Top 10 Mistakes that Entrepreneurs make- Journey from Inception to Exit by Guy Kawasaki Video Lecture | Starting a Startup - Entrepreneurship

thank you all for coming tonight look at
this crowd this is great um this is a
fantastic event then we're really happy
to be introducing my name is Alex Lola
this is Slava Balter we're the co-chairs
of the be plan competition the UC
Berkeley startup competition and we're
really happy to present this event today
just a few things about be planned how
we're doing first of all this is our
15th anniversary of be plan here at UC
Berkeley pretty great yeah and it's it's
going to be an exciting competition
already there's we have signed up some
really recognized mentors and judges
from Silicon Valley and this year there
are over a hundred and sixty teams that
entered and we have already selected the
39 teams that will go to semi finals and
so quick brief before we get to Guy
Kawasaki it's about where we stand with
the competition out of the hundreds like
60 plus teams at DISA me this year the
39 that entered they're now getting bad
already so they're going to start
competing through the next few months
and we're going to start iterating on
the process and using some of the
techniques potentially a lot of them are
here today learning some wisdom from guy
and trying to get to the process of what
is my idea mean and how to actually
bring it to a prototype in April so
really excited about some of the teams
that have come out of the process this
year will continue to learn from them
and they'll continue to learn from some
of the mentors that we have on board so
I wanted to also give a quick round of
applause for the Leicester Center and
Kirsten that for putting on this event
tonight
some of the fabulous work as well as the
B plan executive committee so if you
have a chance to say hi quick on
applause for them as well
tons of work and last but not least the
hard work of one of our own executive
members Antonio Silva he's been working
diligently very hard to get Guy Kawasaki
to come on campus and here we are so
Antonio come on stage want to give a
quick introduction we'll pass it off
thank you and so presenting Guy Kawasaki
is kind of sometimes nonsensical for a
group of geeks like all of us he's very
well known and he's also going to be a
semifinal judge for this year's V plan
competition guy was born in Honolulu
Hawaii he has a BA from psychology from
Stanford and an MBA from UCLA
he's the Apple M fabulist since 1984 a
term that in coin in Federalists
marketing started with him he's now an
advisor for Google and Motorola so
that's an interesting shift if we have
time for questions that it would be
something I would like to ask he has he
is a pro philic writer as you can see
here has written for more than a dozen
books and he's going to talk to us about
top 10 mistakes of entrepreneurs I would
like to say thank you Guy Kawasaki for
coming here today and welcome
oh thank you very very much this room I
have very good feelings about this room
because my son is a freshman here at Cal
and yeah so this is this is the room
where during Cal Day we got the pitch
for Cal for Haas and so a very warm
feeling about this place and I went to
Stanford but I I focus now on Cal can I
just say that so if any of you start
companies and you need an intern
my son is available and if you combine
the number of followers that my son and
I have on social media it's 5 million
I have four million nine hundred ninety
thousand and ninety nine and he has a
thousand so yes I'm very happy to be
here
and it's gonna be a lot of fun I am
going to present something about the top
ten mistakes of entrepreneurs let me
give you a little bit more about my
background I work for Apple from 1983 to
1987 I was Apple software evangelist so
it was my job to convince people to
write Mac software this meant that I
worked in the Macintosh division which
meant that I work for Steve Jobs which
meant that let's just say I had a very
interesting career he was not an easy
person to work for but he definitely got
the best results out of people and so I
learned a lot from him back then the
Macintosh division was probably the
largest collection of egomaniacs in the
history of California we held that
record until last year when Facebook
broke it but we held it for a good
thirty years just to show you what bad
people we were back then the company was
the Apple Division and the Mac the
the Apple Division was shipping you know
boatloads of apples twos making tons of
money
the Macintosh division was still in R&D
so we were burning money so if you
looked at the Apple P&L the P was Apple
two and the L was Macintosh and yet we
would not let people into the Macintosh
division buildings if you can imagine
and if you ever become CEO don't ever
let this happen where one part of your
company cannot go into the other part of
the company that is not good for morale
and then especially after the Apple two
people figured out that they were paying
for the building they weren't being led
into as you can imagine that really
pissed him off and quite logically so so
they came up with a great joke I love to
tell this great joke about about the Mac
division which is how many Macintosh
division employees take the screw to
light bulb the answer is one the
Macintosh division employee holds up the
light bulb and expects the universe to
revolve around him there's a Microsoft
version of this joke and the Microsoft
version is how many Microsoft employees
does it take to screw in a light bulb
and the answer is none because Bill
Gates has declared darkness the new
standard
I hear you're early in your careers I'm
kind of late in my career I started in
technology at about 1983 and so for
about 25 or 30 years I watched hi-tech
speakers and I'll tell you with the rare
exception of Steve Jobs most high tech
speakers have two salient qualities
first they suck speakers and the second
quality is they go long and that is a
really ironic and dangerous combination
because if you suck in your speech is
short it's okay and if your speech is
long and you're great it's okay but if
you suck and go long
that's like be stupid and arrogant you
know it's just not a good combination
and so what I did early in my career is
I embraced the top 10 format so I always
use a top 10 format for my speeches but
I have to tell you this is a speech I
have never given before and so I just
realized
that I forgot to put numbers on my top
ten points so but there are ten points
tonight and the reason why I use the top
10 format is that in case you think I
suck you know approximately how much
longer I'll suck because I have 10
points for you so with no further ado if
you let me talk about the mistakes of
entrepreneurs I have been an
entrepreneur I have worked for a fortune
500 company like Apple I have been a
venture capitalist so I have funded
companies I've been an advisor for many
startups so I've sort of seen it from
all sides the investor the entrepreneur
the advisor and so this is really what
I've picked up after 25 or 30 years of
working in technology ok so and let's
just say that I'm not known for subtlety
so we're just going to cut to the chase
ok because you should hear it straight
from straight from the bottom line
actually so number one mistake is many
entrepreneurs make the mistake of taking
a large market and multiplying it by 1%
and saying how hard could that be
conservatively speaking so we'll just
walk through a hypothetical case 300
million Americans
one in four owns a dog at seventy five
million dogs each dog eats two cans of
dog food per day that's 150 million cans
of dog food per day how hard could it be
to get a mere 1% of 150 million cans of
dog food total addressable market that's
one and a half million cans of dog food
per day let's say you make $2 per can
that's three million dollars a day and
now you know dogs this is not like
enterprise software dogs eat every day
they don't take Saturday and Sunday off
so this is 365 days a year
we can't we could worst-case make three
million dollars a day so conservatively
speaking worst case with our Rockstar
programmers we should do a billion
dollars in the
jeer I can't tell how many stories I've
heard like that you take a large market
you multiply by a small number and you
say how hard could that be
so there's two fundamental flaws with
this first getting 1% of any market is
not that easy number one and number two
which sort of contradicts number one
number two is no investor wants to hear
that you only are going to get 1% so in
one sense you're saying 1% is easy but
the investor is also hearing that you
know they're predicting they can only
get 1% of this market so you're betwixt
in between so don't use this kind of
logic okay don't take this large 300
million times 0.25 you know equals 150 I
equals 75 times 2 equals 150 times 1
percent equals one and a half million it
just doesn't work like that
that's lie a mistake number one mistake
number two sort of the flip side of this
which is you scale too soon so this is
how this goes
so we go through the 1 percent right so
conservatively speaking you should be
selling a million and a half cans of dog
food per day
worst-case okay so now you think oh my
god you know we're going to need at
least three facilities to ship this and
we're going to need colocation because
our servers can never go down as these
millions of dog owners come to our site
and order dead cows in cans and so we
need order processing we need
fulfillment we need customer service so
let's start ramping up because our
Rockstar programmers who have never
delivered a piece of software in their
lives they are going to be on time okay
and with our Rockstar marketing people
in our Rockstar
you know BMW cornflower-blue pierced ear
business development vice-president he's
going to deliver all the partnerships so
we need to ramp up we need
several locations we need colocation of
servers we need customer service people
and so what happens in the real world is
of course your Rockstar programmers
turned out to be total bozos right and
so your software is late your website is
late and the dogs no pun intended are
not eating the food it just happens that
not that many people want to buy dog
food online so your software is late
these these people are not buying your
product but you've already ramped up you
have several facilities you have all
this automation built in you have
customer service you have people you
know in Bangalore just waiting to take
those calls the people who need tech
support for opening cans of dog food
right so then what happens so then what
you do is you have a board meeting and
you tell the investors well we were
wrong our programmers have hit some
limits using Visual Basic that they
didn't foresee and so so now now we
really got it right now we're going to
go to Python or we're going to go to PHP
or maybe we'll go to MySQL but a Visual
Basic just didn't work out
okay so investors are used to hearing
this that you're going to miss your
first your first mark so of course they
understand but then you say but you know
what we've been really great at
recruiting so we have this great IT
staff with this great support staff we
have this great fulfillment staff and
those people are rock stars and so we
know that our rock star team of
programmers it's going to be a few
months late but it would be a crying
shame that we recruited all these great
other support people to let them go now
because in three months we're going to
have to hire new people again and bring
them into the company and train them
again we have so much invested in these
great rock star people that we shouldn't
let them go and so what you do is you
keep those people on board right because
now you know you're going to ship in
three months
guess what three months come by and you
don't ship again and now you have to go
back to your board and you have to
explain again well we're not shipping
but we still have these great people
we've invested
we need to keep them because we will
just have to hire people like them again
and start from scratch
so that's what happens
scaling too soon I I in my career I have
never seen a company die because it
didn't scale fast enough for once in my
life god help me I would love to have a
problem where I advise or invest in a
company that couldn't scale fast enough
that would be as we say a high quality
problem dear God give me this problem
once in my career the company is growing
too fast
too many orders are coming in for dog
food they cannot handle the volume
please God give me that problem I know
how to solve that problem ok usually
what happens is you scale too fast in
anticipation of a conservative 1% with
the programs created by your Rockstar
engineering staff it doesn't come true
you're stuck with big overhead and you
run out of money that's mistake number
two mistake number three is an obsession
with partnering ok let me tell you
something partnering is
partnering is there's only one
thing that counts in a start-up its
sales partnering is partnering
means two organizations try to
compensate for their weaknesses by
partnering with another 2 plus 2 will
equal 3 in this case partnerships mean
nothing just I just don't get me started
on this just you know what what what
what entrepreneur should focus on is
sales sales fixes everything you want to
be left alone by your investors meet
your numbers that's as simple as that
nobody cares about partnering partnering
is total you only use that word
whenever you don't have sales ok
partnering is
number four number four I think a lot of
entrepreneurs are focusing on the
pitching process how do we pitch to
raise money how do we win business plan
contests how do we perfect our
PowerPoint skills and I'll tell you
something listen I can help you win a
business plan context I can help you
perfect your pitch no question but in
the real world the key is not the pitch
the key is the prototype if if someone
gave me a choice of having a team come
in with a great PowerPoint pitch or come
in with a prototype that is working I
would pick the working prototype all day
long because in a few hours I can help
most of you fix your pitch I cannot in a
few hours help anybody fix their
prototype prototyping is the key in a
perfect world in this VC world it's
changed completely now and it used to be
that you try to raise money because you
had to build a team to write software
you needed a year you needed two million
dollars you need something like that
right but now if you think about it all
the things you need for a tech startup
they're free or cheap let's go down
through the list you need infrastructure
ok infrastructure today is free or cheap
you use Rackspace you use Amazon Web
Services you don't buy any servers
anymore you don't buy buildings you
don't lease buildings you use Amazon you
use Rackspace thousand bucks you get a
terabyte in the sky marketing before you
have to throw parties yet the higher PR
firms you have to do all this kind of
stuff now you have Pinterest you have
Twitter your Facebook you have Google
Plus you have LinkedIn you have all
these social media the marketing is free
before you have to have commercial real
estate you have to have a team
physically in one place now many teams
are virtual you don't need as much
commercial real estate before you had to
buy a license for SQL from Oracle now
everything is open-source
so if you go around this
list everything is kind of free or cheap
and so this is a completely different
world and in this world you are expected
to show up with a prototype not just a
pitch a prototype because with twenty
five or fifty thousand dollars which is
you know money that you should be able
to get from your parents from your
credit cards shaking down people you
know you should show up with a prototype
it's completely different expectation
and it works to your advantage
because when you show up with the
prototype you have significantly reduced
one risk which is that you can actually
deliver a product before with PowerPoint
you had a much lower valuation because
PowerPoint is total you're
making stuff up for PowerPoint right so
let me tell you I've been lied to so
many times you could not possibly tell
me a lie that I have not heard so the
the PowerPoint which is fundamentally a
lot of right but a prototype is
not unless you're the person
you're showing it is so stupid it
doesn't understand that you're using
mock-ups but then if the person is that
stupid arguably you wouldn't want that
person's money because that person is
too stupid you don't want stupid money
so is prototype prototype not pitch okay
next lie next lie is if you are going to
pitch the excuse me not next mistake
this is called the Guy Kawasaki 10-20-30
rule of PowerPoint I hope that you will
trust me on this the optimal number
slides in a PowerPoint presentation is
10 10 you'd be lucky to get 10 thoughts
across 10 cogent points across okay the
the the time you should be able to give
those 10 slides in is 20 minutes it's 10
20 30 rule now you may ask well why
would you limit yourself to 20 minutes
when you have a one-hour meeting well
probably not in this audience but in
most audiences roughly 95% of the world
is still using Windows and so that 95%
of the world they need 40 minutes to
make their laptop work with the
projector
okay so it's the whole world if the
whole world was using Macintosh the rule
would be ten sixty thirty okay but it's
not true so it's ten slides twenty
minutes and then the ideal font size is
30 points or larger if you use eight ten
or twelve you're going to be tempted to
put too much text then you're going to
read the text and one slide into the
presentation your audience will figure
out this bozo is reading his slides this
bozo is reading verbatim
I can read silently to myself faster
than this bozo can read them to me I
will just read ahead okay
so if you remember nothing else from
this presentation then in the business
plan context ten slides you know do they
even have 20 minutes do they even have
ten slides even better in the real world
ten slides twenty minutes thirty point
font a good rule of thumb for the font
size is figure out who the oldest person
is in the audience divide his or her age
by two sixty-year-old VC / - 3050 or VC
/ - you know 25 someday you may be
pitching a 16 year old VC that day god
bless you use the 8.5
but until that day ten slides twenty
minutes thirty point five next lie the
next mistake of entrepreneurs is they
believe that they should do things
serially which is to do things one at a
time first you raise money then you
build a team then you write the software
then you ship then you collect okay
that's a serial world the serial world
in entrepreneurship does not exist
unfair as it may seem if you are an
entrepreneur you are going to have to be
raising money writing software
prototyping selling recruiting and
collecting money all at the same time it
is all these paths moving down the road
at the same time it is not a serial
process it is a parallel process you
need to understand that's how the world
works
that it is all about moving multiple
things down the road in a perfect world
I grant you it would be nice if all you
could do was focus on money and then all
you have to do is focus on hiring and
then all you have to do is focus on
programming and then all you have to do
is focus on selling and then all you
have to do is focus on collecting that
is not the real world the real world is
you have to do all that at once next
mistake many many entrepreneurs believe
that as long as they and their buddies
own 51% of the company they are in
control of the company because they
believe in board meetings things come
down to a vote and 51% wins I have never
seen anything come down to a vote in a
board meeting
it's either everybody wants to do it or
nobody wants to do it and the fact that
you retain 51% of the company may make
you feel better and make you think you
are in control of that company but the
truth is that the moment you take
outside money you have lost control of
the company okay it never comes down to
vote 51 to 49 this is not the US Senate
okay
god help us there's no such thing as a
filibuster in a in a venture capital
board meeting but the this is an
illusion the moment you take outside
money you have a moral ethical and
financial obligation to the outside
money if you cannot deal with that
don't take outside money 51% is an
illusion of control the next thing is
that you believe that patents equals
defensibility the ideal number of times
you should use the P word in your
presentation is one we have filed
patents that's it if you say it twice
we have filed patents and it is going to
create a defensible position for us
that's - you're wrong patents
realistically will not help you if you
are acquired someday yes the acquiring
company will love that you have patents
that's a good reason to do it another
probably the most compelling reason to
file for patents as a start-up is that
it will make your parents proud that
they can say that my daughter or my son
has a patent - her name - his name that
is worth something okay but if you
believe that you patented something and
that's going to make you defensible you
are deluding yourself because it takes
about five or six years to file this
patent and get it done and then let's
suppose you do this you file it you get
it done and let's say Microsoft steps
all over your patent so now you have to
ask yourself do you have the time and
the money to out litigate Microsoft and
the answer to that is no you don't you
never will now every once in a while you
hear to this great story that some file
compression utility company in Calabasas
California has won a 60 million dollar
suit against Microsoft okay
you will hear that but you know what
getting infringed and suing Microsoft
successfully is not a fundable business
model okay and the reason why there's
headlines when Microsoft loses a lawsuit
like that is because it hardly ever
happens
if it happened every day it would not be
used and then they never follow up that
story to see if the thing was appealed
and if the little company in Calabasas
California ever really collected the 60
million dollars okay
so file the path and god bless you you
know but don't think that it makes you
defensible and for sure for sure
don't tell a sophisticated investor that
the reason why we are defensible is
because we filed a patent because ASA
fist in fact that's a very good test if
when you say that the investor laughs
and rolls his or her eyes that's a smart
investor if the investor says yeah
that's true walk out of that room okay
that person is an idiot patents do not I
hope there's no patent lawyers in here
now I would say the exception to that is
probably biotech where you can patent a
drug okay but you know if if you believe
that you can patent a method to sell dog
food online using crowd-sourced
referrals
let's just say that you know I wish I
could short privately-held companies
next mistake is to hire in your own
image you know what if you're an
engineering person you need to balance
off or balance out your engineering
prowess so an engineering person should
hire a sales person a sales person
should hire an engineering person many
times companies like to all hire the
same kind of people and when that
happens you'll have glaring weaknesses
you're totally engineering or you're
totally sales or you're totally biz dev
you need to hire people who complement
your skills fundamentally what you need
in a start-up is you need someone to
make it you need someone to sell it and
you need someone to collect it
you need those three people ok I didn't
mention biz dev I didn't mention
anything else I'm saying make it sell it
and collect it that's what you need and
so the danger is that you know if you're
a sales and marketing oriented guy you
hire sales and marketing oriented people
but you really need to balance off all
the talents in a company so remember I
make it sell it and collect it you need
all three skills the next mistake is
befriending your venture capitalists the
way this works is you get funded by a VC
and the day that they say yes or the day
the check clears you say wow you know I
heard VCS or assholes but not this one
this one really understands what we're
doing this one really likes us this one
said that he's never seen a team as good
as ours and this one said that he's
going to stick with us and this one said
that he had such confidence in our
ability having hired all these Visual
Basic programmers that basically he's
going to leave us alone you know we're
not one of his problem portfolio
companies we're one of the most
promising
and you know what he also said that they
don't invest in technologies they don't
invest in markets they invest in people
they invest in people and they invested
in us so no matter how much we screw up
because they invested in people they're
going to like us and they're going to
give us more chances to get us get it
right because they invested in us not
the prototype we showed not the market
forecasts we showed none of that people
they're our best friends they said that
they'll always be available call them
anytime pick up the phone they'll even
come in and roll up their sleeves and
work with us because they're investing
in people they're my friends I mean I I
think I'll take up golf and start
playing golf with them you know let me
tell you something
nice shirt up there I like that shirt
yeah VCS and investors are not your
friends I'm not saying you should hate
them okay but I am saying that it is a
business they are in the business of
making money they are not in the
business of making friends angel
investors maybe but venture capitalists
are not in the business of making
friends they would rather hate you as a
CEO but see you go public and make them
rich okay don't believe that they're
your friends don't try to become their
friend just make your forecasts okay
that's all that they really care about
and and I've seen time and time again
where the CEO really believes so here
here here's here's like what happens so
you raise money you miss your first ship
date the board knows you're going to
ship miss your first ship date because
everybody does that everybody does that
but you know they invested in you so
they still support you you miss your
second date and now they say well you
know you really have to be careful we're
going to give you another five million
bucks but now you know we're really
going to hold you accountable then you
have one more meeting
and to your utter surprise they're
saying we want you to step aside and you
say but last month you said you're going
to stick with us because you still
believe in us what happened in the last
30 days and the VC will say well you
know every Monday I was going to our
partner meeting and every Monday I was
telling you Molly
they slipped but they look really
promising they have rock stars you know
they won percent of all these dogs
eating food you know how hard could that
be so I kept telling this story Monday
after Monday after Monday and then
finally we had this partner off-site and
I just got tired of defending you guys
and I just you know it's not worth my
bandwidth because my time and my mental
faculties are so important so we're
going to take you as a loser company in
our portfolio we're going to take this
other loser company in our portfolio and
we're going to sell your assets to the
other loser company and we're going to
declare victory that you were acquired
so everybody is happy except you have to
step aside you are now god and then the
CEO goes home in a state of shock and he
says frickin VC you know last month they
love me this month they don't love me
they're throwing me out I don't
understand what happened you know we own
51% we're going to take it to a vote
yeah right
so okay again I'm not I don't want you
to think of full of anger okay but I
just I don't don't try to befriend your
VC the key to managing a VC or any
investor is to just meet your
projections okay meet your projections
my advice to you is that you set
projections that you are 80% confident
you'll make 80% that's the minimum
confidence you should have 80% god bless
you if you do a hundred percent you will
make history because you're the first
person who met your forecast if you do
120 percent you're a god or a goddess
not to be sexist so you need to under
promise and over deliver under-promise
and over-deliver okay just now you might
ask well what happens if our realistic
projection doesn't make the company
interesting enough to get funded like
what's the bottom end and that is a real
problem and I will tell you that you
know venture capital is not for
everybody that venture capital is
playing a game every venture kappa sois
us to fund the next google right so lots
of companies are just thrown out of that
that there's no way that a new chain of
restaurants is likely to be the next
Google it could be the next McDonald's
don't get me wrong but the likelihood is
very low it's unlikely that a consulting
practice is the next Google or that a
web design company is the next Google
there's some things that are just not
applicable for venture capital there's
only several thousand deals happen for
venture capital per year of the millions
of companies that start so don't set
yourself up for failure they're looking
for the next Google they will settle for
a hundred million dollar exit but they
want the next Google that's the game
you've decided to play okay so don't
befriend your VC and then the last one
is
don't assume that VCS truly can add
value at any given moment a VC is on 5
to 10 boards of directors they are also
looking at companies every day they are
very very busy people they are there a
touch ADHD
there's certainly egocentric it's very
difficult for most VCS to separate
causation and correlation right that you
know they invested in a certain company
and it did so well that it must have
been them who made that company succeed
be interesting to ask the CEO what his
or her version of that success story is
so you know a VC can pick up the phone
and introduce you can send an email to
introduce you can help you recruit but
you shouldn't think that they're going
to do a lot of heavy lifting
fundamentally what you want from a VC is
money and you want two or three hours a
month of their bandwidth that's about it
should be happy with that if you get
that you're doing well and the irony is
that the more successful you are the
more bandwidth you'll get which is kind
of unfortunate because the less
successful the more you might have
needed the help but you know what
happens with these things is the venture
capital game is a game of hindsight so
what you do is you invest in 20
companies one or two become successful
you know maybe it's a mega success but
let's just say it's a moderate success
and so you you have invested in 20
companies let's say one is successful so
people ask you about the one company and
you say I knew that was a good team I
knew there was rock stars I know they
were in a great market millions of dogs
more dogs coming out
every day I knew this was a good
business model that we were going to
disintermediate this very inefficient
way of getting dead cows into cans to
dogs right why was there a pet food
store in the middle so stupid the pet
food store is grabbing 25% margin what
value did that pet food store add yet to
get in your car drive to the pet food
store find a parking space go into the
pet food store and then what it's dead
cows in cans did you do any
point-of-purchase analysis did you do
any taste tests no they added no value
so it was so obvious that of course
there had to be a better way to buy dead
cows and cans so I knew that I knew the
team was rock stars I knew it a great
business model I knew there was a great
market so I invested in that company
then asked the VC so why what about the
Webvan that you invested and put four
hundred million dollars in so people
could buy broccoli online
why did you invest in Webvan why did you
invest in Webvan and the VC will tell
you my partners did that deal I told
them that was a stupid idea not nearly
the potential of selling dead cows in
cans to the seventy-five million
Americans who own dogs
it's a very retroactive business I'm not
saying that all VCS are like this I'm
telling you have realistic expectations
of venture capital it's a mistake that
many many entrepreneurs make and so
believe it or not that's 11 mistakes
that entrepreneurs make because I
believe in over delivering so so with
that questions yeah thank you
okay
it's my con for any questions by the way
I'm step up to the mics because we are
having a video recording so if you do
have any good questions for a guy please
step on up so guy I sure AM your faculty
here at Haas in entrepreneurship and my
question is we hear a lot about Lean
Startup and our Lean Startup and I want
to hear your take on that and are you
seeing more companies actually following
that path yeah and and and are you
actually working with a company that
that is doing that well well in a sense
well first of all I love the concept of
a Lean Startup my experience is that too
much money is worse than too little
because when you have too much money you
start thinking in very sloppy ways do
you start thinking we need to scale you
start thinking well they gave us five
million dollars they didn't give it to
us to collect one percent interest as a
CD they gave it to us to invest so we
need to invest we need to invest in
thousand dollar Herman Miller chairs so
that our rock star customer service
people have comfortable seating
arrangements and so and and you know we
have to have a we have to have a roll
out party because we need to make a
statement and so if you didn't have
money you would not have such stupid
conversations okay so too much money is
worse than too little when you have too
little you really have to think hard you
have to do guerilla things you have to
you know you have to host your website
on the UC Berkeley server and not tell
anybody here I mean you need to do stuff
like that that's just the way it is you
know don't feel bad you can always endow
a chair later
right now do what it takes yeah so I
heartily endorse that and as I went
through my dialog of marketing three
tools or open source virtual team so you
don't need commercial real straight on
my working you know I mean that's why Y
Combinator is so interesting for 25
grand you can do a lot of damage and
arguably if you cannot do a lot of
damage with 25 grand maybe you're not
such a great entrepreneur so if it you
know if it takes you two million dollars
today to get to a prototype now of
course we're not talking biotech we're
not talking you know I'm obviously
talking about a certain kind of startup
that's a good test that you need too
much money so I love the concept of lean
startup yes yes so I I started an
incubator last year it's called a go to
startup house it's residential incubator
and there we have speakers coming in
here in Berkeley and so one of the guys
was called Alex man and he's doing a
company called clicktime and he owns the
company with his brother and and they
also did something called man consulting
so they were able to fund with the
consulting yeah with the consulting and
then of course lot disputes with his
brother but they were throughout after
like four years so now twelve thirteen
years later he's getting like two calls
from VCS every week wanting to invest in
in his company okay but he did tell this
one story where they were getting this
competitor I was VC funded and he it was
like devastated he thought that this is
it now they will click them thing it's
going to be out competed by obvious VC
money but in eighteen months there
wasn't they weren't able to get a new
round of funding and I just had to shut
that so he's in a very good position
right now and but you don't hear much of
these stories and that's oh there was a
start-up here here like a week ago and
there was a company called guidebook and
they've been able do you really need to
you need to embrace the 10-20-30 rule
so since you're in the freakin
Transamerica Tower this elevator I'm off
the elevator I'm gone
I'm in a cab going to Union Square
already
okay so continue yeah yeah so I'm adding
my Alex's to save way to shop for
groceries tonight it's open 24 hours
keep on going so the Alex man he started
in the nineties when like in town was
brand new
but guidebook they started like a year
ago and now there are 20 employees and
they've been able to grow this
organically and they have so much cash
now that they have to double their their
employee rate and still all this without
VC funding but again I don't hear much
of these stories and I've been studying
entrepreneurship for your question for
15 years so my question is I hope he's
not in your contest cuz I can tell you
right now he's not getting past the semi
finals yeah okay yeah I'm doing a pitch
day entrepreneurship so it this is kinda
like problem you know but basically my
question is do you hear a lot of stories
where companies grow organically and are
successful and come well Jesus I'd like
to pay you for what you just did cuz you
just you just choose everything I said
tonight I you know III think that the
organic mean way is the way to go you
you are it's a harder way to go it is
you know when you do it that way you
have to prototype because you need to
sell right you don't you know you're not
just doing powerpoints slides you have
to sell something nobody buys a
PowerPoint slide so I think that is very
good and I you know I if you look at if
you look at something like Microsoft or
Apple you know they didn't start off
with venture capital they started off
with two guys in a garage two gals in a
garage and they built something that
they wanted to use they did it
organically they didn't go and raise
millions of dollars they didn't do
PowerPoint and so I think a lot of these
things that start organically it really
serves the need and it takes off and one
day your Microsoft or Apple and I love
that story I think it's the core Sequoia
ever comes to speak to you like Michael
Moritz
I think he'll tell you that the richest
vein for Sequoia Capital has been to
engineering students building the
product that they want to use which is
very different than you know a group of
people who saw some kind of Jupiter or
IDC or IDG or McKinsey or Accenture
report about the market forecast and
design decided that because the McKinsey
report said that the pet food business
would be a five billion dollar business
we should have a pet food online store
so I love the organic path okay thank
you yes
hi I'm not sure how much this question
applies to this talk but I work for
Lawrence Berkeley National Lab and
there's talk of perhaps starting a
non-profit you know a company to educate
you know the youth and Richmond say like
intercity educate the what a public
health education and youth education to
promote that and we be interested in it
be a non-profit wouldn't be selling
anything right so would you have any
recommendations of you know how we could
sort of would it be people companies
that would be interested in funding that
starting spec that venture capitalists
or even angel investors I would say you
know they are trying to increase their
financial returns as opposed to do good
if they do good it may be by accident it
may be a natural outcome I mean if you
build the most successful solar panel
company in the history of mankind
you will arguably do good you'll reduce
the carbon footprint of homes but they
did it because they wanted to sell a
boatload of solar panels right so I if I
understand your question correctly it is
not going to be very successful for you
to go to professional venture
capitalists to try to raise money for a
not-for-profit if that's what you're
asking the way you should do that is
what you want is you want rich people
who have made money
through various means to give you the
money for philanthropic reasons but it's
not an investment so it's very different
yeah yeah you answer my question
something I'm sorry you answered it okay
okay thing one for one
yeah yes yes I'm seeing a trend you know
if you ask another 15-minute question
I'm gonna shut you down well you
actually had a 20-minute presentation I
want to give him well no my name is a
mecha co-founding an incubator slask
accelerator program called sparked ups
out of the South Bay and I wanted to see
what the increased rise of incubating
accelerator programs also what those not
given any upfront investment what is
your take on them also with them
disrupting the VC world I thought you
might take on the inky buns on the rise
of incubator and accelerator programs
and also your thoughts on them disrupt
ok so I have I really have mixed
emotions about those because I love I
love visiting them I love the energy I
love the you know sort of banding
together that we're all in this I love
the sort of shared space huddling
together for warmth you know sharing
expertise sharing Xerox machines sharing
Trixie the front desk receptionist
I I love or it could be Biff doesn't
have to be a woman so so I love that
aspect but um having said that I think
that you know just because you have free
space and you have shared resources that
doesn't necessarily make you more
successful that to me you know the most
important thing is the prototype and if
it advances your prototype then I would
be all for it but just hanging around
other people in shared space is fun ping
pong table all the good stuff but that
doesn't necessarily increase the chances
of your success so the key is keep
coming back to that it's the prototype
and build a freaking good prototype and
get to market which is one of the
beauties of not having a lot of money
because if you don't have a lot of money
you cannot dick around making a lot of
crappy prototypes you have to get it
right which is a good outcome of not
having money okay you also mentioned
about VCS or the false perception of
entrepreneurs thinking that VCS can add
value to their companies yes in most
instances these accelerating computer
programs don't give you as much money
but may have different value ads so at
what point does non financial kind of
overtake you know larger investments at
what point does non financial overtake
larger investments wow that's that is so
much of a case-by-case basis you know I
hated not that I have hesitated to
generalize tonight but it's it's some I
don't know how to answer that question I
mean you know someone like Paul Graham
and Y Combinator you know he may just in
a five-minute conversation may add so
much value to your company that
fundamentally changes your company
whereas you could be in another
incubator where you know the blind lead
the dumb and you know just hanging
around there for years you won't gain
anything so it really it's just it's
kind of just a crapshoot but you know
again I mean it just keeps coming back
get a prototype and put it out there
because either the dogs eat it or they
don't I mean that's that's the key
that's the key data point okay thank you
okay yes hi my name is Romy I'm a
full-time MBA student okay and you
mentioned before that one to two out of
every portfolio of 20 companies yes
actually succeeds yeah looking back is
there any characteristics or things that
you can highlight if there are that
really make those stand out like those
teams is there any or is it just too
perhaps you well first of all you know
in a rare moment of humility let me say
I'm not exactly proven as a VC because I
haven't so you could take everything I
say you know guy you're wrong
so you could make the case you do
everything opposite of what I just said
you might be successful I well I think
when most people look back on their
successes they will say that they quote
knew that it was a good team okay the
problem is that you really have to ask
well if you knew that one was a good
team and that's why you invested in it
why did you invest in the 19 other
losers because at the time you squeeze
the trigger you knew they were good too
unless you were purposely investing in
losers right so it's not rational so at
the time you squeeze the trigger all
twenty you thought they were winners
otherwise it wouldn't have squeezed the
trigger so why is it that one succeeded
a 19 failed and it's not as easy as
saying well I knew that team would
succeed
cause what about the other 19 so I you
know as I get older and older I have
come to believe that it's better to be
lucky than smart so you know because you
know just imagine from a VCS perspective
these are some of the pitch pitches you
would have heard right so we're PhD
students at Stanford and we're in this
computer science class and we're working
on this new search engine that measures
you know inbound links at that point
there were five search engines did the
world need a sixth search engine called
Google hmm maybe not right or my buddy
and I we want to have a business model
where we need infinite server space in
the sky with infinite bandwidth so
people can upload their videos that they
stole okay and what's going to make our
company tip is when people start
dropping Mentos into diet cokes
okay raise your hand who would invest in
YouTube okay none of you right okay so
we're going to enable people to send 140
character text messages
oh what a concept have you heard of chat
have you heard of email have you heard
of text messages but you want to send
tweets and what's your business model
well we don't know but you know lots of
people lots of people want to tell
everybody on the internet that their cat
rolled over
you know if just it's just 1% of the cat
owners use Twitter
to tell the Internet that their cattle
Dover you realize how many tweets that
would be per day and so if you look at
these things so so you know you have to
sort of go back in time so at that
moment you know you you had you could
invest in Twitter you could invest in
Webvan you know like lots of broccoli is
sold in all those people need broccoli
they don't want to drive to Safeway
imagine if you could just go online and
order broccoli we just get 1% of the
broccoli sold in America you realize how
big that would be right and so at any
point at the point that you have to
squeeze the trigger Wow I I squeeze the
trigger wrong many times my false
negatives and false positives I I think
if you're honest you just have to say
you got lucky now clearly kleiner
perkins in Sequoia gets lucky all the
time so they must know something but Wow
I'm gonna sneeze one second bless you
allergic to cow went to Stanford yeah
so so I'm is very difficult to say but
you if you look at trends I read I
really think it's the two guys in a
garage engineering background building
the product that they want to use you
know another another sort of retroactive
story was my girlfriend wanted to sell
her PEZ dispenser collection online so I
started eBay great story total
story
Pierre wanted to make in a perfect
market online but it's a great
retroactive story so you know if you're
successful man you can you can just
reinvent history right all the time you
could just interpret history anywhere
you want and if you fail well nobody's
heard of you so it doesn't matter so and
that's how you have nothing but upside
right so yeah I wish I could tell you I
you you need to get another speaker to
tell you that because I cannot okay yes
Oh we'll go back up there hi my name is
Anne Wong and thanks for a good talking
otherwise my mother foreign student from
Korea and trying to start up here North
herself yeah but just in case we get
nuked I want to know
when I try to like turtle here I found
this quite hard for foreigners like for
I just tough and I have no connection
here so can you give me any special
comment or device for foreign
entrepreneur um you know I have to admit
that I think that acoustics for this is
built for the audience not the speaker
so I could not understand your question
can somebody I'll do I have any advice
for foreign entrepreneurs in the u.s.
you know I I actually think that you
have an advantage as a foreign
entrepreneur in America because I think
one of the richest veins for investing
in particular using the Sequoia theory
is two engineers who are first or second
generation American and if you look at
it you know like Andy Grove from Hungary
Sergey from Russia look at all the
Indian entrepreneurs that built this
valley all first or second generation
and I think that um
that poverty is a very motivating force
and so if you gave me a choice of
investing in a start-up where the CEO is
the fifth generation American you know
his great great great great grandfather
came over in the Mayflower started the
largest I don't know you know farming
supply store in Connecticut built that
up built that up billionaire and this
person's name is you know Jonathan
Sebastian the third
and and father has endowed a chair at
Yale and Dartmouth and coincidentally he
went to Yale and Dartmouth total trust
fund baby and now sees that while there
are 75 million dogs in America on versus
you know versus ash meat who one
generation ago his parents were in
Bangalore and you know they put him
through IIT and he came over here or his
parents they caught the last helicopter
out of South Vietnam and they landed in
Sacramento and so his mother became a
maid and his father started running a
liquor store and they saved everything
they could and put you know their son
through Sonoma State and and that kind
of thing and I would invest in the
immigrant all day long all day long
because if you just look at the history
of entrepreneurship it's poor people who
made big companies it's not
fifth-generation trust fund babies so I
think you know as wanna get me started
in politics but if I were the president
United States god help us if first of
all McIntosh would be a standard
computer
if I were president I would say we
should make the most flexible visa
program in the world alright basically I
would say if you want to come to America
we have the greatest education system in
the world Cal is not ranked ahead of
Stanford as of yesterday so you come to
the United States you get the best
education you will be in a legal system
where it might be flawed but it is not
criminal you don't have to pay people
off to get permits you don't have to pay
people off to get your money out of the
bank you don't have to pay people off
you know there's a common law system
here and you don't have to fear for your
life you don't have to worry about the
Mafia you don't have to those come to
America and start a great company I
would do I would I can solve the housing
crisis
if I were Obama I would say all right so
this is the deal if you buy a house that
cost more than half a million dollars in
America you are now a citizen of the
United States you know
our housing problem would disappear in
one day because all these rich people
from all over the world they see our son
our daughter can be a citizen of the
United States by oh my house that would
that would fix the housing problem right
and and then you know like my strategy
would be instead of using drones let's
use the visa system okay and so what we
will do is if you want to come to
America to study and work and start a
company we will give you a visa come on
down and because we want to create a
brain drain we want all the countries of
the world to be pissed off at America
not for killing them but for draining
their best people we want the best
people from every country to come to
America start your company create jobs
do all that kind of great stuff move
back send the money back we don't care
but just come to America mark is the
land of opportunity I think man because
if you look at all the great companies
its immigrants that do it and so I think
you know this is this is like Ross Perot
well if we have you know people from
Mexico comma cars are going to take
American jobs I don't think so man those
those are the hungry people they're the
aggressive people they're intelligent
people sure bring them all down like I'm
third-generation Japanese American you
know like what would have happened if
they sit here no more Japanese Americans
with Japanese Americans you're taking
away the maid jobs and the gardener jobs
you know no more mr. Miyagi we want
Americans to do the yard work right I
would not be here right I would like be
working Starbucks in Hiroshima right now
so
yes I don't don't get me started on this
I really I think we should create a
reverse brain drain she's just suck the
brightest people around the world you
could have a test you know just give
everybody the SATs if you get 2,400 on
your SATs you know you get a visa in one
day you get 2,000 it takes six months
you get 1500 you know stay in Russia
what else you want to know
yes great guy thank you so much for your
time my name is Anthony Beldar I'm a
first year MBA student here I wonder if
you have advice for prototyping and
industries that have higher capital
expenditure requirements consumer
products or biotechnology stuff where
the infrastructure for creation is not
free like in tech wait say this again
you want what do you have advice on
prototyping in industries that require a
higher capital expenditure or the
infrastructure is not in place yeah
that's kind of where my whole pitch for
prototyping breaks down huh my advice
would be change industry yeah I mean
that is that is a flaw in what I'm
saying that you know it's hard to build
a quick prototype of a new kind of mini
nuclear you know power plant right but
you know I might I guess
just okay so you can't build a prototype
of a you know your funding for your new
neighborhood nuclear power plant but I
mean the message is you just got to you
got to have something tangible to show
people more tangible than PowerPoint
whatever you can do I mean point to a
similar company in France that has
neighborhood nuclear power plants I mean
do something but don't just talk about
you know the 300 million Americans alone
75 million dogs you have to do something
more tangible it there's the expectation
in this lean startup world where most
resources are free or cheap these days
that you show up with more than
PowerPoint before I forget do any of you
speak Hungarian in this audience
that's too bad because I just got the
Hungarian version of my book and I don't
know what to do is that
so if any of you know anybody who speaks
Hungarian I think it's Hungarian please
help yourself to this book I also I
brought some of my art of the starts
which is the book that I wrote about how
to start company so I have this many
here I don't know how we're going to
give them out people who asked the
shortest question maybe so that and then
one more pitch my most recent book is
the book called ape which is why I
singled out that guy wearing the ape
shirt up there and ape is a book that
explains how to write a book and so if
any of you are interested in how to
write a book I grab one of these cards
because this is an innovation in the
book business so this card these cards
on the back have a place where you
scratch off a specific redemption code
so you go to a website you get this
number you type it in and then you can
download the eBook version of this so
the the for an author this is probably
200 cards if I were to bring 200 books
you know they would be stacked this tall
I would never do that so this is a way
that I can fulfill orders this is a much
better way to do this so if you're
interested in a book about
self-publishing this is my latest book
called ape and help yourself I do this
for my love of kale that I am because
last two questions okay hey guys last
three three okay nobody else come up oh
yeah I would vote for you any day if I
could I'm a first-generation immigrant
from Vietnam and this is my question for
you so we didn't get into B plan I was
trying so hard for four or five months
to get funding from angels yeah so when
is the time for you to give up give up
pivot or just find something else well
that is that is a difficult question
because you know the what is in a sense
it's what's worse giving up too quick or
staying too long right and there is no
simple answer to that you know you
they're allegorical stories about how
you know Fred Smith was on his last
payroll he went to Las Vegas and he made
ten grand and he say Federal Express
right but you never hear the people who
didn't make ten grand in Las Vegas and
missed their last check and you know
went out of business you don't hear
about those so well this is for one
thing how old are you 23
okay so you know it's not like you're at
the end of your life yet right I hope so
so you 23 years old and you try to raise
money for six months I mean you know you
got lots of time pal I mean you know I
would don't sweat it
don't do anything stupid don't kill
yourself you know
don't delay is Asian kind of crap if you
know you gotta commit how I envisioned
yeah don't sweat it
are your parents here or still in
Vietnam out there in Vietnam and are
there running liquor stores or the you
know election no actually my parents
premier my parents are not the poorest
people why I don't want to ask them for
money for some reason yeah well you know
they're they're like you're so proud
that you're at Cal right they don't
yes so now they're so proud that you're
at Cal you know they would probably
really happy if you went into dentistry
or medical or a lawyer marry a nice
Vietnamese girl you know maybe maybe if
you file for a patent they would be
happy
oh you know you know what I mean I got I
got to tell you so like obviously I'm
Asian I went to Stanford I graduated in
three and a half years and I have to
tell you one of my biggest regrets in
life is that I was I was this frickin
driven Asian right so you know you gotta
like take as many courses as you can I
go to summer school cuz you know you
want to you're in a rush to get out
there and work then you get out and you
work and you find out you got to work
for bozos for the next 60 years of your
life right and so I would encourage all
of you undergrad or grad that you live
off your parents as long as you know my
son is not in the room anymore I think
he inherited that perspective but you
know because like your parents right and
they're like you know it think you're
working hard and they're so proud of you
they're telling all their relatives you
know if our son is at the fifth best
university in America well that's what
the ranking says I you know what do you
have for my life you saying Harvard so
so you know they're so proud they're
telling all their friends and all that
and you know I've been to Vietnam man
there's a lot of scooters in Vitt now
you get 1% of those scooters you
so I guess this is a long way of me
telling you to you know don't sweat it I
mean just it just flow listen I thought
T another store so I'm full of stories
so after I graduated from Stanford the
next year I entered law school at UC
Davis and I went to law school for two
weeks and I could not stand law school I
just hated Law School basically back
then anyway basically law school was
they tell you that you're a piece of
and they're going to remake you and
I had a real fragile ego at that point
in my life hard to imagine but I had a
real fragile ego so I just could not
handle the concept that they were going
to remake me because I was a piece of
so I left law school after two
weeks and that's you know that's the
first time I quit something in my life
and I thought I thought this was the
frickin end of the world right so
asian-american quitting Law School oh my
god you know like I thought also there's
like you know 20 generations of Kawasaki
they're like working in rice paddies and
you're cleaning the homes of white
people and they're doing all this and so
finally you know one of you breaks
through and you get into law school and
you stay there for two weeks and then
quit right so like bringing shame upon
the Kawasaki name for the next 20
generations going forward yes what is it
suicide what should I do you know should
I run away from home so I call up my
father say you know dad I just hate it I
can't I gotta quit and so I thought he's
gonna like disown me right or you know
whatever right and he tells me that's
okay as long as you make something of
your life that's like well why do how
did you force me to go to law school
why did you tell me that before you
forced me to law school so anyway that's
a long story to tell you the blacks
thank you okay you hi first of all I
want to thank you this has been a great
informative and very entertaining time
so my question is what superior mac or
pc well that is a dumbass question okay
so the reason why I say so I could get
that book so now it's my real question
that's a strategy play good question
you said the shortest question gets the
block right that's like you know you go
up to the Pope and say well what's
better Catholicism or you know what
right that's not that wasn't the real
question though so my name is Roy I'm a
founder of an education startup and so
this question pertains to the earth not
a short question no no that was a joke I
was just trying to get the book I didn't
say multiple questions okay well this is
this is the main one this pertains to
your lesson about the 51% yeah will in
control of a company so right now we're
I'm starting an education startup and
I'm trying to bootstrap it as much as
possible well I understand that's the
ideal situation what is a reasonable
amount or what is the maximum amount of
equity you might be willing to share or
you know give to VCS with a reasonable
expectation that you can maintain
control well as I said there is no
reasonable expectation of maintaining
control the moment you take an outside
investor you are kind of fiduciary
working for that investor whether it's
you know 1% or 51% you just just get
that it's not exactly true but it is a
better model to be thinking that way
that you're losing control but on the
other hand you know you're really not
losing control you are getting capital
to make it a bigger pie that's what you
truly do is so also you should disavow
yourself of the concept that you are
giving part of your company to the VC
okay
you're not giving part of your company
you are selling part of your company it
is an arm's length transaction you're
not doing them a favor any more than
they're doing you a favor it's a
mutually beneficial arm's length
transaction okay so so having said
that you know generally speaking you try
to sell about 20 to 30 percent of your
company per round so then then you know
the question becomes well how much is
your company worth and so if your
company is worth 4 million pre-money and
you raise 2 million so now it's 6
million post so 2/6 is 1/3 so you throw
about 33% of your company for 2 million
you know that kind of about right and if
you're if you're selling 40 or 50
percent of your company you're deluding
yourself too much if you try to only
sell 10 percent of your company most VCS
will not be interested because it's not
lucrative enough for them so oh it's
it's kind of in that range ok ok last
question
hi my name is daniel i'm undergraduate
here at house just reentering um grew up
in a family with both entrepreneurs as a
mom and dad being second generation
American um you're making me cry haha so
having the knowing that my parents have
always driven me to be innovative and
push the next edge and believing in like
making a solid product that's going to
last and something that you would want
that somebody else would benefit yeah I
have and I built prototypes that are
working prototypes with patents I had a
problem where somebody had stolen these
would ego lit they stole the patents
from me yeah what the prototype is still
workable ok on the I'm trying if I don't
they steal a patent from you they copied
what you did to copy what I did ok but I
have the originals ok when's the best
time to introduce this to my venture
capitalists no no no not that not that
they stole the
not that they stole the patents they
seen these prototypes and they are
workable when's the best time to
introduce these patents and these
products to the market when you see
there's other viable solutions on the
market but you know my advice is that
you should always deliver bad news early
yeah and so you know it's a very good
acid test of how much the VC really
believes in you if you tell them this
and they say okay forget it
I you know I just think that if you are
transparent and honest from the get-go
it just takes less mental energy to
maintain that I have come to the
conclusion that when you lie it takes
too much energy to lie because when you
start lying you need to keep track of
what lies you told because you need to
be consistent with your lives whereas if
you tell the truth and there's only one
truth you don't have to remember which a
version of the truth you told there is
only one version so I would be honest
and if if the VC or the investors are
truly believers in your company then
first of all they would probably become
stronger believers because they now know
that you have the integrity to deliver
bad news which is a very very useful
thing integrity is a very useful thing
and arguably if they just punt and turn
around and run away you know they didn't
really believe in you anyway so yeah I
think earlier is better I would also
make the case that even if someone
copied your idea the the way that a
company becomes defensible is the first
company to scale as opposed to the first
company to file the patent yeah so I
think even in a race the race is to
scale to build a successful company
as opposed to you know that the reason
why we're defensible is a patent it is
there are many I would rather have a
company with a prototype that is not
patentable that has thousands of people
using the service and joining everyday
then something that is rock-solid
airtight patents that no one is using
absolutely you know just you want you
want something the dogs are already
eating the food yeah yeah cuz I've seen
I seen the need for this product nobody
else had this product I built the
product built a working prototype people
have seen it and then I patented and
then they copy the patent but I still
have their original prototype well I'll
tell you another perspective on this
which is if if simply seeing your
product and copying it renders you non
defensible then you didn't have a good
enough product anyway it should take
more than seeing the product and copying
it to make you vulnerable to that yeah
you should take more if that's all it is
if just hearing what your idea is I'm
going to sell dog food online but I'll
tell you that as a non-disclosure you're
a loser because that's just not even if
you had a path in for selling dog food
online yeah that's just not defensible
it doesn't matter so it's the first to
scale first to succeed and that's what
makes it successful well I guess I
better start packing a lot of dead cows
and yeah
plan and the UC Berkeley student body I
want to thank you guys for the time to
come with us
and have a conversation all right thank
you very much take care