Ben Gilbert: belief

Transcript context

…All right, let's run through each of them and do a quick 45 seconds on each. Great. Counter positioning. I think the biggest example of this comes through where Microsoft is basically willing to jump on the microcomputer revolution before the incumbents were. IBM did not want microcomputers to happen. When they started to happen, IBM tried to figure out how to slow it down and reintegrate it into their old business model. Microsoft basically had no baggage. This is classic innovator’s dilemma stuff. They could say, well, we don't need to make any money on hardware. We don't need to even make hardware. We are free to become the whole point of integration for the entire ecosystem just by shipping bits. And that is crazy. Actually, related to that—I can't believe we haven't talked about this in the episode until now—Microsoft could enable other companies to be successful. You talk to Microsoft people, they always talk about themselves as a platform, like we're a platform. Other companies grow on the back of Microsoft. That was not true for IBM. Totally not true. Microsoft could make Compaq successful. Microsoft could make Lotus successful. Microsoft could make Intuit successful. Microsoft could make Netscape successful.…

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