Thursday, October 25, 2012

Facebook back on track after growing 6 fold on mobile ads revenue in one quarter


Facebook reported a respectable quarter at $1.3bn/$0.12, beating most analysts consensus. While the payment business was soft due to Zynga (dropping almost 20%), the surprising strength in advertising more than offset that weakness.

Mobile was the key driver to the outperformance, contributing 14% of ad revenues and yielding a run-rate of 6x over last quarter. Current daily mobile run-rate is about $3 million and this is mostly coming from the sponsored daily feed on the mobile.

Management attributed the success to three factors: (1) users are more engaging on mobile and spending more time on Facebook; (2) the company introduced more ad products on mobile, increasing audience reached by advertisers and (3) mobile ads yield higher performance, on average 8x more than the desktop.

The company is getting better on mobile monetization, which alleviates a major investor concern and thus improves sentiment going forward. Facebook is well positioned over the long term for the multi-screen environment due to its larger base of socially connected users and its ubiquitous reach on the web and apps. With the roll out of their mobile ad exchange, I m bullish of the future prospects in the mobile ads space. Well done to the team at Facebook and this would certainly put pressure on Google to step up to continue their domination in the same space. I wont discount Apple iAds as they can easily get back into the game having access to so many iOS devices and customers data out there. 

Friday, September 14, 2012

Apple launches iPhone 5 but without the WOW factor


Apple launches the new iPhone 5 last night, a thinner and lighter version of its iconic device capable of running on 4G/LTE networks. Much of the speculation in the run up to the launch proved correct (Apple isnt very good at keeping secret these days especially with Steve Jobs not around) : the new device has a larger 4-inch Retina display, enough room for a fifth row of icons but is 18 percent thinner and 20 percent lighter than its predecessor, the iPhone 4S.

It is powered by Apple’s new A6 chip, which the firm claims can provide up to twice the CPU and graphics performance, while at the same time improving battery life. It also sports an 8MP iSight camera, improved audio and microphones (including a redesign of Apple’s famous white earbuds); and as widely expected a new connector known as ‘Lightning,’ replacing the 30-pin cable used for many years on Apple gadgets. This newly designed connector is going to be a pain for all iDevices manufacturers as they either had to replace the connector or bundle it together with the devices or the iPhone 5 users have to pony out $25 for the adapter.

It will run the previously-announced iOS6, which includes 200 new features to the software, notably new mapping and navigation (by Apple rather than Google) and deeper Facebook integration. Although the general view from analysts was that the iPhone 5 is an evolutionary rather than revolutionary step forward, many are predicting it will contribute to record iPhone sales in the upcoming holiday quarter.

Apple’s current iPhone sales record is the 37.04 million shifted in the quarter following the launch of the iPhone 4S a year ago. The iPhone 5 will retail in the US (after subsidy) for US$199 (16GB), US$299 (32GB) and US$399 (64GB).

It will ship in the US, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore and the UK on Friday 21 September with pre-orders taken from tomorrow (14 September). The device will rollout to 22 more countries on 28 September.


Mashable did a nice blog by comparing 3 other similar devices to iPhone 5 and you will see how it will stack up against the rest. This will help you to decide which devices to buy. iPhone 5 unlike before really have to work a lot harder to compete these days as there are many other devices out there that are either just as good and sometimes even better like the Samsung Galaxy S3. The only thing that is of no comparison is their superior iOS platform which most Apple users are used too.

Just in case if you havent seen the video of the iPhone 5's product launch, Apple has posted the video online at here

Thursday, August 23, 2012

The reality of wealth - "RICHNESS IS WHEN YOU NEED NO MORE"


While reading, i came across a good story or reminder that i wanted to share with all my readers.

The story goes like this...

In 1923, eight of the wealthiest people in the world met. Their combined wealth, it is estimated, exceeded the wealth of the government of the United States at that time. These men certainly knew how to make a living and accumulate wealth. But let's examine what happened to them 25 years later. 

1. President of the largest steel company, Charles Schwab, lived on borrowed capital for five years before he died bankrupt.

2. President of the largest gas company, Howard Hubson, went insane.

3. One of the greatest commodity traders, Arthur Cutton, died insolvent.

4. President of the New York Stock Exchange, Richard Whitney, was sent to jail.

5. A member of the President's Cabinet, Albert Fall, was pardoned from jail to go home and die in peace.

6. The greatest "bear" on Wall Street, Jessie Livermore, committed suicide.

7. President of the world's greatest monopoly, Ivar Krueger, committed suicide.

8. President of the Bank of International Settlement, Leon Fraser, committed suicide.

They were money making machine but what they forgot how to make a good and meaningful life with all their wealth!

Money in itself is not evil! Money provides food for the hungry, medicine for the sick, clothes for the needy. Money is only a medium of exchange.

We need two kinds of education. One that teaches us how to make a living and one that teaches us how to live. There are people who are so engrossed in their professional life that they neglect their family, health, spiritual life and social responsibilities. If asked why they do this they would reply that they were doing it for their family. Our kids are sleeping when we leave home. They are sleeping when we come home. Twenty years later, we'll turn back, and they'll all be gone.

Without water, a ship cannot move. The ship needs water, but if the water gets into the ship, the ship will face problems. What was once a means of living for the ship will now become a means of destruction.

Similarly we live in a time where earning is a necessity but let not the earning enter our hearts, for what was once a means of living will be become a means of destruction. So take a moment and ask yourself....has water entered my ship? RICHNESS is not Earning More, Spending More Or Saving More, but "RICHNESS IS WHEN YOU NEED NO MORE".

And the first person that came to mind was Bill Gates. All his wealth are being put to good use, helping others and most importantly i think Bill is enjoying his life. Why carry on making more money when you cant even keep any of it at the end of the day. We work to live and not live to work...

Friday, August 3, 2012

China's Dianping - Mobile Apps Usage surpasses PC


According to the first mobile lifestyle report recently released by China's leading local platform which connect people with local businesses, Dianping (a chinese version of Yelp), daily views of Dianping's mobile apps have shown explosive growth, exceeding those of its PC.

Views of Dianping's mobile apps have grown over 100 times since early 2010, with the number of its mobile apps' unique users jumping over 110 times, according to data from Dianping.

Through Dianping mobile apps, users can have access to extensive information about restaurants, beauty, leisure, shopping, hotels and lifestyle services. In addition, the demand is increasing as pharmacies, banks, parks, Internet cafes, cinemas, gas stations, nail salons and table games, among others, are becoming the most commonly used search keywords in some cities, which reflects the diverse characters of mobile lifestyle.

Information search and having access to discounts remain the two core needs of mobile lifestyle. Over 70 percent of Dianping mobile apps' users prefer to use the three functions: keyword search, neighboring businesses search and group buying.

It appears in the report that iPhone users are more apt to prefer a lifestyle that is "elegant" and "romantic". Not so the ordinary Android users who prefer a more "common" lifestyle. Illustrating the difference Dianping notes that over half (54%) of iPhone users choose restaurants costing at least CNY80 ($13) per head, compared to 46% of Android users selecting restaurants that cost CNY50 ($8) or less.

As of Q2 of 2012, Dianping has more than 48 million monthly active users, over 20 million reviews, and more than 1.5 million local businesses covering approximately 2,300 cities across China. As of Q2 of 2012, Dianping (including Dianping.com and Dianping mobile apps) has nearly one billion page views monthly, out of which, over 50% comes from mobile users. And mobile apps have more than 33 million unique users.

Its not surprising that Dianping's total view on mobile had surpassed that of PC, its just a matter of time where most eyeballs will be focusing largely on mobile. 

Monday, July 23, 2012

China - Mobile Internet Users surpassed Internet Users on desktop


The latest data from the Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) shows that China has more than 538 million Internet users, of which 388 million are mobile Internet users. This is the first time that the number of mobile internet users has surpassed desktop users indicating that China's internet users are relying more and more to smartphone to get online. With more affordable and accessible mobile devices, smart phones are now the top choice for on line surfers.

A bi-annual statistical report says that by the end of June, 2012, the number of websites had risen to 2.5 million. Meanwhile, the number of mobile internet users reached 388 million, accounting for 72.2% of total web users.

The popular usage for mobile internet is mobile video, mobile searches, communication and e-commerce.

The report also finds that on line video users are growing rapidly. Over 100 million people watch videos on their mobile phones, accounting for 27.7% of total mobile internet users.  And more than 210 million people made purchases through e-commerce sites. 

Saturday, June 2, 2012

SMS revenues is still massive and will hit $722.7bn by 2016

New data from Informa Telecoms & Media shows SMS isn't as dead in the water as reports would have you believe, as traditional text messaging is set to generate $722.7 billion in revenue between 2011 and 2016.

The report expects a small decline in P2P SMS revenues in some developed regions and countries, though total global SMS revenues will increase at 3% the next five years.

Meanwhile, Western Europe will lead SMS revenues with $174.1 billion, followed by developing APAC regions with $173.8 billion. It's an impressive sum, as smartphone OEMs have begun to adopt the trend of preloading their devices with mobile messaging apps such as BBM, Samsung ChatOn, iMessage and WhatsApp. 

Sunday, April 15, 2012

Transition China 2012

I will be speaking at Transition China 2012 event on May 11. Transition China 2012 features Asia's leading business thinkers, entrepreneurs, innovators and 'transitional' businesses. With leading key note addresses, interactive panel discussions, a live debate and spotlighting 'transitional' companies in China, T12 will deliver an incredible experience for sponsors and guests.

If anyone of you are in the city, drop by to get the best business vibes in China. Check out the promo video below....

Venue : Shanghai Centre, Shanghai, China
WWW.TRANSITIONCHINA.COM

Friday, April 13, 2012

Samsung is No 1 mobile handset manufacturer overtaking from Nokia


Nokia’s 14-year stint as the world’s largest handset-maker had finally came to an end in Q1, according to a Reuters poll of analysts, which suggests the Finnish vendor has been overtaken by Samsung.

Based on average estimates, the poll shows that Samsung is expected to have sold 88 million devices in the period, compared to 83 million for Nokia. Samsung is not due to release its official Q1 numbers until 27 April.

Nokia became the world's largest handset maker in 1998 when it overtook Motorola at a time when Samsung had just entered the industry. The Finnish vendor maintained a 40 percent share of the market for some years prior to the launch of Apple’s iPhone in 2007. Nokia was still the smartphone leader at the beginning of 2011 but has since been surpassed by both Apple and Samsung.

Losing the top spot would be a blow to Nokia, but would have little impact on its attempt to turn around its fortunes. Regardless of where they are positioned, they are as good as screwed and its just a matter of time where others will over take them. Nokia's decision to go Microsoft has certainly been miscued by its CEO, Stephen Elop and I don't see how the launch of the new Nokia Lumia would change anything.

At Nokia's current market cap of under $12B, they are certainly a target for acquisition but i wonder who would like to pick up a huge luggage of liabilities. Perhaps they should just copy Samsung's track and adopt Android but even then i think its a little too late....

Tuesday, March 20, 2012

China Approaching the 1st Billion Mobile Subscribers


According to the released data from three telco operators in China, there are 987.58 million mobile subscribers in China by end January 2012. China Mobile is the largest mobile operator with over 655 million subscribers including 53.94 million 3G subscribers.

Monday, March 19, 2012

Netease - Mobile Internet Data Report 2011


Netease released an info graphic in chinese on Netease mobile Internet in 20111. Below are some of the findings include:

- HTC, Samsung and Motorola are the top three brands for Android devices
- Guangdong province has the highest penetration rate in smartphone usage
- 9pm-11pm is the period with the highest mobile usage on both iOS and Android devices
- For news related applications, the highest usage is during 8am-9am
- On iOS devices, games (20%), entertainment (10%) and books (9%) are the top three most popular categories; while on Android, it’s tools (21%), games (21%) and entertainment (7%)
- on AppStore, the number of free apps download equals to that of paid apps; but there are twice the number of free apps downloaded on Android Market
- Games is the favorite category (33%) for Netease Apps on iOS but tools (22%) are the most popular on Android. 

Friday, March 9, 2012

Google replacing Android Market with Google Play

google play
Google is in the midst of overhauling its Android Market into a more expansive online content marketplace with books, movies and apps--thereby putting it more in line with Apple's iTunes and App Store.

Google Play integrates the features of Android Market, Google Music and the Google eBookstore into a single, cloud-based ecosystem.
All previously purchased content will be available through Google Play by accessing a user's Google account. Your videos, books and music apps will also be upgraded to Google Play Movies, Google Play Books and Google Play Music apps.

Google Play also touts the ability to store up to 20,000 songs for free in the cloud, to then listen to via PC, desktop, tablet or mobile device. All content purchased through Google Play is cloud-based, allowing users access to music, movies, apps and e-books on-the-go.

While numerous studies have shown Android to be the dominant operating system among smartphone users, Google's Android Market app storefront has not experienced the same level of success. Last year, mobile analytics firm Distimo reported that revenues generated via Apple's App Store for iPhone exceed Google's Android Market by a 4-to-1 margin. I m certain Google Play will provide some competition to Apple.

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Smartphones outsold PCs for the first time in 2011





Vendors globally shipped 158.8 million smartphones in the fourth quarter of last year, and 487.7 million for the full year according to a recent report by Canalys. That compares to 120.2 million client PCs shipped during the quarter and 414.6 million for the whole year.


That category includes tablets, netbooks, desktops and laptops. The biggest of the four by far was laptops, which accounted for more than half of the annual total; tablets made up 15%. Smartphone shipments increased last year by 63% over the 299.7 million shipped in 2010. The global client PC market grew by just 15% year-to-year.

In all, 2011 saw a decline in demand for netbooks, slowing demand for laptops and desktops and a rise in tablets, Canalys said. In the space of a few years, smartphones have grown from being a niche product segment at the high-end of the mobile phone market to become a truly mass market proposition. The popularity had grown due to the lower priced smartphones, while interest is up in browsing and the use of apps and services on mobile devices.

Apple was the leading smartphone and client PC vendor in the fourth quarter, shipping 37 million iPhones, 15.4 million iPads and 5.2 million Macs. Apple's smartphone shipments in the quarter beat Nokia's previous single-quarter record of 28.3 million. That record was set in the fourth quarter of 2010. In all of 2011, Apple shipped 93.1 million iPhones, a 96% increase over 2010, making it the leading smartpone vendor over Nokia for the first time.

Samsung shipped 35.3 million smartphones in the fourth quarter, for a total of 91.9 million for the year. That was up from 24.9 million in the last quarter of 2010. Nokia shipped 19.6 million smartphones in the fourth quarter, down by 31% from the same quarter in 2010, but up 17% from the previous quarter. Overall, Nokia shipped 77.3 million smartphones in 2011, including 1.2 million Windows Phone devices in the last quarter of the year.

RIM finished fourth overall in smartphones globally for the year, with 51.4 million shipments, representing 5% growth in 2011. 

Saturday, January 28, 2012

Friday, January 27, 2012

Google is dominating the US Mobile Advertising Space


Mobile advertising spending in the U.S. reached $1.45 billion in 2011, an 89 percent increase over 2010 spending of $769.6 million, according to a new eMarketer report. The research firm anticipates nationwide mobile ad spending will grow another 80 percent in 2012, eclipsing $2.6 billion on its way to topping the $8.2 billion mark in 2016.

Google raked in 51.7 percent of U.S. mobile ad revenues in 2011, translating to about $750 million, eMarketer states. Apple's iAd follows at $92.4 million, edging past independently owned Millennial Media at $90.9 million. Google also earns an estimated 95 percent of all U.S. mobile search ad revenues.

eMarketer anticipates that U.S. mobile search advertising more than doubled in 2011 as spending rose to $652.5 million, up from $253.2 million the previous year. The firm expects advertisers will spend $1.28 billion on mobile search ads in the current year.

Google additionally leads its rivals on U.S. mobile display ad spending, earning $127.5 million in 2011 to control 24.8 percent share of the market. Apple accounted for 18 percent of the U.S. mobile display ad market last year, just ahead of Millennial Media at 17.7 percent. eMarketer estimates U.S. mobile display ad spending, including banner and rich media ads, will grow 93.5 percent in 2012 to $861.7 million, up from $445.4 million in 2011. Spending on mobile video advertising will jump an estimated 122 percent to $151.5 million this year, compared to $68.2 million in 2011.

Thursday, January 26, 2012

Apple's announces BIGGEST quarter


Apple has just announced the biggest and most profitable financial quarter of 2011, revealing record-breaking sales figuures for the company. Profits have also more than doubled to $13.06bn up from $6bn in the same quarter of 2010.

Sales of the iPhone stood at an astounding 37.04 million units, a 128% rise on the previous year, with Apple stating that more could have been sold if the supplies were there. iPad sales were similarly impressive with a record 15.43 million units over the quarter, more than double that of a year ago.

A 26% increase of Mac sales was recorded over the last 12 month period with sales of 5.2 million. The only recorded decline in sales was with the iPod, which saw a 21% year on year decrease to 15.4 million units. However, Apple did make predictions that the smartphone would replace the iPod, so the sales decrease is not wholly unexpected.

With launches for the iPad 3, iPhone 5 and Apple iTV all looking to be anytime this year, it seems that the California tech giant’s reign is set to continue throughout 2012 and beyond and many analysts are targeting Apple share to touch $700 at some point. At current Apple's share price, its definitely very appealing taking into account of his current cash in hand of $98Billion, thats about a quarter of his current market cap of over $400Billion! Guess the challenge now for Apple is what are you going to do with all that cash... a bloody healthy problem to have... perhaps buying over Facebook!!

Thursday, January 19, 2012

Interview - Mobile Advertising Landscape in China


Check this out, my latest video interview on ITV-Asia hosted by Alvin Wang Graylin, CEO and founder of mInfo, one of the leading mobile advertising company in China. Click here to watch the interview.

Feel free to drop me any comments...

Monday, January 2, 2012

The Best Article by Steve Jobs


Happy New Year everybody and wishing all of you a great start to 2012. I wanted to start the year by blogging for the man that made a huge change to all our lives. Steve hasn't been just visionary, he has been a remarkable man coming from a humble background having faced several ups and downs but had never given up. His belief in doing what he loves and making the best of everything has been Apple's most critical success factor.

Here is the inspiring article to help you jumpstart to another fun and exciting year :

Steve Jobs on His Life, Career and Illness: ‘Find What You Love’ 

This evening we got the news that Steve Jobs has stepped down from his post as Apple CEO after having been on medical leave since January. In a commencement speech given at Stanford University in 2005, he spoke about his life, his career and his diagnosis with pancreatic cancer. His words, spoken six years ago, resonate strongly tonight.

'You've got to find what you love,' Jobs says

This is a prepared text of the Commencement address delivered by Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios, on June 12, 2005.

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: "We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it's likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn't know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple's current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something. Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.

This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope it's the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much.

From,

Steve Jobs

If you have the time, please get hold of Steve Jobs' biography written by Walter Isaacson, its a great book and must read for everybody in the tech industry. Truly inspiring!!!