Intel, Mobileye, and Smiling Curves

The great story behind it is that when Mike was taking over for Don Valentine with Doug, he was sitting and looking at Sequoia’s returns. He was looking at fund three or four, I think it was four maybe that had Cisco in it. He was like, how are we ever going to top that? Don’s going to have us beat. We’re never going to beat that.

He thought about i... See more

Market Selection in Vertical Integration

If you were to ask what sunk Convoy, it ultimately boils down to an over-dependence on the digital freight matching software they pioneered with a corresponding inattention to the operational parts of the brokerage that were really low margin. Technology isn’t a panacea for operational excellence. Every vert... See more

A subtext to last week’s article, Tech’s Two Philosophies, was the idea that there is a difference between Aggregators and Platforms; this was the key section:It is no accident that Apple and Microsoft, the two “bicycle of the mind” companies, were founded only a year apart, and for decades had broadly similar business models: sure, Microsoft licen... See more