seattle, Røkke knew what to do. He tried to earn some extra dollars then too."

"This rule also applied to the choice of housing. The whole Norwegian colony worked in Ballard, but those with better means chose to move further north, to Edmonds, a small, beautiful town beautifully located on a hillside, overlooking Canada. Mr. and Mrs. Røkke moved there too. They were cramped in their first small apartment, but they did not starve. If it pinched, Kari had several family members in the area at that time to lean on. Especially the uncle was good to have; he owned several apartments in the city of Tacoma south of Seattle, which Røkke could mortgage when needed. This is how the broke trawler base managed to finance his first real estate speculations. He bought the neighboring apartment in the building where he lived, refurbished it in his spare time, and later sold it with a handsome profit."

"The old-timers were completely wrong about Kjell Inge Røkke. He quickly made his mark as someone who knew where he wanted to go, and he quickly became known for his big mouth in the Norwegian community in Ballard, a neighborhood just over the ship canal north of downtown Seattle. They laughed at Røkke's optimism, but the laughter was good-natured. The expatriate Norwegians had seen fortunes made – and blown – in the fisheries before. They had been with big shots up and down, and now here was a newcomer who wanted to live high from day one."

"And while Vaagen Verft needed the money for everything else, Kjønsvik ordered a boat from the American shipyard Flohr Metal Fabricators Inc. in Seattle, USA – with no buyer at hand, of course. It was enough to shake one's head at. The shipyard lacked both contracts and money, and yet the CEO went ahead and ordered a boat from another shipyard?!"

"Kari gave birth to Kristian on February 9, 1983. In many ways, Kari and Kjell Inge each had their firstborn. Back home in Seattle, there was baby crying, while Kjell Inge was so desperate that he could have cried his bitter tears out at sea. He quickly realized that he had bought a pig in a poke. The vessel might have looked good on the drawing board, but when faced with reality at sea off Alaska, 69 feet was just too small. The boat was simply too small to fish effectively for cod. Røkke worked around the clock, but the effort did not pay off – it was impossible to make money from the boat. But he had only himself to thank. Not only was the boat a hopeless little tub, but the demanding, young shipowner had indeed loaded it with extra equipment at the end of the building period. Now he experienced that the things that were good to have were difficult to pay back."

"Therefore, the archives in the probate court in Seattle are stacked with cases against Kjell Inge Røkke. The summonses tell all about how he exploited and played blind man's bluff with people he owed money to. But the recurring theme is secret settlements. This is how Røkke's reluctance to settle his debts was crowned with success. In most cases, he could indeed buy himself out for pennies."

"The smile froze after a few days, when Johnny Austad joined the conference call for the Brooks management for the first time. Now the bureaucracy and paperwork were over, Austad demanded results. "And if you don't deliver as promised, I will come over and drink your blood," was the message. "I wanted to signal that we were Vikings," he smiles retrospectively. Austad's next move was to attack the management with an axe, move Brooks to Seattle, and hire one of Nike’s top people, Helen Rockey. The new boss was known as "the rocket" among friends because of her skiing skills. In record time, she had developed Nike’s sales of T-shirts from 60 million a year to almost a billion."