Month: October 2014

The reason : The disruptor of information technology and further

I don’t know how much Son is known in the U.S. But, I believe he is one of most important person in the information technology like Bill Gates and Steve Jobs. He is a CEO of the Softbank (TSE:9984). As you might know, the Softbank bought sprint last year. And the sprint was looking to buy T-mobile, however they were not allowed to buy. If that happened, the Sprint (NYSE) and T-Mobile (NYSE) could be the third competitive party on the mobile market the U.S. against Verizon (NYSE) and AT&T (NYSE).  You think Japanese are good at only car, don’t you? Japanese is coming also on the mobile market in the U.S.!! However, what I learned from him is not only about the recent mobile market.  He always reminds me I should not look around with my level where I am now. I should aim high wherever I am now, I can find always harder way and higher way to be great.

Japan is the biggest robotic market in the world in 2012. Japan especially is good at industry robot. However, in 21th century, Japan is going to go no industry robot. The Softbank was basically company for information technology, but it is going to get into the robotics. As shown in the video, the Softbank started to sell this walking and talking robot which is supposed to be used in house. It will be sold in 2015 just for around $2000 like buying a laptop computer. It will be constantly upgraded to improve the A.I. technology because it is wired with Wifi technology. I am suspicious for A.I. technology now because Dr. Howkins is against it, but still, this should be very interesting innovation. Since the population of Japan is decreasing and also aging, Japanese are trying to rise up their productivity per person by introducing robots. Once almost all people in Japan have robot at home and that might happen within 5 years, the robotics in Japan will have disruptive innovation for robotics, education, services and information technology in Japan. Japanese and Softbank will help the other aging countries all over the world.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwMJCAZUyGc

And also you might know that recent biggest IPO in the NYSE by Alibaba group. The Son has 34.4 percent holding in Alibaba valued at more than $50 billion after the initial public offering. Jack Ma was invested around 2000, Ma said to Son “Just, $1 million or $2million is fine for startup” but Son said that “Take $20 million, you won’t regret by how much you have money” So, it turned out $50 billion in 2014. Some says that he is like Warren Buffet in Asia. But the different is that he does know technology, so more like between Bill Gate and Warren Buffet.

The Softbank recorded ¥1.09 trillion (= $10 billion) operating profit 2013/2014 fiscal year, up 36 percent from previous fiscal year. There are only 3 companies (Toyota Motor Corp (TSE:7203) and NTT DoCoMo (TSE:9437)) earn more than ¥1 trillion of operating profits in that term. But, he is aiming at world No.1 in the future base on market capitalization. When the Softbank won Toyota and then becomes No.1 in Japan, something might happen. Yes, there is possibility for that. Son started the Softbank as a distributor of packaged software in 1981. Not like Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, or Warren Buffet, he is still active and working hardest at company with great ambition.

The reason: He is the prototype of disruptive innovator in 21th century

I believe he is one of the most brilliant guys on the earth. Elon Musk is the Co-founder of Paypal. And he is currently working on Tesla motor and SpaceX as CEO. He is a disruptor car industry, new wind for space industry. He recently even mentioned he will send people on Mars [1]. How can someone possibly make an internet company to the space rocket company? I have no idea. I don’t know why there aren’t so many books that analyze his talent? I did not know him so much, so I researched a lot of publications from self-publishing e-book, and articles and interviews (including TED) yesterday to write this post. I need to do more though, here I guess what I learned from him.

• Keep taking risk like crazy

He has been taking huge risks every project he has done. He gave up Ph.D at Stanford to start his company. I surely could not. He was born in South Africa and went to Canada, and then the U.S., started his companies and has had several issues for his projects and money, but still he is running in every direction. I have lived the foreign country. So, I know how hard someone succeeds in the foreign country. He started everything from scratch and now he is competed with giant company or government institute. It seems that the adversities he had has been trained him a lot. He even worries that his sons don’t have enough adversity like him.

• Read books and talk to people

On his interview [2], he said “Read books and talk to people, it’s kind of how I have learned anything”. This is very simple suggestion though, it is very profound. Even making rockets, there is someone specialist and great books out there. Why not asking or reading how I can make them. I love to read book, some of them is too hard to read for me but I now knew someone like me (must be human beings, not alien from another planet) wrote that book. Why not sticking to read it until I understand it well? If I can’t, even how hard I tried, why not asking about the problem to the author?

• Only authentic people can tell who is authentic.

On this interview [2], he also explained how to tell the person who are really involved in and have solved the problem. I think what is said is very true. But I know, as a scientist, who is the person who solved the problem. If he were me, I can explain how I could solve the problem with multiple levels because I struggled a lot to solve the problem. We can tell who the one is because the person is he who struggled a lot the problem and never forgets how he solved the problem.

• Study physics, boys and girls, and gentlemen and ladies!!

As a physicist, I am kind of feeling ashamed when I learned about him. He said that the frame work of physics is very strong. It seems he is learning everything by using the framework of physics. I knew physics framework is very important though, I was not challenging enough to take advantage from it. I know physics, I am professional. The physics is the comprehensive study to solve the problem by keeping asking “Why is this happening?” He reminds me that I have to use physics a lot more.

• Honesty

He says honestly sometimes “I don’t know” during interviews when he was asked question that he doesn’t know or cannot answer. It seems it is easy to say so, I don’t think so. He can say “I don’t know” because he knows something clearly and confidently, but also he knows he doesn’t know or can’t say exactly. I don’t think this is easy.

• Living in the 21th century

When I saw and read about him, I realized that we are living in the 21th century. Since even we are living 21th century we are using many of ideas from 20^th century. And they are great. Also they are improving gradually, but the concepts of them don’t change so much. Many people might say that we have everything to live already, say “Why should we innovate something to the future?” This question might be the biggest disruptor of our motivation to innovate.

People might have cheap electric car, live sustainably with self-produced electricity (with Solar power maybe?), travel with hyperloop, talk to artificial intelligent, and even live on Mars in near future. Let’s struggle to our future human beings!! We are living the 21th century!!

References

[1] CNBC’s number 1 disruptor, Elon Musk: http://video.cnbc.com/gallery/?video=3000285676#.

[2] How Elon Musk Can Tell If Job Applicants Are Lying About Their Experience http://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-job-interview-rule-2013-12