Zero to One: Notes on Start Ups, or How to Build the Future

a startup messed up at its foundation cannot be fixed.

1. The Engineering Question Can you create breakthrough technology instead of incremental improvements? 2. The Timing Question Is now the right time to start your particular business? 3. The Monopoly Question Are you starting with a big share of a small market? 4. The People Question Do you have the right team? 5. The Distribution Question Do you have

A board of three is ideal.

“What important truth do very few people agree with you on?”

As you craft a plan to expand to adjacent markets, don’t disrupt: avoid competition as much as possible.

You’ll attract the employees you need if you can explain why your mission is compelling: not why it’s important in general, but why you’re doing something important that no one else is going to get done. That’s the only thing that can make its importance unique.

Positively defined, a startup is the largest group of people you can convince of a plan to build a different future.

The lesson for entrepreneurs is clear: if you want to create and capture lasting value, don’t build an undifferentiated commodity business.

In the real world outside economic theory, every business is successful exactly to the extent that it does something others cannot. Monopoly is therefore not a pathology or an exception. Monopoly is the condition of every successful business.