Most of the time you will fail, but you will also occasionally succeed. Those occasional successes make all the hard work and sacrifice worthwhile.

I consider high-speed data transmission an invention that became a major innovation. It changed the way we all communicate

People take the longest possible paths, digress to numerous dead ends, and make all kinds of mistakes. Then historians come along and write summaries of this messy, nonlinear process and make it appear like a simple, straight line.

Sporting competitions seem to be what we obsess over, frankly. So if we can put engineering, science, technology into a format of healthy, fun competition, we can attract all sorts of kids that might not see the kind of activity we do as accessible or rewarding.

My biggest worry is I'm running out of time and energy. Thirty years ago I thought 10 years was a really long time.

What really makes it an invention is that someone decides not to change the solution to a known problem, but to change the question.

I don't work on a project unless I believe that it will dramatically improve life for a bunch of people.