Reid Hoffman Quotes

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

I have seen entrepreneurs ask for hundreds of millions of dollars on a concept and try to sell because of 'their passion' for an idea. If the idea is that good, why wouldn't I cut you out and hire someone who is just as passionate for much, much less?

For me, the winning strategy in any start-up business is, 'Think big but start small.'

By definition startups usually do not turn a profit.

I love working with really early stage startups where the outcome is still in doubt. Maybe they'll go on to greatness, or maybe they'll never get off the runway at all.

The biggest challenge is to build the team and start the company, while hiring people, raising money, building a brand which has no history, all at the same time. You're doing a lot of things that in an established company are already done.

I think that's exactly what Silicon Valley was all about in those days. Let's do a startup in our parents' garage and try to create a business.

Taking a great new idea with an entrepreneurial team that wants to create something significant and trying to build a real company is what is interesting.

For decades, technology entrepreneurship has been revered, and people like Steve Jobs and Elon Musk were heroes.

My attitude is there are at least hundreds of interesting startups that are going to get going in every year.

Building a successful business requires a combination of human capital, financial resources, market opportunity, persistence, community support, and even luck.

I'm a firm believer of the venture capitalist-style approach to solving problems. Rather than doing many small things that you hope add up, it's much more effective to work on projects that are high risk and high reward.

So many of the major decisions that affect the entire future of your enterprise happen during its first year in business. In fact, most don't make it because they don't know how to get the resources they need to survive.

I'm in favour of entrepreneurial, risk-taking businesses that create great products and services.

Fact is, inventing an innovative business model is often mostly a matter of serendipity.

What I've learned in my career is that it takes the same amount of effort to build a $10bn company as it does a $1bn company; you as the entrepreneur are going to put your entire life, your entire effort into it.

Once a few Facebook employees put together a promising idea and start a company, that's very exciting to people. I happen to think being a Facebook employee is really correlated with good ideas.

Business has only two functions - marketing and innovation.

If you look at where the tried and true of Silicon Valley VC's are investing, it's in people who understand what it takes, who've been through it and have a network of people they can tap and resources to pull together.

It's really easy to create a $1 billion company - you just have to solve a $10 billion problem.

Be careful not to start a company that really belongs as a feature of another company, like the 25 Twitter URL shortener companies out there. Pick a real problem that's here to stay.

Technology ventures can succeed with very little investment, unlike many other industries. A lot of the big Internet players like Google or Yahoo were started by a couple of guys with computers. Microsoft was started in Bill Gates' garage.

I want to create an environment where I can create technology, get it into the hands of someone to market it, and move on to other technologies so I can keep innovating. I want to be a serial entrepreneur: Incubate an idea, get it to a good state, and make that an enabler to get to the next state. It's every researcher's fantasy.

To turn really interesting ideas and fledgling technologies into a company that can continue to innovate for years, it requires a lot of disciplines.

Great entrepreneurs focus intensely on an opportunity where others see nothing.