The Mistakes Some CEOs made about World Ruling Innovation

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A lot of technological innovations have changed and shaped our worlds as scientists, innovators and inventors work tirelessly to bring growth and ease to humans with the help of technology but in doing this, there are always people who do not always believe in this technology and they always use their words and actions to demining the great works of the innovators, technologist, inventors and life changers. It is quite understandable when such negative words and actions come from people around who are not well known to world, but it now becomes a thing of concern when people with reputation and power turn down inventions because they do not see a future in them. I will be going through a list of wrong words said about projects and innovations from CEOs and what happened to the projects.

IBM and Computer

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The early computers were big and consumed a lot of energy and its use wasn’t visible as it was space consuming and energy consuming and to IBM, a company which was into the business of punch cards, mechanical calculator and producing typewriters, there was no future for computer. The Chairman of International Business Machine (IBM) Thomas J Watson said;

“I think there is a world market for maybe five computers” - Thomas J Watson

Western Union Telegraph Company President’s and the Telephone

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Before the advent of the telephone, the telegraph was making the world a better place and western union was holding a monopoly in the telegraph market. Telegraph was the future then and had conquered other means of communication so what did you expect from the president of western union telegraph company William Orton who was at the peak of a technological advancement then to Alexander Graham bell who wanted to sell the patent to a new technology, the Telephone. Graham wanted to sell the patent for $100,000 but Orton refused and wrote to graham about his invention saying;

“After careful consideration of your invention, while it is a very interesting novelty, we have come to the conclusion that it has no commercial possibilities… What use could this company make of an electrical toy…. The Idea is idiotic on the face of it. Furthermore, why would any person want to use this ungainly and impractical device when he can send a message to telegraph office…?” - William Orton

Those words were harsh and I can’t imagine the look and Graham and his team back then but as it turned out to be, Graham started making telephone and doing upgrades to his work and in 2 years, the company had made a revenue of over $25 million. Today, the phone is accepted worldwide and I am sure Western Union till date will regret that great loss.

Steve Ballmer and iPhone

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The iPhone was going to bring a revolution to the world of mobile phone coming to compete with a lot of phones giants at the moment of which Microsoft was one of them. The difference between the phones available then and what iPhone was bringing was Keyboard. iPhone was a touch screen phone while previous phones needed keyboards to operate. Steve Ballmer said this about the iPhone;

$500 fully subsidized with a plan, I say that is the most expensive phone in the world and it doesn’t appeal to business customers because it doesn’t have a keyboard which makes it not a very good email machine” - Steve Ballmer



Seeing this, it is clear that there are always mixed thoughts about innovations but what would have happened if this people had seen something different in this innovations, maybe they would have bought the companies, patents and rights. Seeing things from a fresh perspective would have made this companies millions, billions or even trillions.



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