Sep 2006
Domain expertise is over-rated
Saturday - September 30, 2006 Filed in: Venture
Capital
For one, true disruptive innovation does not come from compliance to an existing market. Apple, as a pure technology company, has proven it does not need to be a content expert to take the music business for a spin, and a massive overhaul. Real innovation starts with a healthy skepticism about current markets and its tactics. Coming up with new approaches to make money, and fundamentally changing the workings of paralyzed markets, is what makes my heart tick.
In my career I've always taken the disruptive standpoint. I became one of the most successful media experts for Oracle, not because of my prior domain expertise: I had none, but because of my drive to disrupt and look at the issues from a different perspective, one that is not necessarily tied to common acceptance. Finding and believing in OuterBay Technologies when it was unpopular and (yet) unsuccessful and creating a new market segment no industry analyst had heard of and starting immergo video communications without prior video communications knowledge and signing up big brand customers like IDG, blowing existing 20 year old production companies away, are living proof of why domain expertise is over-rated. SoftKinetic, the company I just became the CEO of, enables the next disruption in home entertainment no-one has travelled before.
The right investments are those made into people with guts, who vow to change how markets work and create disruption that unleashes new money. As Einstein taught us early on: imagination is more important then knowledge.