[fragmede]

A slightly more "we're-living-it" example is to look at Elon Musk and Tesla. Mr. Musk has succeeded in convincing the auto industry to make electric cars. Not all by himself, mind you, certainly the EU emissions regulatory environment had something to do with the "convincing", but nor were those regulations dreamed up in a world where Tesla did not exist.

Fisker tried and failed at around the same time Tesla was making the roadster, so while there is certainly an element of luck to Elon Musk's success, saying it's all due to luck undercuts the fact that he's also worked very, very hard to get where he is - there are stories about him sleeping in the factory so he can do QC inspections himself.

I'm doubtful that electric cars would be in the same position they are in today, if this single individual, Elon Musk, had not existed, but that's impossible to prove - there were hobbyists who were converting Mazda Miatas and Honda Civics to electric engines, without Mr. Musk, would one of those hobbyists have "made it big" and managed to the auto industry into the future?

[rljy]

But this still potentially "luck". Or perhaps "luck" is a very bad term. Imagine that Musk had a twin name Allen who happened to start a company called "pay-now". And "pay-now" was hit with a lawsuit related to the patent on eshops and had to shut down. Allen would never have started Tesla. Would we even know about Allen? He wouldn't even be rich. His behavior, timing, actions ect. were identical to those of Musk, but his outcome was greatly different. There are probably several Allens out there. Now, consider, what if Musk was identical, but he had never started paypal at all. Instead he, after studying electric drive trains for 20 years, made a proposal to investors that an electric car company should be started. This Allen would be MORE qualified than Musk to start an electric car company, but lacking capital to back the investments, he would be LESS likely to succeed!

[fragmede]

I hate to break this to you, but the American myth; that if Allen is just as smart, and works just as hard as Elon Musk, then they both get to be just as successful, is a sham; a lie. There are definitely many Allens out there, but shame of failure means we barely ever hear that story. There are people dumber and lazier than you or I, that have far more money than you ever will, or at least did far less work to get there. Not to be cynical about the world, but there's more to life than fame or fortune.

There is undoubtedly luck involved in business, I can agree with that. FedEx's Vegas story from their early days could easily have gone the other direction, and then they wouldn't even rate a mention in a book about the history of shipping.

However, I disagree about studious Allen - someone who studied drive trains for 20 years is less qualified than serial entrepreneur Mr. Musk, who had two successful businesses under his belt before coming on board Tesla simply due to his experience running businesses. That Mr. Musk was already wealthy from those businesses which gave him a leg up with Tesla seems unfair to everyone who didn't start off independently wealthy, but c'est la vie. (There have been several articles recently about the dearth of new software company IPOs, due to how much the big 3 control the industry.)

Starting an auto manufacturing business was never going to be a bootstrapped operation the same way a two-person software startup in a garage could be, so having funding to hire a good drivetrain engineer is simply part of it. Having studied electric drivetrains for 20 years, maybe Allen ends up a very early employee at his brother's car company, and if that goes public, then Allen will be very rich - say he's still holding on to 50k shares of pre-IPO TSLA, he's doing quite well for himself, despite not being famous. Not nearly as well as Elon Musk, but he's doing well enough.

That's not to say Allen couldn't learn about news skill so he can run a business, or about, say, the intricacies of lithium battery manufacturing, but studying drivetrains for 20 years doesn't make a CEO. CTO for a drivetrain subcontractor perhaps, but sales and marketing and managing people; all those soft skills that aren't hard-core engineering building a product are actually vital to a company's success. (There was even a post on HN early today saying just that very thing.)

Elon Musk's success with SpaceX's success comes from rejecting prevailing industry knowledge - that reusable rockets just won't work. Everyone else in the industry, especially those that had been studying rockets for 20 years, knew that as fact.