Steve Jobs as the Most Famous Entrepreneur - Research Paper Example

? Steve Jobs is perhaps the most famous amongst the entrepreneurs and innovators of the century. He currently serves as the CEO of the Apple Inc. which he co founded in the late 1970s. Jobs spent most of his early life in California. He was born in San Frisco on February 24, 1955. Steve’s surroundings had a marked impact on him. He grew up in a place which was emerging to be a center of computer technology and electronics: Silicon Valley. Steve formed many important friendships that would hold a vital importance in his life later. He attended Cupertino Junior High School and Homestead High School. At Homestead, he became friends with Bill Fernandez as they same same interests in electronics. Through Bill he came to know Steve Wozniak, with whom he would later co-found Apple. After his high school, Jobs opted to go for Reed College, a private liberal arts institution located in Oregon. The cost of the college was extremely expensive but his parents consented to send him. He had to struggle a lot at the college. He did not have enough money to buy himself a room in the dorm so he used to sleep on the floor in his friends’ room. It was also at Reeds that he was attracted towards the Eastern mysticism and other different philosophical beliefs. Unable to bear the expenses, he eventually decided to drop out. In his own words, "If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts." He got a Job in Atari in 1974 which relieved some of the financial burden on him. For Jobs, Atari Company was an inspiration as it was the first video game Jobs had become friendly with Wozniak despite a big age difference. Wozniak had an idea of building a personal computer because he was unable to afford an Altair 8800, a personal computer kit famous at that time. His idea behind a personal computer was that it would be user-friendly and could do some basic tasks like calculation and load video games. Wozniak and Jobs sold off some of their personal belongings in order to pool in money for the equipments needed to build the computer. The first Apple I was built in a garage and in the first year of their business, they had to go from shop to shop to market their product. Meanwhile Wozniak worked on the better design and came up with Apple II. The Apple II was a computing device unlike the world had ever seen before. It had a color display and was compatible with a variety of different programs. Jobs knew that this product would be a revolution in the personal computers industry and he set out to find investors. A retired Intel executive, Mike Markkula decided to invest a huge amount of $250000 in their product and predicted that they would be a part of the Fortune 500 list within the next two years which did happen. Apple II was a huge hit and the company went public in December 1980, just four years after its creation. He was only 25 at that time but his total worth was more than $200 million. Apple’s existence however was soon threatened. IBM, a very renowned name in the industry was planning to venture in the personal computer market which could move Apple out of business if it did not come up with something new. Steve jobs started a project named Lisa, which was the name of the daughter of his former girlfriend; even though he refused to agree that he had fathered her. Steve Jobs however started to have conflict with the managers of the Company due to his volatile behavior and he was kicked out of the team that administered the Lisa project. As retaliation, he started to work on the development of Macintosh by hiring extremely bright and talented engineers in his development team. Although initially it was meant to jeopardize the Lisa project and the sales of Apple II, the Company soon started to depend on it after Lisa failed to make its mark in the market. Macintosh was a success for a little time but its demand continually declined. The Company was in a state of chaos because three of its products had failed and the reputation of the company was starting to go down. Furthermore, Steve’s attitude was not appreciated by the directors and eventually he was stripped of all his managerial rights in the year 1985. He was again dangling on an uncertain path after being kicked out from his own company. He formed up another company by the name of Next which aimed to improve the computer technology for research and educational purposes. Despite extensive marketing, ‘Next’ was unable to come even near to Apple in terms of success and revenue. However his other company Pixar proved to be yet another breakthrough in his career as it was able to produce the first ever animated movie of all time: Toy Story in the year 1995. The Apple Company on the other hand witnessed hard times in the absence of Steve Jobs. Apple eventually bought Next and Steve jobs was back into his own company as the ‘informal advisor to the CEO’. In 2000, he was made a full-time CEO of the Company and he took drastic measures to reestablish its reputation in the market. Since then he has strived hard and come up with amazing products like IPod. On January 27, 2010, he launched the IPad which could be considered a new revolution in the computing industry.. Steve Jobs has been a revolution as his entrepreneurship has improved the lifestyle of the people globally. He has been an awe-inspiring visionary and is considered as world’s most eminent business leader. His story is full of ups and downs but he remained focused on his interests and was able to change the world through his innovative ideas. Steve Jobs is a source of inspiration for millions of his fans around the world Works Cited Deutschman, A. (2000). The Second Coming of Steve Jobs. Broadway; 1st edition. Katz, M., Levering, R., & Moskowitz. (1984). Computer Entrepreneur. Dutton Adult. Young, J., & Simon, W. (2005). iCon Steve Jobs: The Greatest Second Act in the History of Business. Wiley; 1st edition . Read More