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I have realised more and more that great companies, founded for a long-term purpose, such as Google or Facebook or SpaceX, may do more good in the world than any other vehicle that we have.

From my point of view, what I really like, what I think is really terrific about my work, is that the company's had the opportunity to train literally thousands and thousands of brand new franchisees to successfully run their very first business.

Many companies don't exist after 25 years. It's a rarity. Or if they do exist, they're like IBM, with a totally changing personality.

Green-tech could be the largest economic opportunity of the 21st Century.

If being the biggest company was a guarantee of success, we'd all be using IBM computers and driving GM cars.

An awful lot of successful technology companies ended up being in a slightly different market than they started out in.

Companies that have been built and operated for a long time are the most successful companies.

We got bigger, much scarier competitors. We ended up with Microsoft, a company with all the money in the world, the way I look at those guys. And IBM, another company that, historically, dwarfed us.

That business we started with 10 people has now grown into a great American success story.

When I was a young man in the 1970s, tech firms were scattered across the developed world. Since then, America has come to dominate tech almost totally.