English articles

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Robin observes that many teams disappear after receiving investment and stop interacting altogether, which only makes it harder for them to move forward. His personal recommendation is to report progress at least once a quarter, good or bad: what is going well, where the bottlenecks are, what is going badly, and what to examine next. Facing investors’ questions is also a valuable opportunity to assess yourself from someone else’s perspective.

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On October 12, 2022, Robin observed that technology giants from Meta, Google, and Amazon to Microsoft and Apple were freezing hiring and recruiting less, while tech startups continued tightening their belts. Silicon Valley’s hiring freezes and layoffs appeared likely to continue for a while. His personal guess was at least another 12 to 24 months. (This was a forecast at the time; subsequent developments need to be compared separately.)

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Robin says entrepreneurship calls for disregarding existing rules, trying to break them, and setting new rules of the game. But avoid going too far into gray areas, lest you invite too much controversy, as with Uber.

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Robin argues that entrepreneurial success does not come from being exceptionally capable yourself. It comes from finding people more capable than you and attracting them to join. “Willingness to share shows generosity; knowing how to share shows wisdom.” He retells a story mentioned by Mr. Qiu: Momotaro kept sharing his rice balls along the way, recruiting a monkey, a dog, and a chicken to work toward and ultimately achieve the same goal. His conclusion is that entrepreneurs must be willing to share and know how to share to attract people more capable than themselves.

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Robin believes Taiwan has plenty of smart people, but the world has even more. Founders cannot win over the long run on clever little tricks and small openings alone. They should think more deeply and see more clearly before others have grasped what is happening.

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Many founders understand entrepreneurship as spotting an obvious opportunity and quickly copying it—and end up failing. This suggests that obvious opportunities and paths that are easy to enter may be traps. The question is how to escape the pull of conventional thinking and fantasy and discover real opportunities that others dismiss, fail to see, or do not understand.

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Robin suggests that startup founders listen to Chairperson He speak several times to learn how to explain an industry and its development trends. Although e-commerce has developed for more than 20 years and many regard it as mature or largely settled, He can still make it sound full of potential, with substantial room for further development.

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The post says that before this year, tech giants and startups favored an all-out sprint to capture the largest share as quickly as possible. This year—2022—the emphasis is on steady progress for the long run. To go farther, first move steadily, prepare well, and stay alert to changes in the external environment.

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Robin believes entrepreneurs should make as much use of government resources as possible. He points to an important ability of Elon Musk: working effectively with governments in different countries and leveraging national resources, including through SolarCity, Tesla, and SpaceX.

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Following the previous post on the clarity of US strategy in World War II, this post turns to the space shuttle. It argues that US space missions spent heavily but stalled because they tried to meet too many conflicting goals at once. According to the text, NASA originally wanted the cost of placing a pound of payload in orbit below $100. Five shuttles were ultimately built; two were lost, killing 14 astronauts, and the average cost was $28,000 per pound. Everyone made demands: Congress wanted low-cost solid-fuel rockets, the Air Force wanted wings, and legislators wanted contractors in their own states to get a share. The result was an incoherent hybrid. The conclusion: there are not 100 things to do; only one matters most.

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The CEO recounts reading many biographies of successful people at 21 and finding two common techniques: set a goal, then write it down and say it aloud. He put his dreams into words and carried them in a notebook, turning them into a powerful source of support. He says that over the following 15 years he founded GMO Internet and achieved his goal of taking the company public at 35 years and one month. Although one month later than planned, he realized a dream everyone thought impossible. (The timing is approximate as stated in the original and has not been independently verified.)

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Reprinted from Wan Weigang’s Elite Daily Lessons 2: entrepreneurs do not need an accurate assessment of their prospects, because someone who accurately understood the chances of startup success might never start a business. Entrepreneurs are often fearless through ignorance, overconfident, and ready to pick a direction and act first. Explorers like these are needed to find the right direction. The text says the opposite of success is mediocrity, not failure, and that those who fail deserve as much honor as those who succeed. It compares many of Musk’s ventures to gambling: without betting, you never lose, but you never win either. What entrepreneurs need, however, is a way of seeing things that mobilizes different forces.

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The world is complicated, but we can choose simplicity. Entrepreneurs can think about problems simply. Simplification contains many insights: it helps you grasp a problem’s essence, gives you the courage to face it, and offers the wisdom to solve it.

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Founders need to broaden their perspective and think at a higher level. Rather than always asking what their company could become, they can start from the industry: what should the company do, and in what direction could it help move the industry?

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The post quotes Wang Xing: major waves create many opportunities, each with enough room for a company to grow. At this stage, there is no need to combine everything at once. Choose one thing, specialize in it, do it exceptionally well, and satisfy all the parties served in that industry; the prospects will be very good. The conclusion is that early-stage founders must learn to make trade-offs among many opportunities.

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The post quotes Mao Daqing: “Entrepreneurship is an endless journey.” Like travel, it has no end. For someone who loves travel, curiosity never runs out. Setting out is the beginning; returning does not mean the end, only a rest before the next departure. The first step on the entrepreneurial journey is to treat every rejection as an opportunity. Robin adds that when facing setbacks, it is better to spend time doing something more valuable than complaining or blaming the external environment.

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Robin opens by suggesting another approach to competition: rather than always trying to eliminate rivals, find ways to tame them or align their interests with yours. A fable reprinted from Luo Pang’s 60 Seconds describes God facing two demons with only two arrows. One demon can be killed with one arrow, the other with two. God shoots the latter once, then tells both that whoever disobeys will receive the remaining arrow—and gains two slaves. The text says that when facing something hostile, we tend to want to eliminate it with every tool available and always feel underpowered. Another approach is to tame it, rise above it, and make it part of ourselves.

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Robin notes that Taiwan now has a dedicated agency for startups: the Small and Medium Enterprise Administration has been reorganized as the Small and Medium Enterprise and Startup Administration, and a chapter dedicated to startups is to be added to the Act for Development of Small and Medium Enterprises. The post sees this as a shift from policy packages such as “Asia Silicon Valley” to an ongoing, routine statutory responsibility. It expects a crucial impact on Taiwan’s startup development, particularly new growth momentum and jobs. (This is policy news from September 2023; the current situation has not been verified.)

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Robin lists the time from founding to reaching the Global 500 as stated in the post: 18 years for JD.com, 18 for Alibaba, 14 for Tencent, and 23 for Huawei. Xiaomi took only nine years. He says Lei Jun deserves credit for that, and that Xiaomi’s recent move into cars is worth watching. He adds a reminder: if you have spent ten years or more building a business without clear progress, examine where something has gone wrong.

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Robin offers a personal impression: US$1 million is the starting point for a SaaS company, and tripling to US$3 million seems broadly achievable within a few years. Taiwanese SaaS startups stall at the next tripling, to US$9 million; exceeding NT$300 million in revenue is quite difficult. Non-SaaS businesses may reach more than NT$1 billion in revenue, but growing another two- or threefold also faces a hurdle. Do not stay confined to local or regional markets: software and the internet have no borders. (The reference chart mentioned in the post is not available.)

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Robin identifies a blind spot common among technical founders: carrying a hammer and looking everywhere for nails. Blockchain startups a few years ago, and AI startups in more recent years, are the clearest examples. Both can be seen as taking a technology and looking everywhere for possible use cases.

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The post lists four signs of inner strength among successful people: knowing clearly what they want; knowing how to get it; having the execution skills to achieve it; and being good at adjusting their mindset to handle the bumps along the way. It is tagged “創業36條軍規” (36 Rules of Entrepreneurship).

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Robin argues that founders should quantify their products and services as much as possible, rather than offering only empty narratives. Follow industry measurement standards where they exist. Where the industry has no such standards, there is a tremendous opportunity.

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The post quotes He Fan: once the economy grows, many problems resolve; without growth, even things that were not problems become thorny challenges. Robin adds that you can replace “economy” with “company.”

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The excerpt says that less brings gains, while more brings confusion. Good strategy means subtraction: doing fewer, but right, things. A company that spreads its efforts across many goals has few resources left for what truly matters. Resources are limited; trying to do too much means doing nothing well. Simplifying and concentrating resources makes success more likely.

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The excerpt says strategy means choosing what to do and what not to do. Do not consume company resources on nonstrategic opportunities. Only by continually focusing on the core business can a company strengthen its core competitiveness. What is that core business? Something others find hard to replace and you can replicate quickly. Strategy requires knowing what to leave out to achieve focus and competitiveness.

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Robin asks whose fault it is when a company has not taken off. You can, of course, blame the environment, shareholders, and other outside factors; external attribution is easy. But rather than shifting responsibility for failure outward, he personally believes you should examine yourself first. The biggest problem is probably not an external factor.

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In this sixth segment of Allen Zhang’s early-2016 speech, he discusses payments, Enterprise WeChat, and the future of WeChat. A service works best when users barely notice it: they simply open WeChat and scan a QR code when paying. Enterprise WeChat would have far greater value if it extended beyond internal company communications and made every employee an authenticated service contact. A 4S dealership employee, for example, could function like a customer’s mini program, combining a service menu with real-time conversation and helping build customer loyalty. Zhang argues that population is finite while new services are not; in the internet era, three to five years can mark a new generation of needs. Innovation is the only way to meet the future, and the real challenge comes from changing users rather than competitors. The WeChat team does not set out to hit KPIs; it asks what each feature means to users, and questions features built only to drive traffic. WeChat’s aspiration is to be each person’s best tool and friend, and to create a marketplace where creators can realize value. In the image of the wall and the egg, it sides with the egg. Its only real competitor, Zhang says, is whether its organizational capabilities can keep pace with the times. The excerpt closes with the line, “Among all things, hope is the most beautiful.”

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A Roadmap for SaaS Startups identifies three headwinds for China’s software-as-a-service (SaaS) industry. First, demand for IT products that improve efficiency has not yet taken off at scale: many small and midsize businesses are managed informally and focus on winning orders, without recognizing how IT systems can reduce costs and improve productivity. Because efficiency is the core value of general-purpose SaaS tools, companies without a clear pain point are difficult to sell to. Second, many SaaS products are not good enough. Early innovations are quickly copied, leaving software companies to compete on marketing and price-performance or turn to custom development. Yet customers’ needs change frequently, and vendors may not even recover the cost of the staff assigned to a project. Global software giants such as Oracle, SAP, and Microsoft dominate the most profitable market segments, leaving only a few niches. Weak software-industry capabilities carry over into SaaS: products lack useful features and clear value, architectures are repeatedly rebuilt, and organizations lack management systems. This creates a vicious cycle of weak product value, poor customer word of mouth, and slow demand growth. Third, complex corporate IT procurement drives up marketing costs, slows customer access, and makes renewals require fresh negotiations. The author sees procurement as a symptom; the deeper issues are demand and product value. The book expects industry-specific and scenario-specific SaaS to grow faster than general-purpose tools because the problems are more concrete, the founders often understand the industry firsthand, and the products take fewer detours.

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Fusion physicist Annie Kritcher, named one of Nature’s ten people who mattered in 2022, offers three ways of thinking worth learning from. First, build complementary strengths: reaching the top 20% in two fields can put you in the top 5% of the population. Alongside scientific excellence, Kritcher sought opportunities to lead projects and teams and deliberately honed her communication skills. Second, keep looking for hope amid pessimism. The U.S. inertial-confinement fusion program began in 1997, its facility was completed in 2009, and ignition was first achieved in 2022. Before success, you may not know exactly what you are pursuing; solve the problems in front of you and seek small gains in each successive experiment. Third, communicate in a way that quickly establishes common ground: explain ignition to the public as bringing to Earth the process that powers the Sun, then switch to technical language when speaking with peers. Robin’s commentary applies this to entrepreneurship: an MVP should be low-cost, fast, and designed for learning through trial and error; stay constructive, complain less, and do what you can.

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Repeated decision-making can wear down willpower, discipline, and self-control. A Forbes article argued that consumer decision fatigue would be a key problem for businesses: comparing brands and reviews or trying to qualify for discounts can leave shoppers too exhausted to buy. One study estimated that people make 35,000 decisions a day, creating the familiar pattern of being meticulous about small things but careless about big ones. The common solution is to simplify: create default rules for recurring decisions and set limits for shopping. The aim is not to perfect trivial matters, but to save energy for consequential decisions. Drawing on Wan Weigang’s Elite Daily course, the article adds that setbacks themselves do not determine our well-being as much as our response to them. A maxim offers three approaches: the weak retaliate, the strong forgive, and the wise ignore. “Ignore” means setting aside the emotional reaction, not neglecting the event. Notice your emotions, offset small annoyances with small pleasures, and separate your own responsibilities from what you cannot control. We need not wait for one grand opportunity to shape ourselves; we can do so by handling the small things in daily life well.

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The most important part of self-management is devoting enough time to what matters most. Lei Jun’s first rule of time management is the 80/20 principle: set aside 80% of things and focus on doing the other 20% well—either do not do something, or aim to be the best. The article warns against using tactical diligence to cover up strategic laziness: working hard without spending enough time thinking about your goals may get you nowhere. After reading Fire in the Valley at Wuhan University, Lei set detailed goals for six months, one year, and three years, and completed his undergraduate coursework in two years. Procrastination describes planning as a connection to the future rather than a trap. Sheng Fu’s approach is to clarify the goal first, then peel back the path to it layer by layer. A clear goal and a sufficiently broken-down path allow you to mobilize your resources. The article also retells the professor’s jar experiment: golf balls, pebbles, sand, and beer fit only in the right order. Fill your time with trivia first, and the important people and things will not fit. Lei’s three suggestions are to set aside a few hours each week for reflection, rank each day’s tasks and do only the important few, and deal with simple things immediately.

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Robin reviews the principles of STEAM education and criticizes problems in the market. STEAM grew out of a U.S. K–12 education initiative, adding arts to STEM—science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. It is hands-on, interdisciplinary learning: children complete projects that interest them and relate to their lives, learn through the process, make mistakes, and try different ideas. Yet Robin argues that many STEAM providers lack structure and depth, merely cobbling together experiments or lesson content. Maker activities are mistaken for technological innovation, while robotics programs treat imported hardware and courses as sophisticated toys, sometimes without updating them for years. Asked how they actually build capabilities, many providers cannot give a clear answer. A complete STEAM education, he argues, should start with real-life problems and follow scientific inquiry or engineering practice: children describe a problem, identify constraints, research previous approaches, propose solutions, select one and build a model, make a physical object, test it, evaluate it, and improve the design. Learning objectives also need a clear assessment framework: one-third knowledge, one-third technical skills, and one-third integrated capabilities, with explicit instructional activities supporting the latter two.

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Zhang Xiaoyu summarizes three hiring criteria associated with YC. First is drive: at an early-stage startup, attitude matters far more than ability. Drive means facing difficulties and achieving goals under your own steam, without being pushed. Apple, Nike, Starbucks, and Airbnb did not arise from astonishing technology, but from professionals overcoming obstacles to make good products. People with impressive credentials may have more fallback options and retreat first when difficulties arise. Marc Andreessen compares drive to height in basketball: it cannot be taught, so find people who have it and persuade them to join. Second is curiosity: a desire to keep improving one’s craft and stay at the forefront of a field because it is enjoyable, not compulsory. Startups do not have time to cultivate this quality. One interview technique is to ask which websites inaccessible in China the candidate regularly visits. Robin suggests asking what skill or technology they learned most recently, why they chose it, and how much effort they invested. Third is integrity. Paul Graham’s method is to keep probing a familiar subject until the candidate reaches something they do not know, then observe whether they admit it or bluff. A good leader’s progress should also improve the lives of subordinates, rather than come at their expense. The article ends with a metaphor from Xu Haofeng, screenwriter of The Grandmaster: one kind of person is like a wildfire that leaves nothing growing, while another is like an auspicious creature whose passage brings nourishing water, fertile soil, birdsong, and flowers.

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The post quotes an unidentified author: if your business cannot operate without you, you do not really own it—you merely work for it. Such a business is chaotic, making it the worst job in the world. Robin adds that at a certain stage, founders must choose to let go of and hand over their current tasks, then move up a level so the company can keep advancing rather than stagnate.

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Robin recommends Paul Graham’s Hackers & Painters and describes a Silicon Valley entrepreneurial spirit that disregards rules and wants to break them quickly. Entrepreneurs look for gaps between the ideal and the actual system, then use those gaps to build new businesses. The accompanying excerpt—by another author whose source is not identified—describes Buchheit’s hacker mindset: challenge the received idea that success has no shortcuts and believe that shortcuts and loopholes exist. Starting a business is itself an act of hacking. The greatest hacking discovers the nature of the world through persistent exploration. The excerpt ends by suggesting that readers identify inconvenient parts of the industries and daily routines around them and create shortcuts.

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The article argues that entrepreneurship needs passion, but enthusiasm inevitably cools. To get things done, learn to become deliberately cool-headed, beginning with a calm assessment of genuine opportunities. It quotes Kevin Kelly through Chinese renderings whose exact wording has not been verified: real opportunities do not announce themselves with a “great opportunity” headline; do not waste a crisis; every breakthrough initially looks laughable and absurd; and success can trap us, so say no to tasks you are unlikely to fail at and yes to those you might fail at.

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The post recounts four basic suggestions from Chris Anderson, whom it describes as TED’s founder: focus on one idea; give listeners a reason to care; explain your idea through concepts familiar to them; and make the idea worth sharing. Robin’s advice is to draft an outline, decisively cut half of it, and then cut half again. A good talk develops one central theme rather than branching out excessively.

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The post quotes advice from a book it calls Yongbao Ni de Kehu (擁抱你的客戶, meaning “Embrace Your Customers”): remember all the information about your first 100 or 1,000 customers and study it as thoroughly as possible. It says the secret to success is captured in four Chinese characters: know your customers.

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The book excerpt says to focus first on users’ problems and then on solutions. Today’s challenge is not developing more features, but discovering which features need to be developed. Starting with a solution is like making a key before there is a door: even a beautiful key may leave you searching for a suitable door for a long time. Starting instead with the door—a problem worth solving—makes the key much easier to create. Robin asks whether your startup is making an exquisite key before there is a door and then searching for one. Usually, he says, you will not find it.