Alan Sugar, Richard Branson and others
Discussion
bogie said:
those that are sucessful dont come up with excuses or try to rationalise their own failures, they look forward and persevere with their business, believing that they will be sucessful one day
If they don't analyse and learn from their mistakes they are unlikely to be. Looking forward and persevering are great qualities but not enough on their own.I had a Amstrad satellite receiver / VCR it was superb and the first easy way to record from satellite. That was in 1990 - not a lot since. Home phones with advertising, screens for advertising he has the advertising revenue bug.
Selling at the top is a skill as so many don't do it and follow the biz down again, My brother invented an item you all see every day, he asked mum for help to tool it but she said no so he remortgaged and made it. He sold right at the top and good job as the item changed to a variant his patent don't cover - the item? The plastic alarm sounder housing, before Dennis made it in plastic they were only metal. He was in the right place at the right time he couldn't do that now so it's not only having the idea it's having it at the right I've and managing it Shugs ain't had one or a while.
Selling at the top is a skill as so many don't do it and follow the biz down again, My brother invented an item you all see every day, he asked mum for help to tool it but she said no so he remortgaged and made it. He sold right at the top and good job as the item changed to a variant his patent don't cover - the item? The plastic alarm sounder housing, before Dennis made it in plastic they were only metal. He was in the right place at the right time he couldn't do that now so it's not only having the idea it's having it at the right I've and managing it Shugs ain't had one or a while.
Edited by DSLiverpool on Saturday 6th October 18:04
mybrainhurts said:
BigBen said:
Muzzer79 said:
mybrainhurts said:
Sugar is expert at stuffing his shareholders. I put £2000 in and he turned it into £200 before I could blink.
As for anything else, tell me one product of his that succeeded.
Seriously? As for anything else, tell me one product of his that succeeded.
Loads of people had Amstrad VCRs, HiFi equipment, Word Processors in the 1980s all successful. In fact the e-mail telephone is the only significant failure I can think of.
Sure he has made money from property but from what I can see property he bought as a result of success in his core trading businesses rather than as his principal source of wealth.
Ben
By successful products, I mean enduring products. He kept getting ideas, putting them into production, then losing the plot.
When he got into PCs, I thought he'd cracked something big. That was when I put £2000 in, which he promptly turned into £200 as he lost the plot again.
I have to admit he's expert at screwing his shareholders, but he probably had an army of advisers to guide him along that devious path.
So, Lord Superspiv it is, then.
t load of money for the set top box business which is still going today?fridaypassion said:
Amstrad had run its course and Sky actually bought Amstrad for 120m when it was on its arse with Sky as virtually its only customer. Anyone who thinks Alan Sugar is daft....is daft.
But it was on its arse with only one customer... a position it got into with him at the helm... so Alan's 'skill' in that case was in jumping out of the window. Or in selling a donkey for £120M of course!Digga said:
coyft said:
Andrew[MG] said:
coyft said:
He's better at running the business than the people he's sold it to?
He realised the business had reach it's maximum potential and sold it at the top?
He is an excellent businessman?
I was more thinking that he knows how to build revenue but not profit?He realised the business had reach it's maximum potential and sold it at the top?
He is an excellent businessman?
He knows how to sell lemons to idiots?
He knows how to frame an investment so that it will tick all the boxes for investment funds?
He is good at making money for himself by selling bad companies to idiots. At least Branson has managed to keep most of his going for a couple of decades.
coyft said:
Andrew[MG] said:
Digga said:
coyft said:
Andrew[MG] said:
coyft said:
He's better at running the business than the people he's sold it to?
He realised the business had reach it's maximum potential and sold it at the top?
He is an excellent businessman?
I was more thinking that he knows how to build revenue but not profit?He realised the business had reach it's maximum potential and sold it at the top?
He is an excellent businessman?
He knows how to sell lemons to idiots?
He knows how to frame an investment so that it will tick all the boxes for investment funds?
He is good at making money for himself by selling bad companies to idiots. At least Branson has managed to keep most of his going for a couple of decades.
If your idea of success is getting rich at the expense of all others then I'm glad not everyone is like you.
CHIEF said:
Alan Sugar admitted himself he sold it at the wrong time. Had he sold it earlier it would have been worth hundreds of millions and not the paltry 120 million (I actually thought it was 90 million but hey ho) he got for it.
Still 120 million isn't too shabby is it?
That's why we don't have a silicon valley, if he had invested in technology and actually had vision it could have been worth billions. Still 120 million isn't too shabby is it?
In the late 1980's Amstrad turned over £600m which was about half Microsofts and 1/5th of Apples at the time. However those two companies were founded by IT geeks who wanted to make cool stuff hence they employed people who were innovative, set up huge R&D departments and pursued numerous different product lines and business models being perfectly happy to write off R&D if it didn't bare fruit.
Can you really imagine Sugar leading Amstrad in such a way?
Sugar was wheeler dealer opportunist who briefly had a business model which worked. He would always have been a millionaire even if he hadn't been lucky, but he would never be a good CEO.
Talksteer said:
CHIEF said:
Alan Sugar admitted himself he sold it at the wrong time. Had he sold it earlier it would have been worth hundreds of millions and not the paltry 120 million (I actually thought it was 90 million but hey ho) he got for it.
Still 120 million isn't too shabby is it?
That's why we don't have a silicon valley, if he had invested in technology and actually had vision it could have been worth billions. Still 120 million isn't too shabby is it?
In the late 1980's Amstrad turned over £600m which was about half Microsofts and 1/5th of Apples at the time. However those two companies were founded by IT geeks who wanted to make cool stuff hence they employed people who were innovative, set up huge R&D departments and pursued numerous different product lines and business models being perfectly happy to write off R&D if it didn't bare fruit.
Can you really imagine Sugar leading Amstrad in such a way?
Sugar was wheeler dealer opportunist who briefly had a business model which worked. He would always have been a millionaire even if he hadn't been lucky, but he would never be a good CEO.
Alan Sugar was not trying to be in the same business or do the same kind of things as MSC / Apple. The clue is in the trading bit of the company name, he set out to be a trader and was successful at it.
BTW the UK punches above its weight in Silicon Valley type activities.....
Ben
^^^ This. Sugar was and is a trader. He started out, as many know, selling car aerials out of the back of a van.
He was not a university geek drop out. He found a gap in a rapidly expanding market and exploited it with rare genius.
Similarly with Branson. But, the latter had a relatively wealthy family to bank roll his early career.
He was not a university geek drop out. He found a gap in a rapidly expanding market and exploited it with rare genius.
Similarly with Branson. But, the latter had a relatively wealthy family to bank roll his early career.
Gassing Station | Business | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff