View Full Version : Jim and Oakley
Yash Keough
05-11-2007, 07:40 PM
Hey everyone, I just happened across this article on the Oakley site and thought it might serve as an interesting comparison between Jim's startup of Oakley and his startup of RED, when you think about the two. As they say, history tends to repeat itself...so watch out Sony et all! ;)
http://oakley.com/innovation/history
Bachman
05-11-2007, 07:43 PM
I dont think he'll be selling RED's out the back of a car though!
Yash Keough
05-11-2007, 07:44 PM
Undoubtedly not however I found the part about challenging existing thoughts and preconceptions about industry to be very fascinating as this is precisely what RED has been doing. :) I guess if you want to get a feel for the ability of Jim to succeed at his own personal project, you need only look at Oakley.
Bachman
05-11-2007, 09:03 PM
I just wish there where more ppl around like him that challenge the status quo in the business world. Unfortunalety it seems Jim is fairly unique in these times of Corporate Globalisation
Shawn Nelson
05-11-2007, 09:18 PM
I'm tellin ya, he's like Howard Hughes without the insanity (so far, so good). Howard revolutionized the aviation industry and even though he spent like crazy, he never went bankrupt because his patents from his company's breakthrough inventions brought in truckloads of coin.
Jim is crazier than hughes. And thankgod for that!
As for Sony... Call me crazy, but give it 5-10 years and I forecast RED to be buying out Sony's pro camera division through a highly complex series of aquisitions and mergers.
Desert Rune
05-11-2007, 09:34 PM
Anywhere I can read about why Jim decided to tackle affordable 4K acquisition? Like, the story behind it. I'm curious.
Because he didnt know any better :)
TimothyD
05-11-2007, 10:18 PM
It is because he is a camera fanatic, and wanted to own this camera. That's a lot better motivation than a simple market share. And in the end Red will probably own the market anyway because he is always willing to push the limits of what can be done.
Let's hope he doesn't decide to grow a beard and spend the rest of his life in a hotel room in hawaii after accomplishing it though:)
Jeff Kilgroe
05-11-2007, 10:19 PM
Jim is crazier than hughes.
I seriously doubt that... And I mean that in a good way.
I seriously doubt that... And I mean that in a good way.
Geez, I didnt mean crazy crazy
One thing is for sure though. They both share a genius naivety to the impossible. And impeccable organisers.
Greg Voevodsky
05-11-2007, 10:31 PM
As for Sony... Call me crazy, but give it 5-10 years and I forecast RED to be buying out Sony's pro camera division through a highly complex series of aquisitions and mergers.
Sorry Ace,
I love your posts. But that sounds like Mercedes buying Chrysler to me. :-)
Or Aol trying to swallow Time Warner. :-)
Sorry Ace,
I love your posts. But that sounds like Mercedes buying Chrysler to me. :-)
Or Aol trying to swallow Time Warner. :-)
Completely different. Thats not what Im talking about. I never said they would directly buy them out. Anyhow, it was just a point en magnifique... bit tongue in cheek.
Yash Keough
05-11-2007, 11:36 PM
Yes Jim is pretty exceptional in the business world from the sounds of it. However there are others most notably Isadore Sharp founder and CEO of Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts - do a little reading on him its extremely impressive. I just started working at on of theirs and I have been blown away by the high level of professionalism, courtesy and company philosophy. Quite an exceptional company and the man himself has done a lot for not only the hotel industry but also various causes and indeed his employees. Anyways, just another shining example :)
Yash, absoloutely. Many inspiring leaders in business indeed. Perhaps you misunderstood my post. I was alluding to the fact that stealing a companies customer base is a form of "buying them out". A company is its customers.
Patrik Forsberg
05-12-2007, 01:20 AM
INT: HOTEL RESTAURANT, GERMANY
Three men are sitting at a table. Dinner is done and they are sipping on the fourth bottle of Chablis. Jim Jannard, founder of Oakley and camera fanatic, turns to the man across the table.
JIM JANNARD
Really cool you guys are going digital. I mean every DoP will have his own stuff from now on.
The man in front of Jim, HANS, is the CEO of a very noteable german film camera maker. He looks puzzled, as he turns to Jim, and his german accent is very noticeable as he replies.
HANS
What do you mean?????
JIM
I mean there are no moving parts. Just electronics. The price should come down to like on tenth, right?
HANS (with an even stronger german accent)
Zere iz a zet price for a movie camera, and ziz price will stay......
Roger, the CEO of PAN-and-VISION turns to JIM
ROGER
Yeah....that right....and to make sure it stays that way we even mede a deal with the Japs that they will only be making 2/3 cip camers. And we will be the only ones that can buy their fullsize chips until 2010. Moooohhahahahaha
CUT TO: THREE BOTTLES LATER
The three men are in the middle of an animated discussion, as Jim ends a speach.
JIM
......and that's why I will make a camera myself. And it will have higher resolution and better specs then anything you can think of.......and...and.....its own recording format.......so it...f¤¤¤ck it it'll be 4k....and it....it'll be usd17 500...just so that you know it. And i'll f¤¤cking blow you of the map....
Jim stumbles as he leaves the restaurant. He looks over his shoulder as he holds the door post.
JIM
I'll do it, ok....I'll f¤¤cking do it.........and I'll put you guys out of business..
As Jim leaves the restaurant Hans takes the last sip of the Chablis. He shakes his head as he turns to Roger.
HANS
Poor silly idiot.....
Costelloe Michael
05-12-2007, 01:33 AM
As for Sony... Call me crazy, but give it 5-10 years and I forecast RED to be buying out Sony's pro camera division through a highly complex series of aquisitions and mergers.
Hey Guys, don't you think that Sony have stuff like this already on the shelf, admittedly not half as cool, but have been waiting to drip feed the market to kepp their stock, and prices, as high as possible.
Thank God, and Jim of course, for the revolution brothers. Otherwise we'd be slavishly chained to DCT, 2/3" Chips and 30 year old tape transport for the forseeable future!
Hey Guys, don't you think that Sony have stuff like this already on the shelf, admittedly not half as cool, but have been waiting to drip feed the market to kepp their stock, and prices, as high as possible.
Thank God, and Jim of course, for the revolution brothers. Otherwise we'd be slavishly chained to DCT, 2/3" Chips and 30 year old tape transport for the forseeable future!
They do, but putting their price down to RED standards means giving away almost everything beneath their top end camera for next to nothing.How do you think shareholders will feel about that? They simply do not have the agility of a small and young company. Also, RED no doubt has set up a patent minefield for the big guys to stumble upon. To be perfectly honest, it would be absoloutely awesome if sony produces 4k 35mm aquisition technology for the market.. But dont expect them to be red about it.
Zk2007
05-12-2007, 02:03 AM
Sorry Ace,
I love your posts. But that sounds like Mercedes buying Chrysler to me. :-)
Or Aol trying to swallow Time Warner. :-)
Completely different. Thats not what Im talking about. I never said they would directly buy them out. Anyhow, it was just a point en magnifique... bit tongue in cheek.
I think he was being sarcastic. Because Mercedes did bought Chrysler and AOL and Time Warner got together some time ago (although not sure the deal is still going).
ericyoung
05-12-2007, 04:04 AM
I just wish there where more ppl around like him that challenge the status quo in the business world. Unfortunalety it seems Jim is fairly unique in these times of Corporate Globalisation
Ricardo Semler has been shaking things up in South America too:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ricardo_Semler
but agree there are very few visionary business heads, where the bottom line is not the only measure of success.
Chris Gearhart
05-12-2007, 04:39 AM
I think he was being sarcastic. Because Mercedes did bought Chrysler and AOL and Time Warner got together some time ago (although not sure the deal is still going).
I believe Gregg was too. All part of the fun. Most people miss the humor in my posts too. . . . or maybe I am missing the humor in my posts. :matrix: Anyway, back to our originally scheduled thread.
Yash Keough
05-12-2007, 09:25 AM
Lots of great points here :) It will be a VERY interesting next 5-10 years! :)
Michael Hastings
05-12-2007, 09:47 AM
Hughes really didn't go crazy until after his plane wreck that left him in constant pain and addicted to painkillers and the physical deterioration exacerbated the OCD, paranoia, etc.
Hughes, Jannard, Steve Jobs and others have had an ability to see changes happening early and the opportunities they represented to disrupt existing markets and ignore the naysayers - and the resources to make it happen.
Hughes had the large ongoing cashflow from his father's invention of the drilling head that allowed deep oil drilling, and used it to make movies like Hell's Angels spending well beyond what was normal at the time - and it worked out. The same in aviation. He was very insightful, but also had the money to follow through on his visionary ideas.
Jobs and Jannard made their first pile of money the classic entrepreneurial way, but then the MAC and the RED were forward looking, disruptive products that also required the resources they had already created to make them happen.
I salute them all.
By the way, there is a lot of Sony bashing/resentment on this forum (and I feel some of it too), but remember for many years Akio Morita was the upstart entrepreneurial bad boy in Japan working outside of the system, and many of his products - the Trinitron, Betamax, Betacam, the Walkman, etc. were visionary and disruptive in the tradition of Hughes, Jobs, and Jannard.
I'm tellin ya, he's like Howard Hughes without the insanity (so far, so good). Howard revolutionized the aviation industry and even though he spent like crazy, he never went bankrupt because his patents from his company's breakthrough inventions brought in truckloads of coin.
Sonys designers and executives were some of the best thinkers in the world. However, the Sony today is not the same company unfortunately.
My university design lecturer was an ex sony designer in the early 1970's. The way he taught lateral thinking in design was nuts, and the way the Sony coroporate culture was set up, was so that the designers needed no authority from the CEO to develop products.. They would go home after hours, work on something they found interesting or inspiring, bring it in to work, and ask the CEO "what do you think of this?" he would tell em to go ahead and develop it and see what comes out of it.
Today, unfortunately designers report to the shareholder before anyone else.. So.... Its not the same.
Sonys original team would do wonders in the hands of the right leadership.