My advice to fledgling entrepreneurs is always the same: build a company that you plan to be with for the next 10 years - that is the best way to increase your chances of success.
If anyone tells you that you're too old to be an entrepreneur or that you have the wrong background, don't listen to them. Go with your gut instincts and pursue your passions.
I used to have an obsession with building businesses and forgot about building health. I was focused on the destination instead of the journey. I caution you to not do the same.
In the U.S., PC-makers have no incentive to lower prices because it kills their profit margins. They keep adding new features like high-end retina displays and faster processors to justify their high prices.
When my generation grew up, our only sources of knowledge were books, teachers, parents and friends. The encyclopedia was an item of luxury. We faced big limits in what we could learn, where we could be and who we could reach.
You have to live in Silicon Valley and hear the horror stories. You go and hang out at the cafes, and you meet entrepreneur after entrepreneur who's struggling, basically - who's had a visa problem who wants to start a company, but they can't start companies.
The most valuable lesson I learned in dealing with the ups and downs was to invest in my employees - to do all I could for them when the times were good.
My message to students is that if you want to become an entrepreneur and save the world, definitely don't skip college. But go to a school that you can afford. You'll be freed from the chains of debt and succeed on your own ambition and merit.
If you don't have savings, and your co-founders are as poor as you are, and if Mom and Dad won't loan you money, then your best bet is to find people that know you - your friends. If they, too, won't help, then you're stuck seeking out angel investors.
During the dot-com days, one could take just about any company public and reap fortunes. All you had to do was to make sky-high projections for growth, say you were in the Internet space, and go along with unscrupulous investment bankers and their analysts.
Ask any venture capitalist, and they will tell you that they consider the experience and completeness of the founding team to be a more important factor in their investment decision than the technology that is being built.
After my health suffered due to the stress of running my second company, I had to switch careers. But I still didn't want to go back to the corporate world. So I became an academic.
