Elon Musk | Doer of things on X and sad little man

[Cassidy]

Then state something more than total and complete vagueries. Everything you've said is "its clear, trust me bro". You make a statement about revenue vs employee growth but don't state what you think it should be like. Its almost like you don't know what you're talking about so you're putting headlines out there without anything behind them.

The snide tone lends absolutely nothing to your position or argument, quite the opposite.

Snide is what I was met with based on a statement which went against the majority view in the thread. I’ll leave it there though.

 

[Jotun]

I don’t buy for a single minute this Twitter is gonna be better in two years. And if that really happens, and Elon will be able to make a better product with 80% or so less employees, then it means that the entire industry does not know what is doing and has over hired. Which means that all of us in the industry are in trouble. feck that so hopefully Twitter burns!

I think everybody understands this already; if you work people to the bone, you produce more(in theory, discounting employee wellbeing/churn etc.). One of the core notions of the tech industry is that it doesn't do this though, at least in the way long standing industries like finance do. It's supposed to be run, for the most part, by people that don't subscribe to this burnout inducing mentality, so I'm not sure that it's going to cause some sort of revolution.

My personal opinion from 10+ years in the industry is that there is overhiring. I've repeatedly had teammates on various projects who were barely positive contributors. They would deliver features, but they would be bugged as hell or the code would be designed so badly any future work on it would take twice as long.

However most businesses want features out as soon as possible. It's ridiculous how many times do businesses really have an approach "if it takes 9 months to deliver a baby, we should have 9 mothers to deliver it in one". The problem is it works, kinda (you'll get it in 4 months), but then the next baby takes twice as long. But at least you are getting features out and making money on them. Which is important.

Working people to the bone, never works. They stop caring, start delivering sh*t and then leave.

So my opinion is, can Twitter be streamlined? Sure, but how much? I don't know, but I do know you need to do it slowly, carefully and make sure not to overwork the rest of the teams as then it's getting counterproductive.

What Musk doesn't look very smart to me, but I'm giving him a small chance of success, maybe he lucks out. I do think it's more likely Twitter and his other businesses will collapse due to this.

 

[Bepi]

The perfect / entirely sustainable / barely tolerable head count at Twitter is not a trivial matter because their product per se was a technical mess already, in need of constant micro-management… and without ever generating sufficient money to be profitable, they already relied upon “subsidies” (venture capital, the most) that are not going to suffice now that ads’ income is disappearing.

Here enters Muskonomics?? Older businesses in the engineering sector, not necessarily brick and mortar ones, had a golden rule for profitability going like this: every employee generates 3x his gross salary for the firm.

I do not have Twitter’s numbers before and after Musk, yet I suspect he was underestimating again how heavy and messy Twitter is as a platform, so messy that there is no way to make it sustainable without ads… if not downscaling it massively, making it a closed circle without freeloaders (which is a business model as well, think of substack for example?).

 

[Jotun]

The perfect / entirely sustainable / barely tolerable head count at Twitter is not a trivial matter because their product per se was a technical mess already, in need of constant micro-management… and without ever generating sufficient money to be profitable, they already relied upon “subsidies” (venture capital, the most) that are not going to suffice now that ads’ income is disappearing.

Here enters Muskonomics?? Older businesses in the engineering sector, not necessarily brick and mortar ones, had a golden rule for profitability going like this: every employee generates 3x his gross salary for the firm.

I do not have Twitter’s numbers before and after Musk, yet I suspect he was underestimating again how heavy and messy Twitter is as a platform, so messy that there is no way to make it sustainable without ads… if not downscaling it massively, making it a closed circle without freeloaders (which is a business model as well, think of substack for example?).

If this were a twitter, I would retweet this. I think it's a really good take of what's happening.

 

[Revan]

I completely buy the idea that Twitter has been poorly run and could have been a much better (and more profitable) product, but I have zero belief in the idea that whatever Elon is doing now is going to make it any better, or that Elon is capable of doing it in the first place. I wasn't a Twitter shareholder, or someone whose business relied on Twitter, so I was perfectly content with it just sort of stumbling along as it did. This just looks like it's going to spectacularly crash, which will be entertaining for a little bit and then in the end we don't have Twitter anymore.

My personal opinion from 10+ years in the industry is that there is overhiring. I've repeatedly had teammates on various projects who were barely positive contributors. They would deliver features, but they would be bugged as hell or the code would be designed so badly any future work on it would take twice as long.

However most businesses want features out as soon as possible. It's ridiculous how many times do businesses really have an approach "if it takes 9 months to deliver a baby, we should have 9 mothers to deliver it in one". The problem is it works, kinda (you'll get it in 4 months), but then the next baby takes twice as long. But at least you are getting features out and making money on them. Which is important.

Working people to the bone, never works. They stop caring, start delivering sh*t and then leave.

So my opinion is, can Twitter be streamlined? Sure, but how much? I don't know, but I do know you need to do it slowly, carefully and make sure not to overwork the rest of the teams as then it's getting counterproductive.

What Musk doesn't look very smart to me, but I'm giving him a small chance of success, maybe he lucks out. I do think it's more likely Twitter and his other businesses will collapse due to this.

I agree that Twitter could have been run better, and I also agree that there might be some overhiring here and there. However, what is happening in Twitter is extreme. He randomly fired half of their workforce, which made many others leave. And now, if the rumours are true that 75% of the remaining are leaving, we are talking for less than 1000 people remaining in a company that had over 7000 workers. I do not think that 700 or so remaining employees, however hard core they are, can do the job that 7000 did in the past.

Now of course, Twitter will start hiring, and luckily for them, Meta just fired 11K people (although most of them in not-tech), Argo AI closed (so 2000 good workers there), and there are other layoffs in other top tech companies. At the same time, he basically fired every recruiter, and even at the best of times, recruiting takes time (checking your CV, talking with HR, talking with hiring manager and/or 1-2 screening interviews, followed by 5 rounds of technical interviews and 1 behavioural interview, with a committee reading the assessments and deciding to hire or not, often followed by a VP checking the decision with veto power). Essentially, it is very hard to do this in less than a month, and quite often it goes 2-3 months. To make things even worse, there are entire teams who have been fired, so who is gonna do the inteviewing for those roles. With entire teams fired, it means that there are entire parts of the codebase/database/infrastructure that no one doesn't even know what to do with, entire features that people are not aware, let alone know the codebase. If Twitter starts hiring fast, it means that the current engineers need to spend a significant amount of time interviewing, rather than writing code.

In other words, it looks like a total clusterfeck.

 

[Dumbstar]

I've just skimmed two pages since midday and there are no more tweets in here. Has Twitter already gone down or is everyone just too busy babbling?

 

[nimic]

I've just skimmed two pages since midday and there are no more tweets in here. Has Twitter already gone down or is everyone just too busy babbling?

Here's a tweet:

 

[Jotun]

I agree that Twitter could have been run better, and I also agree that there might be some overhiring here and there. However, what is happening in Twitter is extreme. He randomly fired half of their workforce, which made many others leave. And now, if the rumours are true that 75% of the remaining are leaving, we are talking for less than 1000 people remaining in a company that had over 7000 workers. I do not think that 700 or so remaining employees, however hard core they are, can do the job that 7000 did in the past.

Now of course, Twitter will start hiring, and luckily for them, Meta just fired 11K people (although most of them in not-tech), Argo AI closed (so 2000 good workers there), and there are other layoffs in other top tech companies. At the same time, he basically fired every recruiter, and even at the best of times, recruiting takes time (checking your CV, talking with HR, talking with hiring manager and/or 1-2 screening interviews, followed by 5 rounds of technical interviews and 1 behavioural interview, with a committee reading the assessments and deciding to hire or not, often followed by a VP checking the decision with veto power). Essentially, it is very hard to do this in less than a month, and quite often it goes 2-3 months. To make things even worse, there are entire teams who have been fired, so who is gonna do the inteviewing for those roles. With entire teams fired, it means that there are entire parts of the codebase/database/infrastructure that no one doesn't even know what to do with, entire features that people are not aware, let alone know the codebase. If Twitter starts hiring fast, it means that the current engineers need to spend a significant amount of time interviewing, rather than writing code.

In other words, it looks like a total clusterfeck.

I think you have it spot on. I haven't seen how many employers are quitting (source on that would be good), and how many he will be left with. I guess we will know the real numbers in a few month. The fact some people were fired and then re-hired in the next few days, just even more demonstrates the clusterfeck.

He obviously knows he bought a non-profitable company and needs to bring in more revenue (hence the 8$ badge) and cut the expenses (streamline the workforce). It looks like both moves are backfiring, because he is going about it so terribly.

Considering he spent no time before announcing changes, shows to me he did not properly analyze all of this. To me these all look like moves of a panicking persona that's trying to wing it. Maybe something's going on with Tesla? Or his other money. I think I've read he loaned money from the saudi's, if true, maybe that's why he is rushing it.

 

[sun_tzu]

He obviously knows he bought a non-profitable company

witter annual net profit / loss 2012 to 2021 ($mm)

Year	Net profit / loss ($mm)
2012	-79
2013	-645
2014	-577
2015	-521
2016	-456
2017	-108
2018	1206
2019	1466
2020	-1136
2021	-221

so over a 5 year period it made 1.2bn profit

witter annual revenue 2012 to 2021 ($bn)

Year	Revenue ($bn)
2012	0.3
2013	0.6
2014	1.4
2015	2.2
2016	2.5
2017	2.4
2018	3
2019	3.4
2020	3.7
2021	5

turnover of 17.5bn in the same period

which is about a 7% return which isnt bad in a company growing revenues in the way it was ... certainly it wasnt dying anytime soon before he started poking it with a stick

 

[Ali Dia]

I know this might sound stupid but isn’t he going to lose a load more money and time rehiring new teams to do the “hardcore” work? Surely the smart play with a business so big would have been gradual evolution but he’s trying so hard to look like a cutthroat genius that it feels like he’s lost the reigns already. Interesting times. I hope he crashes and is shown for the chancer he really is.

 

[The Firestarter]

I agree that Twitter could have been run better, and I also agree that there might be some overhiring here and there. However, what is happening in Twitter is extreme. He randomly fired half of their workforce, which made many others leave. And now, if the rumours are true that 75% of the remaining are leaving, we are talking for less than 1000 people remaining in a company that had over 7000 workers. I do not think that 700 or so remaining employees, however hard core they are, can do the job that 7000 did in the past.

Now of course, Twitter will start hiring, and luckily for them, Meta just fired 11K people (although most of them in not-tech), Argo AI closed (so 2000 good workers there), and there are other layoffs in other top tech companies. At the same time, he basically fired every recruiter, and even at the best of times, recruiting takes time (checking your CV, talking with HR, talking with hiring manager and/or 1-2 screening interviews, followed by 5 rounds of technical interviews and 1 behavioural interview, with a committee reading the assessments and deciding to hire or not, often followed by a VP checking the decision with veto power). Essentially, it is very hard to do this in less than a month, and quite often it goes 2-3 months. To make things even worse, there are entire teams who have been fired, so who is gonna do the inteviewing for those roles. With entire teams fired, it means that there are entire parts of the codebase/database/infrastructure that no one doesn't even know what to do with, entire features that people are not aware, let alone know the codebase. If Twitter starts hiring fast, it means that the current engineers need to spend a significant amount of time interviewing, rather than writing code.

In other words, it looks like a total clusterfeck.

The 7K number is a bit crazy by itself. I'd love to see how these were distributed by teams.

 

[Jotun]

witter annual net profit / loss 2012 to 2021 ($mm)

Year	Net profit / loss ($mm)
2012	-79
2013	-645
2014	-577
2015	-521
2016	-456
2017	-108
2018	1206
2019	1466
2020	-1136
2021	-221

so over a 5 year period it made 1.2bn profit

witter annual revenue 2012 to 2021 ($bn)

Year	Revenue ($bn)
2012	0.3
2013	0.6
2014	1.4
2015	2.2
2016	2.5
2017	2.4
2018	3
2019	3.4
2020	3.7
2021	5

turnover of 17.5bn in the same period

which is about a 7% return which isnt bad in a company growing revenues in the way it was ... certainly it wasnt dying anytime soon before he started poking it with a stick

So it's been leaking money except in 2018 and 2019? What happened? Revenue jump in those years doesn't correspond with profits, so they somehow cut expenses, how? Also why did they lose so much money in 2020, but they've had revenue growth, what were the extra costs?

These numbers (2017 to 2021) are so strange to me, such huge shifts in profits, while revenue consistently rising. It makes me wonder what's going on. On the other hand I know nothing about finances of big corporations.

 

[calodo2003]

 

[Beachryan]

I'm 99% sure FTX will definitely be under investigation.

 

[sun_tzu]

So it's been leaking money except in 2018 and 2019? What happened? Revenue jump in those years doesn't correspond with profits, so they somehow cut expenses, how? Also why did they lose so much money in 2020, but they've had revenue growth, what were the extra costs?

These numbers (2017 to 2021) are so strange to me, such huge shifts in profits, while revenue consistently rising. It makes me wonder what's going on. On the other hand I know nothing about finances of big corporations.

Id guess in 20 their advertising revenues were less than forecast because of covid? but their overheads would not have been able to have been reduced as quickly?

not looked into it but that would be my gut feel for 20 and 21 they had stopped most of the loss - no idea what the figures would have looked like for 22 if musk had not got involved?

 

[frostbite]

It seems he is having fun...

 

[crappycraperson]

The work force was bloated clearly (not just Twitter the entire industry). They will make mistakes and iterate quickly rather than suffer from paralysis and ship nothing (what has Twitter shipped in the last few years)

I wouldn’t judge this based soley on the first month, especially when a lot is based on dislike for Musk anyway.

Fail fast and iterate with a smaller more engaged team. I think what comes out at the end of that will be interesting.

Do not be suprised to see long form video coming to Twitter within that 2 years along with improvements in spaces.

I think the industry is going to get a shake up top once PE sees what happens at Twitter.

Fail fast and iterate happens at all start ups. Nothing ground breaking about it. If Musk has some innovative idea that can monetise Twitter's user base then jolly good. But Twitter's existing infra to support daily DAU will require more head count than a start up just getting off the ground. Also the only ideas Musk has thrown out so far are to try to monetise videos on Twitter ala Youtube or append Twitter with a payments platform. Facebook has a much higher DAU than twitter, already possess long form video hosting and would be much better equipped to challenge Youtube. They launched their own video streaming service to host original TV shows and sporting events like La Liga. Yet they have have not succeeded in this space so don't think cracking the video space is going to be easy for Musk either. P2P Payments in US market, I am not well versed it so can't say if that will take off.

 

[Stactix]

I reckon Twitter will turn out to be better and profitable within 24 months.

I doubt it, Musk is running it like a headless chicken currently & it's only going to get worse due to the amount of resignations. That's not going to motivate advertisers to come back.

Then you need to factor in that Musk openly airs that he's a w"nkstain. Don't like any Billionaires really but how often do you hear about Bezos,Gates,Dorsey..

I don't even know any of their political leanings but I know Musk is a proud Republican at a time when they've gone full nutjob.

Not hard to see that bias will be a major thing going forward, it'll be the right wings version of free speech. Hate over facts.

 

[JPRouve]

I have been too busy enjoying Ronaldo's meltdown so, why is the End of Twitter trending?

 

[MTF]

Fail fast and iterate happens at all start ups. Nothing ground breaking about it. If Musk has some innovative idea that can monetise Twitter's user base then jolly good. But Twitter's existing infra top support daily DAU will require more head count than a start up just getting off the ground would. Also the only ideas Musk has thrown out so far is to try to monetise videos on Twitter ala Youtube and append Twitter with a payments platform. Facebook has a much higher DAU than twitter, already possess long form video hosting and would be much better equipped to challenge Youtube. They launched their own video streaming service to host original TV shows and sporting events like La Liga. Yet they have have not succeeded in this space so don't think cracking the video space is going to be easy for Musk either. P2P Payments in US market, I am not well versed it so can't say if that will take off.

Good post. And on P2P, there's already incumbents Venmo/Paypal and Cash App.

 

[Cassidy]

Fail fast and iterate happens at all start ups. Nothing ground breaking about it. If Musk has some innovative idea that can monetise Twitter's user base then jolly good. But Twitter's existing infra to support daily DAU will require more head count than a start up just getting off the ground. Also the only ideas Musk has thrown out so far are to try to monetise videos on Twitter ala Youtube or append Twitter with a payments platform. Facebook has a much higher DAU than twitter, already possess long form video hosting and would be much better equipped to challenge Youtube. They launched their own video streaming service to host original TV shows and sporting events like La Liga. Yet they have have not succeeded in this space so don't think cracking the video space is going to be easy for Musk either. P2P Payments in US market, I am not well versed it so can't say if that will take off.

I agree on infra support,I don’t believe it cannot be replaced though especially in the current market place

 

[P-Ro]

Has he spent 44 billion on twitter just to troll AOC?

 

[Cassidy]

I doubt it, Musk is running it like a headless chicken currently & it's only going to get worse due to the amount of resignations. That's not going to motivate advertisers to come back.

Then you need to factor in that Musk openly airs that he's a w"nkstain. Don't like any Billionaires really but how often do you hear about Bezos,Gates,Dorsey..

I don't even know any of their political leanings but I know Musk is a proud Republican at a time when they've gone full nutjob.

Not hard to see that bias will be a major thing going forward, it'll be the right wings version of free speech. Hate over facts.

I guess time will tell. I certainly wouldn’t rule it out after 1 month

 

[frostbite]

To older guys here: Does this whole discussion here remind you of the Bill Gates saga in the 1990s? Is Bill Gates smart? Can Bill Gates program? He is not a programmer, he doesn't even have a degree. He stole everything from Apple. Bill Gates is stupid, he missed the internet. Linux on the desktop had 100% increase last year (1998), Microsoft will soon be history.

 

[Beans]

To older guys here: Does this whole discussion here remind you of the Bill Gates saga in the 1990s? Is Bill Gates smart? Can Bill Gates program? He is not a programmer, he doesn't even have a degree. He stole everything from Apple. Bill Gates is stupid, he missed the internet. Linux on the desktop had 100% increase last year (1998), Microsoft will soon be history.

Microsoft practically had a monopoly, Tesla has a small share of the market.

 

[calodo2003]

 

[4bars]

I'm 99% sure FTX will definitely be under investigation.

And to be honest, twitter is far more damaging in the wrong hands than FTX

 

[B20]

To older guys here: Does this whole discussion here remind you of the Bill Gates saga in the 1990s? Is Bill Gates smart? Can Bill Gates program? He is not a programmer, he doesn't even have a degree. He stole everything from Apple. Bill Gates is stupid, he missed the internet. Linux on the desktop had 100% increase last year (1998), Microsoft will soon be history.

He didn't miss the internet. On the contrary, their early integration of it into Windows (Internet explorer, outlook) was a big factor in its near monopoly of the desktop sphere.

Regardless, Windows and twitter are orders of magnitude different in scope. Facebook comes closer.

 

[frostbite]

There are so many funny tweets these days. Can all this be a publicity stunt to increase twitter traffic? And sell more ads, because of the increased traffic?

I had an account for 8 years and practically never used it, but I have been using it for the last few days just to see Musk fail catastrophically. I am sure there are thousands and thousands like me. I have now started worrying that this whole saga is an ad campaign and I have been sucked into it...

 

[stoinz]

To older guys here: Does this whole discussion here remind you of the Bill Gates saga in the 1990s? Is Bill Gates smart? Can Bill Gates program? He is not a programmer, he doesn't even have a degree. He stole everything from Apple. Bill Gates is stupid, he missed the internet. Linux on the desktop had 100% increase last year (1998), Microsoft will soon be history.

There is cycle for everything. Ya he was kinda of irrelevant in the late nineties and Microsoft might soon be history but that doesn't take anything away from what he achieved. He was also smart enough eventually to step aside.

Totally different from Musk's situation. Gates did create his own software (the first), and he was a cunning business man who exploited every opportunity to create a monopoly on desktop computing. Whatever his motive was he was able to put his differences with Apple and invested 50million in 1997 which helped kick started the Apple revival. Something I cannot imagine Musk do for his rival.

Despite being the richest man on the planet, have near monopoly of talented people working for him, he seems quite humble and he has never claimed to be a polymath or pretended to be an expert on everything outside of computing. Which again something I cannot imagine Musk doing.

 

[nimic]

To older guys here: Does this whole discussion here remind you of the Bill Gates saga in the 1990s? Is Bill Gates smart? Can Bill Gates program? He is not a programmer, he doesn't even have a degree. He stole everything from Apple. Bill Gates is stupid, he missed the internet. Linux on the desktop had 100% increase last year (1998), Microsoft will soon be history.

Bill Gates and Elon Musk are not even remotely comparable. Yes, Bill Gates can program. Elon Musk is incredible at making money, that has never been in doubt (though I guess we'll see what the future holds if he continues his meltdown), but he's just an entrepreneur. Bill Gates has done a lot of shitty things too, and also came from a position of great privilege, but at the very least he does have other tangible skills.

I think this comparison of the situations misses the mark a bit.

 

[nimic]

There are so many funny tweets these days. Can all this be a publicity stunt to increase twitter traffic? And sell more ads, because of the increased traffic?

I had an account for 8 years and practically never used it, but I have been using it for the last few days just to see Musk fail catastrophically. I am sure there are thousands and thousands like me. I have now started worrying that this whole saga is an ad campaign and I have been sucked into it...

You're overthinking it. If it's all a publicity stunt to sell more ads, it failed more or less immediately as companies became increasingly worried about what kind of content their ads would appear next to. Any schadenfreude-bump is temporary and definitely inadequate to make up for the tangible damages.

 

[crappycraperson]

Bill Gates and Elon Musk are not even remotely comparable. Yes, Bill Gates can program. Elon Musk is incredible at making money, that has never been in doubt (though I guess we'll see what the future holds if he continues his meltdown), but he's just an entrepreneur. Bill Gates has done a lot of shitty things too, and also came from a position of great privilege, but at the very least he does have other tangible skills.

I think this comparison of the situations misses the mark a bit.

I don't think I agree. Musk is not just some VC who chose to invest in Tesla and Space X. He did lead those company into successful businesses. No one thought Tesla would make it and hence who almost every single other established automative giant did not invest in electric cars and let Tesla have the first move advantage. For Space X, he took on Bezos' Blue origins who had much more money than him 5 years ago and did better than him. Gates does not have similar range of diverse products or companies he has pioneered as a leader. Since Windows and Office Suite, it is the cloud business that has allowed MS to stay competitive and that was the brain child of Satya. Besides even if Gates was a programer, he did not invent the Windows OS, it is a well known story that he bought the IP from Xerox. Just like electric cars, Gates' wealth was result of his vision of computers becoming a universal need for businesses and individuals alike

 

[nimic]

He hired the right people. He didn't create anything. He's a great entrepreneur.

 

[frostbite]

Bill Gates and Elon Musk are not even remotely comparable. Yes, Bill Gates can program. Elon Musk is incredible at making money, that has never been in doubt (though I guess we'll see what the future holds if he continues his meltdown), but he's just an entrepreneur. Bill Gates has done a lot of shitty things too, and also came from a position of great privilege, but at the very least he does have other tangible skills.

I think this comparison of the situations misses the mark a bit.

But doesn't this whole thing about the Musk-hate remind you the Gates-hate in the 1990s?

Of course, there are differences. Perhaps the greatest difference is that back then we had the gigantic Microsoft-Netscape war, and we loved Netscape! And the Windows-Linux war of course, and we loved Linus. Now, Musk doesn't have any companies against him, it is just plain Musk-hate, there is no one to love today!...

 

[crappycraperson]

He hired the right people. He didn't create anything. He's a great entrepreneur.

Same is true for Gates, Bezos, Jobs etc. Very few if any example exist of an individual "inventing" a product that then turns them into a successful businessman. Even Zuckerberg, might have coded the initial platform of Facebook himself but it was not an innovative product by any means. Even established companies like Google had similar platform (Orkut) at that time, it is just that Zuckerberg had a better business strategy than them to succeed.

 

[Bepi]

The best term to define Musk as a businessman is a catalyst, which is a great talent to have and served him well.

 

[crappycraperson]

But doesn't this whole thing about the Musk-hate remind you the Gates-hate in the 1990s?

Of course, there are differences. Perhaps the greatest difference is that back then we had the gigantic Microsoft-Netscape war, and we loved Netscape! And the Windows-Linux war of course, and we loved Linus. Now, Musk doesn't have any companies against him, it is just plain Musk-hate, there is no one to love today!...

Musk has invited all hate on himself in last year or so. Before that he was perhaps one of the more beloved billionaires given his start ups where in "cool" spaces like Electric cars, which liberals loved, and rockets. Unlike Bezos or Zuckerberg who got a lot of hate. He since then, inserted himself in popular political discourse for no reason which eventually culminated in the shit show of last 2 weeks.

 

[MTF]

I don't think I agree. Musk is not just some VC who chose to invest in Tesla and Space X. He did lead those company into successful businesses. No one thought Tesla would make it and hence who almost every single other established automative giant did not invest in electric cars and let Tesla have the first move advantage. For Space X, he took on Bezos' Blue origins who had much more money than him 5 years ago and did better than him. Gates does not have similar range of diverse products or companies he has pioneered as a leader. Since Windows and Office Suite, it is the cloud business that has allowed MS to stay competitive and that was the brain child of Satya. Besides even if Gates was a programer, he did not invent the Windows OS, it is a well known story that he bought the IP from Xerox. Just like electric cars, Gates' wealth was result of his vision of computers becoming a universal need for businesses and individuals alike

The company that Gates founded and built will in all likelihood last beyond his own lifetime, and probably with a greater value than it had the day he stepped down from being its leader. That's quite an accomplishment in itself because it takes more than just having 1-2 good ideas.

 

[Revan]

I don't think I agree. Musk is not just some VC who chose to invest in Tesla and Space X. He did lead those company into successful businesses. No one thought Tesla would make it and hence who almost every single other established automative giant did not invest in electric cars and let Tesla have the first move advantage. For Space X, he took on Bezos' Blue origins who had much more money than him 5 years ago and did better than him. Gates does not have similar range of diverse products or companies he has pioneered as a leader. Since Windows and Office Suite, it is the cloud business that has allowed MS to stay competitive and that was the brain child of Satya. Besides even if Gates was a programer, he did not invent the Windows OS, it is a well known story that he bought the IP from Xerox. Just like electric cars, Gates' wealth was result of his vision of computers becoming a universal need for businesses and individuals alike

To be fair, Gates hasn’t been involved in Microsoft for roughly 20 years, so not fair to blame him for MS not being more creative in these years.

Gates was definitely brilliant on MS though, no doubt there.