Terry Matthews Quotes

Our shipment of mowers was lost at sea, and while we waited, winter descended and covered our green lawns with snow.

We set it up with $4,000 of borrowed money and now it's making $1.5 billion revenues. It doubled its revenues every year for the first 11 years and generally in electronics a successful company can do that and remain stable. Anything above that can be unstable.

In my career, I have started up around 40 companies and I have lost only two when the normal success rate is one in 10, and some of them have had absolutely staggering success.

Why is it that I can start up 60 companies and only ever lose two - and even the two that I lost, the technology went on to be a part of someone else's success?

I am truly an angel investor and I'm not a passive investor. As a passive investor, I am awful because I cannot put funding into a company and leave it to other people.

It's a good win. I've been working on it for 20 years, understanding how it works, how the Ryder Cup board works. It's all about persistence.

I don't think I'm stubborn. I just focus on the task at hand and do what it takes. Persistence is the single most important thing for success.

It wasn't clear to anyone when I signed that agreement what was on my mind but I knew in my gut that there would be a technology change in enterprise communications.

Last year it didn't look a particularly good thing to do but in my gut I was absolutely convinced that convergence would happen this year. Now I know I'm right.

Our shipment of mowers was lost at sea and while we waited, winter descended and covered our green lawns with snow.

That taught me a key lesson, the importance of timing. The shipping company lost the lawnmowers! By the time they showed up no one wanted them, as you can't cut grass when it's covered with snow.

And that's the secret. Timing, hard work, smarts and partners. Using that formula, I've either founded or funded over 80 companies, and none have gone bankrupt. Most have done very well.

I proceeded to increase our spending on IP solutions. I more than doubled R&D. Now, I am pleased to say, I got the timing right.

That tells you I'm doing the right thing, and it also means that if we hadn't spent the money on IP solutions for enterprises the company would be in decline so rapidly that I would probably be selling it now. Instead, I am taking market share from everyone else...so I feel pretty good about that.

I always had engineering in my blood and I got a reputation for being able to fix stuff, and when people asked ‘How much?' I'd say ‘It's a pleasure and no charge'. It left an obligation and I very quickly found when Christmas came around, I had so many gifts.

If there is a payment, it is a settled account, but if it is for free, it is not settled and it engenders a very close relationship.

I helped to build Mitel and then Newbridge and lots of other companies, developing a tight team relationship and a fighting spirit that wins. I love kicking ass.

The deal was that for every $1,000 loaned to the company, the person who loaned would end up having a $1 share. Ten years later, that $1 share turned into $2.5 million.

Demand grossly outstrips the ability to supply. Anything you've seen in the last 10 years in networking technology is just the tip of the iceberg. This is one of the most exciting developments ever in human endeavour because networking is fundamental to every aspect of life.

There may be a few problems now with the share prices but this is such a titchy bit of the iceberg and the value of the overhaul of the network is so staggeringly high that the entire sector will continue to do well. And the applications are even bigger once the basic highway has been laid. Until you put the roads in, the cars, buses and garages can't happen.

This is dramatic and it's now. You've got to take advantage of the infrastructure and the applications, as in one or two years all the roads will be in place.

Lots of companies are cutting back because the so-called bubble burst, allowing me to hire some of the best talent on the planet. While they were cutting back I bought Mitel and increased R&D spending by 50 per cent.

I can now do things for senior citizens in terms of health care which will help deal with a chronic shortage of nurses, for instance.

Five years ago who would have said cell phones would have photography capability? And that is a great example of integrating things, because the truth is people like networking their photos - passing them to others - but who would have thought that? It's a massive new business, and those people who make cell phones without a camera are having a tough damn time right now. And then there's the whole growth of SMS text messaging: 138 billion SMS text messages were sent in 2003 in Europe alone. Good God! And five years ago that was almost nothing.

To start, you are not looking at the replacement of simple things. So, for example, if I said to a business person ‘I have really good news, I am speaking to you through a Voice over IP system,' well big deal, I can do that over a traditional phone network. Where's the extra value?

Yes, IP is lower cost but I could do that same functionality before. On the other hand, if I can, with a click of a button, add an entire team [into a conversation] quickly and easily, that's new.

If I am on a call from my desk I can say ‘Hold on for a second, I'd like my workgroup to be in on this' and I can look up my workgroup contact list and drag and drop it in Your Assistant and all those people would be added immediately. And all the files and discussions associated with the call would pop up. So what are we talking about here? We're talking about secure instant messaging, knowledge management, and a simple drag-and-drop process that can bring in a whole group of people.

But again, if you say ‘I've got Voice over IP therefore you must buy it because it's new technology,' that's bullshit.

Every different vertical has its own set of killer apps, but the important thing is that IP broadband has created a killer environment for new apps. During 2004 the conditions that allow getting killer apps were there, but the confusion as to how to get there and what they could gain was not present. Companies want to see benefits in a substantive way.

Anything you can introduce that, one, speaks to revenue growth and, two, reduces costs and improves customer satisfaction - that's all good. If you're talking to a hospital and you come up with apps that save lives that is their most important thing. If you prove that, they'll buy it.

Okay, so I suggest you write some articles to stay that's bullshit. Canadians need to just get on with it.

I don't have time to play.

Right now we are in an Aspirin market, instead of a vitamin market. We call it that because vitamins are for healthy purposes and Aspirin is a pain killer. People are only making changes when there is pain, but I think...people will begin to look at business more as a vitamin market.

Make a mark; don't be part of the living dead.

The opportunity for me now is to use all those pipes and develop broadband solutions where you can use video, voice and data to help businesses. It is about utilizing the technology and delivering tangible business benefits.

It's important to be an enthusiast and know what's going on. When everyone else was downsizing including Nortel, ‘dumb nuts' [himself] was investing...People were saying, ‘This guy is a nut case.'