Startup : A Silicon Valley Adventure (Buch)

I read Kaplan's book over 3 years ago, and still consider it the best book on entrepreneurship that I have ever encountered.

Having met a lot of entrepreneurs, I find their experiences to be mostly incommunicable. Sure, they can dispense advice a la bulleted PowerPoint slides and Top 10 Lists, but the meat of the wisdom never quite make it out of their head into mine. This is where "Startup" the book excels. Because Jerry was so meticulous in recording every bit of his startup adventure (for he had intended to record GO's life in writing nearly from the very beginning), his book alone has an incredible amount of valuable detail that is lacking in other such startup "memoirs." Startup is so well-done as a "memoir" type, in leaving nothing out, that I felt like I was living through the experience along with Jerry. What is it like to operate a company with real employees, who have real personalities, real disagreements, real visions and real limitations? What is it like to have to put the rest of your life on hold to pursue your passion and what does it do to you and those around you mentally, physically? Jerry won't tell you these things, but he will show you. Because Jerry's story is real, these conflicts fold so naturally and almost imperceptibly, but often devastatingly -- just like in real life. Jerry's detractors say that he made some terrible decisions -- and maybe he did, but the only reason you know that is because he lets it be known. He really bares all in this book and I didn't feel like there was a single moment when he was trying to pull something over the reader's head. Of course, there are times when I don't necessarily agree with his conclusions, but that's a result of differences in our characters, and not because he tried to extricate himself from his responsibilities.

In addition to the realism and detail of the "adventure," startup-lovers will be pleased to know that the technicalities of the fundraising, marketing, and selling/negotiating processes (particularly with the Evil Empire, aka Microsoft, whose self-aggrandizement really knows no bounds!) are also revealed. As are the presence of and Jerry's interactions with Silicon Valley legends John Doerr and Bill Campbell. Reading "Startup" was like sitting next to these people in a bar -- Jerry's handsome writing, full of humor, really brought them to life.

I also was lucky enough to meet Jerry and have him sign my copies of the book at a Silicon Valley VC event where he was speaking. I now have two copies of the book -- one that I have at home, and one that is constantly roaming in my circle of friends and acquaintances, because I really believe that this is one of those books that should be required reading for all startup enthusiasts.

I read this book over the thanksgiving weekend. I thoroughly enjoyed it. This book shows what it takes to be passionate about technology. Startups are not for making quick money, but to solve the real-world problems, fast. There are some very important lessons to be learnt from GO/EO and I think Jerry has done a terrific job at being honest and telling it like a story and not a chronicle of events. I discovered some very talented people through this book (E.g. Mr. Kapor, Campbell) who are an inspiration. There are many parts of the story that one will not forget. For me there were two:
1. Death of Jerry's cat. My heart really pained after reading it.
2. Jerry willing to bring on Campbell as the CEO. This showed that he was not part of GO so that he could be the CEO. I think this is a very important quality one must have.

Again, a great read.

-ranjeet

This was a fun business story told with unusual finesse by Jerry Kaplan. Kaplan has an eye for detail that can make negotiations and other business meetings come alive.

The plot tells the story of a high profile venture in the late 90s, Go Inc., from inspiration through fund raising and product development to fame, near success and ultimate failure. Anyone who may have thought about starting a new venture who wants to sit in the passenger seat and observe the whole ride in detail (though not too much detail -- it's an easy read) will enjoy. I wouldn't say the book is highly educational in a process sense (how to do this, how to do that...), but it does give a lot of high level insight into the difficult tradeoffs and predatory practices that can be confronted in trying to grow a business in high tech. I read it in a few days and enjoyed it thoroughly.

Jerry Kaplan seems to be the master of finding the trend, but falling inches short of capitalizing on it. (Go preceded Palm's pend based success by quite a bit of time, and Onsale preceded eBay) In essence, that's what makes this story so interesting. Join the ride of a pre-Internet boom technology company running by the seat of it's pants with a cool idea that may or may not work, but no matter what is visionary and light years ahead of it's time. Whew!

Hindsight being the great guide that it is, one can read the book knowing that Kaplan's vision was spot on, but that is not always enough. Technology challenges, competitive threats (or dirty pool?), organizational challenges and who knows what else can come in the way.

Despite what we know to be a crash and burn, it is hard not to be inspired reading this book.

Startup tells the story of the rise and fall of GO Corporation, a maker of pen-based computer hardware and software. GO was founded in 1987 based on the idea that lightweight portable computers that used a pen instead of a keyboard would be quite useful devices, and that entirely new operating system software would be required to run them.

From the outset, the company faced a major problem: their main product was a pen-friendly operating system, but the device for which their software was targetted did not exist! Back then, the so-called portable computers were affectionately referred to as "luggables", and they all came with a keyboard. So to demonstrate the benefits of their software, GO was forced to spend its early precious resources developing its own pen computers. It was 3.5 years before the hardware group was spun out into a separate company called EO and bought by AT&T.

Kaplan's book is an interesting no-holds-barred account of the hectic start-up life and the cut-throat business world. To succeed, GO required a variety of partnerships, from hardware vendors to ISVs. In the course of wooing companies to help them, they rubbed shoulders with such big technology companies as IBM, Apple, HP, Microsoft, and AT&T. Negotiating with and placating the IBM bureaucracy turned into a major ordeal, and Microsoft's unethical theft of GO's intellectual property allowed Microsoft to become a competitive threat long before they otherwise should have been.

GO's other serious problem was that, in its 7+ years of existence, it never realized any significant product revenue. As a result, Kaplan was constantly scrounging for new investment money and was forced to make large concessions to get it. In the book's epilogue, he sums up the situation rather succintly and forthrightly: "In looking back over the entire GO-EO experience, it is tempting to blame the failure on management errors, aggressive actions by competitors, and indifference on the part of large corporate partners. While all these played important roles, the project might have withstood them if we had succeeded in building a useful product at a reasonable price that met a clear market need. ... The real question is not why the project died, but rather why it survived as long as it did with no meaningful sales."

The book may make even more interesting reading today (mid-2001) than when it was first published (1994). The intervening years have seen the dot-com boom and bust of the late 1990's, and the development of Palm handhelds, the first truly affordable and useful pen computers. GO may have burned through $75 million in its 7 year existence, but that is nothing compared to the hundreds of millions of dollars wasted on short-lived dot-coms with ridiculous business models. And the overwhelming success of the Palm devices is a testament to the power of the idea that gave birth to GO. It was a valiant and commendable attempt, but in the final analysis, GO just had too many forces working against it, not least of which may have been that it was a bit ahead of its time....