Asking Tech Billionaires How They Got Rich!

Excuse me, sir, sir, sir question for you real quick. How did you get rich? I have a channel with 22 million followers. I need to be billionaires on how they made it. How did you get rich? Have you heard of twitch? What was the most amount of money you made in a single year we sold twitch in 2014 for a nine hours every doll almost a Billion dollars. No, excuse me, sir. Sir question for you, man. How old were you when you became a billionaire this year this year? I was 38 years old. Congratulations. How did you become a billionaire man? People here get rich by writing code. I got rich by making code optional Who am I here with today Ashton kosher a lot of people do you as a famous Hollywood actor? But what they don't realize is that you've been one of the most successful investors in Silicon Valley What's the greatest piece of advice that you received throughout your career? How you doing, my friend? It's great to see you Basketball team do you own I want this? Hey, we were $50 I did and you turn that into an absolute empire if me and you died tomorrow and you had one more message sleep with the Younger generation, what would that be? Well, I would say to them Today I'm gonna be any room some of the richest tech billionaires in America I'm at one of the largest tech conferences in the world inside our AI found billionaire investors It's some of the most powerful people in Silicon Valley. These are the people building the future and getting rich Today, I'm gonna cold approach them to find out what it actually takes to get rich and later in this video We're gonna be heading to the house of a billionaire who sold a software company for five billion dollars and bought an NBA team So this video is about to be insane from start to finish that being said let's get this video on the way Excuse me, sir, sir question for you, man. How old were you when you became a billionaire this year this year? I was 38 years old. Congratulations. Thank you for a bit. I'm from Jordan originally How did you become a billionaire man? What type of company was it? You know people here get rich by writing code. I got rich by making code optional Wow So if you have an idea you go to replit you can build an app by just putting in a prompt you became an AI Billionaire. Yeah, congratulations, man Seriously, how can somebody use AI to become wealthy in today's world? Everybody talks about AI this artificial intelligence that how can somebody actually leverage AI to become wealthy in today's world? You know the difference between people who get rich and people who don't it's not about smartness It's people who ship people who do things the Internet and AI is the biggest wealth creation engine There's gonna be more millionaires and billionaires created in the next five years than ever in the history of humanity And the difference is getting started putting something out there So do you think that what calls people back is they just don't even get started there? Did they procrastinate? I think it requires some technical knowledge. It requires some schooling or whatever No, just go to a site like replit put in your idea. See what comes out iterate from there. They go sell go market Go put your ideas out. One of my favorite things is sell it first and then figure it out. That's right customers You need revenue, right? Exactly growing up. Did you come from a lot of money? I did not my father's a refugee actually and Cool thing about it is he bought us a computer when very young and I learned how to code and I started building businesses The difference is I had good ideas It wasn't just that I learned to code so it became my life mission how to make it so that anyone with a good idea Can become wealthy and did you have any idea growing up that you were gonna become a billionaire? Is that ever a goal? Yes, yes. Why what was your self-talk when you were a young kid in Jordan? I always felt like you should think big I always believed in visualization have incredible patience our business took eight years to take off Most people quit in a year. We got offered to get acquired for a billion dollars in 2019 I said no because I want to build a trillion dollar company, right? Always thinking big and paradoxically have incredible patience to be able to do it in 10-20 years But move incredibly fast in the short term How did you prioritize long-term thinking over short-term profits who said no to a billion dollars man that that's remarkable people never do that How did you prioritize the long-term thinking when you had the opportunity to build, you know forever? Well, I think it's mindset. It's like it's Zuckerberg that much better than me is Elon that much better than me Why are they better than me? They're not and if you just have that self-belief that self-talk I think you're gonna be able to achieve amazing things in the next one to two years What is the best industry people should be looking to get into right now? I think AI is yeah, just be specific what part of AI in the next year's Yeah, I think it's important not to be specific because you can apply AI to any industry So if you're a doctor look around you, why is AI not being applied to healthcare if you are a driver? Why is an AI being applied to trucking literally pick any industry any vertical that you have experience in and go figure how to apply? You don't like the idea of going after a small niche you like a big market Well, it can be a small niche but figuring out how AI can transform your industry Anyone has experience in life that is differentiated, right? I can be a nurse I can be someone who's into sports whatever it is something you're obsessed about now find the intersection with AI Figure out how to transform that industry and you're gonna make a billion dollars 38 years old today If me and you died tomorrow and you had one more message to me with the younger generation What would that be give me these next 30 seconds? How can somebody become a billionaire in today's world? Don't sit on your ideas go build them. Don't just wait and overthink go do things I mean today's world with AI it benefits the doers more than the thinkers have incredible advice my friend. Thank you Thank you so much for your time and appreciate that the 53rd billionaire. I've interviewed you. I love your channel. It's very inspiring Did you like the questions? I love the questions and I get your contact. Is that sure? What's your name for the people? I'm John Guys, I cold approached the AI billionaire It was coming out right after speaking and he knew the channel man. He's seen the billionaire interviews Well now he just became one of them because that's officially the 53rd billionaire that I've interviewed on the school of hard knocks But look my biggest takeaway in that interview was when I asked him What is the specific part of AI people need to be leveraging in today's world? He said don't think about specific AI as a whole can disrupt any industry you think about take notes from that interview right there But we got to keep this from rolling and go find cold approach my next billionaire out here you guys. Come on Excuse me, sir, sir, sir question for you real quick Real quick sir real quick. How did you get rich? I have a channel with 22 million followers I need to be billionaires on how they made it. How did you get rich? Have you heard of twitch? I'm a co-founder. No, you're not. Are you serious? Yeah. Yeah. Are you actually God smile on me? Yeah, so how long were you running twitch for him? And how long have you been a business owner? I started my first company when I was 20 years old. So that was 22 years ago. I guess I'm old now 40 42 years Old today. Yeah Over these 42 years. What was the most amount of money you made in a single year? We sold twitch in 2014 for a nine hours every dollar almost a billion dollars. Yeah, can I leave you for a minute real quick? Okay, we're doing that now, right? 22 years you've been an entrepreneur for that's the greatest lesson You've learned about entrepreneurship you give to somebody about to start their first company in today's world I always tell people do what you would do if no one ever found out about it and you didn't make any money from it What would you do where if tomorrow completely failed you wouldn't feel like you wasted all your time today How did you come up with the idea for twitch? I mean, I mean this is this became a phenomenon man You know, it's still super relevant. It's popping today as well. How in the world did you become you were way ahead of your time? What started off is something very different, you know, I was in a shy extrovert I always wanted to be connected with people and to be popular and I had that scarcity mindset I want to be rich and famous, you know because when I was a kid I felt like I didn't get the attention that I needed from my parents or my peers and so We had this idea for creating a streaming company around myself and my friends and we're gonna call it Justin TV That's you know, and there was no streaming at the time This is like before Instagram, you know, even before Twitter existed And so we had to invent the technology to do that and we launched it We called it Justin TV and it was a streaming platform of one channel which was just my show me wearing a camera around 24 7 and we launched that people came they were like Why are you doing this? You're not that interesting, dude I was not that entertaining and then people luckily gave us they were like, hey, I want to create my own stream, too How do I do that? How are you doing this? And so we opened up as a platform and then eventually that that turned into twitch. What's your name? My name is Justin Yes, did you come from a lot of money growing up? No, my mom was a was an immigrant She had nine brothers and sisters. She came to America with like nothing put herself through college and she provided a middle-class Upbringing for us but like I didn't come from money. What's your turning point to financial freedom? Was there a turning point when you were growing up or you were like I'm gonna go out there build an empire for myself Like you did well, but you know, everything is good and bad, right? Like so like when I was a kid my mom because she grew up really poor with you know One of many kids she had a deep scarcity mindset around finances and changed what you thought about so she passed that along to me So I was like, I never felt like I had enough right? I was like, I got to prove myself to the world and I need to make a lot of money I remember when I first started on building internet companies when I was in college I was like if I can make a million dollars this back in 2004, then I will be set that'd be crazy, right? And you know, I blew by that goal over the years, but it never felt like enough. I learned luckily over the years I learned like there's money will never get you true happiness You know You can have security and it can help set you up to learn about yourself so that you can you can learn what really will Give you and drive happiness for yourself, but but it's probably not gonna be extrinsic You sold your company for nine hundred seventy million dollars. Who did you sell your company to Amazon in 2014? Amazon what was it like negotiating with Amazon? It's one of the biggest companies in the world Basically, we tried to sell it to Google first and we got all the way up to the finish line They almost bought it and then we couldn't agree on some terms and they walked away We both mutually walked away from the deal. What was their offer if you can share they started really low It was like 150 million and then eventually got up to almost a billion dollars We walked away we walked away and then you know that didn't feel super good But then we almost sold it to Yahoo after that and then they walked away from the deal at the last minute and then by That time we were like very fatigued and then Amazon came in and we agreed What is your best negotiation advice to anybody in business because it's one of the most valuable skills that I've noticed the most successful Entrepreneurs possess what's your best negotiation advice right here? Yeah, there's this book called negotiation genius, which is a great great book But I think you always want to have options if you are able to walk away you have multiple options That's always gonna give you the strongest position. So you can't be desperate to get a deal. Yeah, it cannot be desperate Don't negotiate from a place of weakness people that doubted you when you started twitch I mean, yeah, there were tons like people were like, this is the dumbest idea ever My dad was like I told them about you know When we started Justin TV there I told my my friend who eventually became our co-founder Michael Seibel and my dad I was sitting down dinner. I was like, hey, I want to scream my life and they were like laughing at me You know, why don't you listen to those people because a lot of people they listen to the naysayers and they end up not executing On their ideas. Why did you not listen to the people that doubted you? I realized I have like a tweaked sense of risk, you know Like I don't have the same risk sense as normal people. I've realized that over the years I used to think as normal in that way But like you have to believe if someone could talk you out of your idea for your business That's a bad sign right as an entrepreneur You have to have almost that reality distortion field where you say this is the way the world is gonna be and then you're the one Convincing investors employees customers to sign on for that vision. How do you feel about AI? How would you be leveraging AI to get rich in today's world? There's an old business saying it's like you want to commoditize your compliments Right, you want to not be the commodity layer? You want to be something where you're adjacent to the commodity layer? So in the world of AI a lot of things become more commoditized, right? So knowledge work is cheaper programming is cheaper code is free, right software is free So what are the things that benefit from free software? What are those industries like for example? I think hardware devices that use software you make and distribute a hardware device that uses software that takes advantage of commoditization of software 42 years old today. Are you happy? I'm happier than I've ever been. Have you ever been depressed? I've been depressed even post which actually is selling to which was that when you sold a company for almost a billion dollars you were Depressed. Yeah, you know what's hard when I say this people are like think it's bull Maybe a lesson that everyone has to learn for themselves and I hope everyone gets a chance to but money doesn't make you happy money Can help you be secure which can set the stage for you to to be happy But money alone or any sort of extrinsic motivator whether it's money or fame will never give you lasting happiness You know when we sold twitch Yeah, I felt good for a couple weeks But then you go back to baseline for me being of service to people around me being a good friend a good father a good Family member that's really what gave me lasting happiness beautiful advice man. You gave an incredible interview Thank you so much and I connect with all the billionaires I interview could I get your contact? Guys, we are literally interviewing tech billionaires out here in Silicon Valley And one thing that becomes obvious when we're interviewing the richest people in the world. They are all in on using AI They're constantly figuring out how to use it in their businesses And that's exactly why I use high level high level is an all-in-one sales and marketing platform They can automate a massive part of your business So instead of paying for five or six different softwares, you can have your CRM or calendar funnels websites email and text marketing Tracking and follow-up all in one place So when someone becomes a lead books a call or reaches out to your business I level can automatically follow up with them nurture them and keep that opportunity your potential customer moving in the right direction Even when you're not sitting there doing it manually like I'm out here filming right now That's where AI and automation become real leverage is the winners in this next era are not just gonna be the ones that understand AI They're gonna be the ones who actually use it to save more time build systems and make more money So if you're serious about scaling your business in today's world, I'm gonna do something special for you If you go down right now click the link in the description this video You can start your free trial and use high level today to automate your business now watch your business and your life change forever With that being said, let's go get this next in All right, you guys look so Ashton Kutcher, right? A lot of you guys know him as an actor, but he's actually one of the most successful Venture capitalists investors in the world right now. He's about to get offstage. Okay, and apparently he's gonna be walking out this way, man Apparently they agreed to do the interview So we're gonna go right into it because apparently he's gonna be racing to the jet to get out of here to fly back to Los Angeles So, let's see if we can get him to stop at the interview and get some game from for you guys. Come on All right, my friend appreciate you man. Yeah, what's your account called? It's called the school of hard knocks Okay, got it. Who's like Mark Cuban Michael Rubin lots of other companies who am I here with today Ashton Kutcher? A lot of people know you as a famous Hollywood actor But what they don't realize is that you are you know, one of the most successful investors in Silicon Valley What was the turning point becoming an investor becoming a venture capitalist out here in Silicon Valley? I met a lot of really great people just try to be generous with them and Be as helpful to them as I possibly can in any way shape or form and in return they taught me a lot They always say it's not what you know, it's who you know, and do you believe in that though? Yeah, I genuinely do because when you know the right people they will show you the shortcut It's like you can get from Los Angeles to San Francisco on the 405 or you can take a plane And if you don't even know that a plane is available, you're never gonna jump on the Southwest flight and so I really do believe that it's the who you know because who you know will open up your eyes to see the World in a different way and what's possible and when I got to Silicon Valley, I met Mark Cuban who you've talked to I met Ron Conway. I met Mark Benioff. I met Jason Calacanis I met these people that were seeing the world in a different way and I was just curious enough to ask them What that way was and they taught me a lot of things I'm gonna challenge you Ashton take me back to the most life-changing conversation you ever had What's the greatest piece of advice that you received throughout your career? Oh, I had this woman and I said, will you marry me? And she said I do that's the most important conversation in my life And her name is Mila Kunis and she's my wife and this undoubtedly the most important most valuable conversation I've ever had how important is the decision to marry the right woman in today's world. Look, nobody does it alone Maybe it's a person that you marry. Maybe it's your parents Maybe it's a brother or sister or a friend but having a support ecosystem around you that is rooting for you when things don't go, right? Like everybody fails everybody fails who you are there are moments where you feel like a failure and if you don't have somebody to lift you back up and be like Yeah, that's just like that one thing like you're a good human like you're and you're good at these like we all need to be Reminded of that. How are you today? 48 years old if me and you died tomorrow and you had one last message to leave with the younger generation What would that be love that neighbor as myself? It's about the only thing there is everything else is commentary Thank you so much for your time. Sorry. I appreciate that action guys. I don't think you realize man We just interviewed Ashton Kutcher and like I said a lot of you guys know him as a Hollywood actor But man He's recently become one of the best investors in all of Silicon Valley investing in some of the biggest companies that you know and use on a regular basis and my favorite Part about that entire interview is when he talked about how important meeting the right people was for his success in his career But more importantly hearing the right woman and look you hear all these millionaires and billionaires on this channel talk about that That was a great interview We got to keep the seat rolling and go get our next interview the billionaire out here in Silicon Valley March guys I have a special surprise for you all right now. Look we're out in Silicon Valley a billionaire interviews Have it going crazy, but I just got connected to the owner of an NBA team the Sacramento Kings But that brought a demon he became a billionaire after building and selling a software company for five billion dollars He just invited us out to his home out here in Silicon Valley to interview him on his secret to building a billion-dollar company What it takes to buy an NBA team in today's world man. Let's go meet the back right now Go see what he has to say guys. We just got to the vex house out here in Silicon Valley, man We're gonna go up right now and get this interview in with him you guys So this is about to be a good one you guys man. I'm gonna get him talk I'm gonna get that real secret sauce from him, and I'm really how he became a billionaire in today's world you guys come on Dude, how are you good to see you my friend? Man yeah, man. We just interviewed Justin Kahn the founder of twitch you guys man. Yeah, definitely. How are you doing, man? You doing good? I'll have a little water How you doing my friend it's great to see you good man good to see you. How are you doing? Thank you, man, I appreciate that man the back. I you got to show him the basketball court in the house though Okay, you've got to see the court Famous people come and play here. Yeah guys like Obama Amazing this is kind of a man cave the movie theater Yeah, so cool Good that you like that Tyler. I'll pay for this house, so they changed the law did they really yeah, I need this anymore No, I joke that you know when the Taj Mahal was built the guy who built it It was like a love story, and he didn't want another one so he cut everyone's thumbs off So nobody could build one so the City Council did that they said nobody can build a house this big such a big basement Yeah, we see the house man, and and just the incredible life that you built for yourself, right? You sold a software company for several billion bucks. I own a basketball team Did you growing up have any idea that this was possible because you didn't come you weren't you weren't born in America You're from India originally. Yeah, did you growing up have any idea that this was possible? Yeah, I never really thought of it like that. You know I still think I got a lot to do the best days How are you now 67 67 and you're just getting started yeah, I'm still trying to figure out what to do when I grow up amazing That's so good right there. That's so who am I here with today Vivek Rana Deva And what do you do for a living out here in Silicon Valley? Well actually I'm still trying to figure out what to do when I grow up, but I start companies I invest in companies. I own a basketball team. I've involved with a whole bunch of different things What basketball team do you own I want the Sacramento Kings the Sacramento Keys came here with $50 I did I did in Boston I had $50 in my pocket, but big dreams in my head, and you turn that into an absolute Empire What was the most amount of money you made in a single year how much did you sell your company for well? I've made billions and so I sold my first company for like 130 million And we had a payout scheme and that was another 250 million And I started another company took it public and that was worth 30 billion at one time. Let me ask this right now I'm gonna challenge you take me back to the most life-changing conversation you ever had What's the greatest piece of advice that you received throughout your career? Well, I've always been lucky to surround myself with amazing people and somebody smart told me that hey Just be with smart people and my superpower is I can convince people that are way smarter than me to hang out with me And even follow me to the ends of the earth So you surround yourself with a lot of other super rich people with very smart very smart people and among yourself and the most Successful people that you've met throughout your career. I want you to think about your entire billionaire network What's that one trait they all have in common? They're a little bit outrageous and a lot ferocious and ferocious means that you're unrelenting You can get up no matter how many times you get knocked down. It means that you're absolutely obsessed with what you're doing 24 7 It means that no detail is too small My friend steve jobs literally would specify the width of his counters the apple store and you have a sense of urgency You have to take bad news. You have to take setbacks and I call it chewing cactus You just chew the cactus you listen you smile learn you adjust and you keep moving forward you do that and anything is possible Now when you talk about surrounding yourself with smart people and convincing them How do you even make that happen? Because oftentimes in today's world unless you have some sort of like value to really offer that person It's hard to get those people to come to you What advice would you give to somebody you're trying to attract the right people to come work with them and maybe invest in their company when people see that you're ferocious when people see that you have a vision you have a mission and you're Unrelenting in the pursuit of that then they will follow you to the ends of the earth So what i'm hearing is you can't take no for an answer. You can't take no for an answer Do you think everybody's built for entrepreneurship? Actually, I think most people are not if i'm giving a talk and oftentimes I have somebody raise their hand and say hey I have this idea and this and this and this do you think I should quit my job and start a company? And I say to them now because if you have to ask then the answer is no so you have to know 100 That you're meant to do it. You have to just have such conviction that there's no force in the universe That's going to prevent you from reaching your destiny. How did you find that self-belief? You came to america with 50 and you turned it into a multi-billion dollar empire How did you find that self-belief because the odds were against you man? You didn't have a lot of money starting out. You didn't have a ton of connections. What did you do the best stay foolish? Stay hungry. I'm a fool. You're a fool. I'm a fool and I love fools. What do you mean by you're a fool? Well, I go into areas. I don't know nothing about imagine steve jobs going to his board and saying hey board I want to get into the cell phone business steve How much experience you are doing that non steve? There's 10 companies tripping over each other trying to make cheaper and cheaper phones How are you going to make a cheaper phone? I'm, not mine's going to be more expensive a few years later The iphone business is worth more than microsoft and google combined So it sounds like you have to be a little crazy to become this you have to be a fool Just stay foolish my friend stay foolish. Are you a little crazy completely completely 67 today If if me and you died tomorrow and you had one more message to leave with the younger generation, what would that be? Well, I would say to them that you're living in an incredible time Don't waste it because what happens in the next 10 or 20 years is going to be unprecedented in human history So go out there be a fool learn try different things and be ferocious. You have amazing advice, sir. Oh, thank you Thank you for your time, sir. Can I just say one more thing? Yeah, when I talk about ferocious and outrageous exhibit a for that is here. Thank you, sir So you're cut from the same cloth my friend. I appreciate that guys. That's a wrap on today's video I need y'all to stop right now like and subscribe for amazing content coming every week to the school of hard knocks man We just interviewed tech billionaires out here in silicon valley, but I want to go a step further I want to connect you with these billionaires I launched and built the number one community for entrepreneurs in the world where you can ask your questions directly to the 8 9 10 and 11 figure entrepreneurs the billionaires I interview every week on live zoom calls I host inside of the school of mentors So if you want access go down right now click the link in the description this video and i'll see you on the inside With that being said we'll see in the next video