Whatever your goal is you will never succeed unless you let go of your fears and fly – Sir Richard Branson
Pic credit : Virgin
‘Fly’ could literally be Sir Richard Branson’s middle name. From Virgin Airlines that made people fly in style to hot air balloons and now Virgin Galactic, flying people to space!
With selling Christmas trees and then a successful magazine Student in the 60s, selling records by mail order, opening a record shop, recording studio, record label in the 70s, 1980s was when he launched his vision to fly and Virgin Atlantic was launched followed by Virgin Airship & Balloon company. While he kept expanding his music record empire and stores, he also got his hands dirty with quirky offbeat ventures like Virgin Bride and Mates condoms. ( ha-ha…good he didn’t name the condom venture virgin) Virgin Rail & Virgin Mobile and Virgin holidays & Virgin Active and in the 2000s Virgin Energy, Virgin Cars, Virgin Money, Virgin Healthcare got added to his ever expanding never ending Virgin portfolio. Amongst the ones he launched in early 2010s the Virgin Hyper loop made lot of news. All that I mention here is roughly only 20% of his ventures; this man has experimented in almost Everything!
The commonality in all the things that Richard (yeah first name basis) ventures into is that he dabbles with thrill and business and not just passion and logic. The first business book I ever read was ‘Losing my Virginity’ and I remember telling my friends, I am going to join Virgin someday. Well, that never happened, but for entrepreneurs like me and other new age cult companies, Branson is the iconic cool guy who redefined norms of business. He made risk-taking look so cool. The quintessential enfant terrible!
All through the years, fascinated by this image, many tried to emulate his style and failed not realising that Branson is not only about style. It is his calculated thrill that he defines in his quote “Luck is when determination meets opportunity”
The iconic Virgin Galactic flight today stirred a few thoughts about others on this route and their entrepreneurial rides.
The Everything Store guy Jeff Bezos; a hard-core realist still is a staunch experimentalist. Someone who has a framework for “Regret Minimisation” one can only imagine how detailed and calculated his rocketing into high-risk space would be in the next 10 days.
On the surface of it, Richard appears to be the ‘Everything in the world’ guy and Bezos the ‘Everything in a Store’ guy. One might even be tempted to put bumper stickers on them; Richard’s would say ‘Let’s get into everything’ and Bezos’s, ‘Let’s get everything into one’
Nothing could be further than the truth;
Fun fact: Blue Origin was formed in 2000 and Virgin Galactic in 2004. Amazon Web Services contributes to 47% of Amazon's overall operating income, Washington Post became profitable three years after Bezos bought it. Whole Foods is a Jeff Bezos company and Bezos acquired Zappos.
While the media would love to peg the ‘Race to Space’ as a battle between these giants, it is quite interesting to notice that they both have set the rules of game for themselves and not against each other. Both have taken decades to realize their ambition. Branson is 70 years whereas Bezos is 57 years. And you thought one the young start up founders who have raised billions would do trip to space?
Not just age, even net worth hasn’t been an accounting factor for these icons. With Branson at $5.9 Billion and Bezos at $214 Billion, they are not playing a David Vs Goliath game; they are just playing their own game. From where they operate, the game is quite different. Bezos’ Blue Origin is aiming to go beyond the 100km line above sea level, whereas Virgin Galactic is aiming at 88-90 kms.
This space trip is aimed at inspiring our young generation to dream about space again. And obviously it will have its share of business growth for both of them. I believe we will have more space ventures soon. Let us not forget, there is another maverick who probably is aiming few more kms ahead and be the first person to land on Mars.
There is something about a race, a marathon, the race to be the richest, and the race for legacy. We all are part of a race, which is an interwoven matrix of different ideologies, morals, ambitions and a very skewed definition of success, finish line and legacy. Humanity is not built on rules, but dreams. It is dreamers like these that inspire and not set some rules for others to follow.
I think Branson’s call to have this trip 10 days before Bezos shows the sort of spirit of the game shown by sportsmen. Build / Leave a legacy and retire in style. We have seen that in sports very often. That one last Hurray. This morning Messi won his first major title for Argentina, this afternoon will be about Djokovic aiming to equal the record for 20 grand slams and then move to another orbit of being the first player to reach there. This evening’s Euro final for England is nothing less than the thrill of the space mission Neil Armstrong undertook while landing on the moon in 1969. It was around that time in 1966 that England was last in a major international final.
We all love underdogs; it shows the spirit of the game; for me it is the existence of a fair opportunity world.
Never won a major for his country Messi v/s multi-time champions Brazil, Quirky Djokovic’s record against the consistent Federer’s record, an English team who has reached finals after almost 55 years, the 70-year-old Branson vs the richest powerhouse behemoth on the planet Earth!
Branson, Bezos, Musk all are my icons, but my heartbeats for Sir Richard Branson, the non-conformist, thrill seeking enfant terrible!
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