The Era of Start-Ups

A billion dollars in revenue for 30 startups around USA, China and UK is not shabby by any standard while a 19-billion-dollar acquisition of WhatsApp by Facebook signifies a commanding era for startups.

Apple took five years to become largest music retailer, Google in 18months became the dominant search engine while Alibaba in 7 months became the largest in money market lending out 16billion dollars.

Alliances, joint ventures and acquisitions are effective strategies across all industries, but the secret is to develop solutions that enhances the social and commercial lives of customers.

The slowest way to get funding is to go try to play a game where you are trying to convince VCs you have what they want. Just go out and build a great business and they will find you. There is a great way to get funding. It’s called build a product that customers want and get them to pay you for it. And then guess what? You have some money. Once you get that money, you the validation to raise more funds from other people.

For instance, a quarter of traditional banking revenue comes from payment transactions, but this has been highly contested but gives PayPal business validation, PayPal is dominant with online payment, it is no surprise that Tmobile, Google and Walmart got the validation to encroach into that space by introducing plastic debit card to their customers.

The banking sector much like other industries needs disruptive technology around the social and commercial lives of their customer base.

The startup mindset should not be limited to just entrepreneurs but to project it in government, in academic institutions, in large and medium-sized organizations, in faith-based organizations or nonprofits and even in their personal lives.

Overall Prioritize self-care and avoid burnout. A balanced life enhances productivity and overall well-being. Acknowledge achievements, no matter how small. Celebrating milestones boosts motivation and morale.

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Conception of the Mind

Thoughts are nothing more than signals of energy.

Your thoughts extend beyond your physical body, they affect everything you do and the results you get.

Warren Buffett was for a time the richest man in America, not by working hard, but by investing smart. Starting with very little capital, he compounded his investment over many years at yearly rates far above stock market averages. He achieved this with a limited degree of analysis but consistently applying a few insightful thoughts.


William Levitt, was the master builder of Levittown, In the 1950s, he was the king. No detail was too small for his attention. He would personally pick stray nails and extra chips of wood from construction sites to make sure his construction team maximised all available resources. He sold his company in 1956 to ITT for $100 million, which is equivalent to a few billions today.

Then he was distracted.
He retired.
He married the wrong woman.
He moved to the south of France and lived on his new boat with his new wife.

William Levitt, went back into business. And he proceeded to go bankrupt. He was out of the business for twenty years, he came back, and he was not the same.

No matter how accomplished you are as a leader,
No matter how successful you are in business,

You have to remain vigilant about the details of your industry. You can not be competent based on experience alone. To stay ahead of the game you need to be retrained regularly, to apply the current technology and the latest research procedures.

Your Thoughts is something you have to work at to maintain your lead.

"The only thing that separates any one of us from excellence is fear, and the opposite of fear is faith.  I am careful not to confuse excellence with perfection. Excellence I can reach for, perfection is God´s business." -- Michael J. Fox

Excerpts from book Believe the Dream

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