If I were 21 years old, I would go into biotechnology or genetic engineering.
When you find errors in conventional wisdom-when everyone says A and A is not true-you gain competitive advantage. Only a few times do you have to find errors in conventional wisdom to make a living.
All you can do is every day, try to solve a problem and make your company better
Because software is all about scale. The larger you are, the more profitable you are. If we sell twice as much as software, it doesn't cost us twice as much to build that software. So the more customers you have, the more scale you have. The larger you are, the more profitable you are.
So what makes me happy? I was really happy to build this house. That's it; building things. The trouble with software is that it's very hard to show your aunt in Florida what you've done.
I believe people have to follow their dreams-I did.
Bill Gates wants people to think he's Edison, when he's really Rockefeller. Referring to Gates as the smartest man in America isn't right... wealth isn't the same thing as intelligence.
If an open source product gets good enough, we'll simply take it. So the great thing about open source is nobody owns it - a company like Oracle is free to take it for nothing, include it in our products and charge for support, and that's what we'll do. So it is not disruptive at all - you have to find places to add value. Once open source gets good enough, competing with it would be insane. We don't have to fight open source, we have to exploit open source.
Everyone thought the acquisition strategy was extremely risky because no one had ever done it successfully. In other words, it was innovative.
When you live your life in different ways, it makes people around you become uncomfortable. So deal with it. They don't know what you are going to do.
I'm addicted to winning. The more you win, the more you want to win.
I'm right, and everyone else is wrong.
You can't spend as much money as I have, even if you try. I've been trying.
The computer industry is the only industry that is more fashion-driven than women's fashion.
Taking care of your employees is extremely important, and very, very visible.
If your cash is about to run out, you have to cut your cash flow. CEOs have to make those decisions and live with them however painful they may be. You have to act and act now; and act in the best interest of the company as a whole, even if it means that some people in the company who are your best friends have to work somewhere else.
When you're the first person whose beliefs are different from what everyone else believes, you're basically saying, "I'm right, and everyone else is wrong." That's a very unpleasant position to be in. It's at once exhilarating and at the same time an invitation to be attacked.
Our goal is simply to become the desktop for e-businesses.
I am also involved with all the acquisitions and overall strategy. Now it's true, I don't run operations. But I've never really run operations. I've never had the endurance to run sales. The whole idea of selling to the customer just isn't my personality. I'm an engineer, tell me why something isn't working or is and I am curious.
Five years from now, I don't know how I'll think.
Bill Gates is the pope of the personal computer industry. He decides who is going to build.
I think after a certain amount, I’m going to give almost everything I have to charity. What else can you do with it? You can't spend it, even if you try. I've been trying.
I'd prefer people read about Churchill and how he wasn't overwhelmed by Nazi Germany. Amazing; that the morale of a country rested on one person's shoulders. Extraordinary people carried that country through its darkest hours; truly inspirational. I suppose that's my theme. Whether it's a biography or a movie; whether it's fictional or true, I'm inspired by people doing great things.
I can't think of anything that isn't cloud computing with all of these announcements. The computer industry is the only industry that is more fashion-driven than women's fashion. Maybe I'm an idiot, but I have no idea what anyone is talking about. What is it?
Once the business data have been centralized and integrated, the value of the database is greater than the sum of the preexisting parts.
