So, you would like to know how Mark Shuttleworth, a youngster of just 27 years when it all happened for him, became a BILLIONAIRE from his Internet Business!
An enquiring mind............I like that!
So let me tell you!
Mark Shuttleworth graduated from Cape Town University with an Honours degree in Business Science.
Suddenly disgorged from the comfortable womb of academia he discovered that in the Real World you need to earn MONEY to survive.
According to his own testimony he first considered building web sites for others as an option. Somewhere in is wanderings he happened upon Verisign, a 'Net company offering on line security and web site verification SSL - secure socket layer (whatever that means). To cut a short story even shorter, Mark joined a company selling Verisign SSL secure servers and learned all there was to know about algorithms, SSLs, and 128-bit encryption.
No slouch in Math, Mark was soon in his element and it was not long before he developed itchy feet and hankered to 'do his own thing'. Here's the really important bit: he followed it up with ACTION.
No slouch in Math, Mark was soon in his element and it was not long before he developed itchy feet and hankered to 'do his own thing'. Here's the really important bit: he followed it up with ACTION.
He quit his job and with the blessing of Verisign opened his own SSL verification company ... Thawte ...in the garage of his Parents' home in Cape Town. Verisign probably thought that Mark would get a few clients in South Africa and amble along with a 'just surviving' local business. Meanwhile Mark had other ideas and soon he had a goodly following of clients mostly in Europe and Australia but also in Verisign's home turf, the USA. In fact it was about 40% of the current market with only about 1% of his business located in South Africa. Within only a handfull of years from launch, his company, Thawte, was generating a mere US$3,5 million in revenues. Not shabby for South Africa but still not in the big league. Little as this was in 'Fat Cat' language it attracted the attention of Verisign, his former mentors.
Since Mark was offering his SSL at less than half the price of Verisign to Companies, and gave them away FREE to ordinary folk, it was no surprise that Verisign sat up and took note. The writing was on the wall....Mark was not going to be a 'make ends meet' kind of business. Here was a real threat. Something had to be done!
After due consideration of their dilemma Verisign made Mark an offer he could not refuse: a BILLION DOLLARS for his company!!!
Being SMART Mark accepted the offer...then settled every one of his fifty or so employees, right down to the gardener, with a USD$100,000 parting gift, and began to plan his next adventure...a ride into Space. What a regular nice guy....the World could use a few more of them.
The point is....no Company generating a mere US$3,5 million dollars was worth a buying price of ... a BILLION DOLLARS.. That, my Friend, is a s**t load of cash!
Let's put that in perspective.....
Businessman of the year in South Africa, Mike Lamberti, heads up a large retail organisation with a presence in every city. As CEO he earns somewhat more than Million Dollars a year. Actually closer to two million dollars per year when perks, bonuses and share options are added. It would take him more than 500 years at that earning level to stand next to Mark in the money stakes! Assuming, of course, that Mark earned nothing over the same period.
So what was it???? Why did Verisign pay him a Billion Dollars for his company???
It was his customer base...all recorded with names, addresses, e-mails. They bought a ready made SSL market with an indefinite future 'sell to' potential and eliminated some serious competition in one easy operation. What's a Billion Dollars when it's someone else's money...and the dot com bubble was at its zenith? Sense some similarilties with PayPal, ICQ and some of the other mega fortune 'buy out' deals that have happened on the 'Net? Yes??? Well you are begining to get the picture: It's all about the Multiplier Effect. Big, big multipliers = big, big money.
Anyway, that my Friend is the objective: build a big, big Multiplier.
"Be Open to new ideas....
give opportunities a chance to find you. "
Mark Shuttleworth...27 Internet Billionaire.
You ain't seen nothin' yet....
The most recent internet buy out extravaganza .... when Google bought U-tube, an internet start-up not yet two years old and having never yet shown a profit ... for a staggering 1,7 billion dollars. Why? Because they have ME. (I wish) in the form of about ten million visitors a month to their web site.
Apply the previous reasoning and it would take Mike all of six thousand years before Christ was born and right up to present times !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Who on earth thinks in these kind of numbers?
the mind googles!
The most recent internet buy out extravaganza .... when Google bought U-tube, an internet start-up not yet two years old and having never yet shown a profit ... for a staggering 1,7 billion dollars. Why? Because they have ME. (I wish) in the form of about ten million visitors a month to their web site.
Apply the previous reasoning and it would take Mike all of six thousand years before Christ was born and right up to present times !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Who on earth thinks in these kind of numbers?
the mind googles!