I have had all the disadvantages required for success.

I started NetSuite. NetSuite was my idea. I called up Evan Goldberg and said, 'We're going to do ERP on the Internet, software-as-a-service.' Six months later Marc Benioff, finding out what NetSuite was doing, and kind of copied it.

In order to grow at this pace, there will have to be a couple of acquisitions along the way. The tricky thing is to grow at this rate and maintain a 40 percent operating margin.

When you're the first person whose beliefs are different from what everyone else believes, you're basically saying, "I'm right, and everyone else is wrong." That's a very unpleasant position to be in. It's at once exhilarating and at the same time an invitation to be attacked.

To model yourself after Steve Jobs is like, 'I'd like to paint like Picasso, what should I do? Should I use more red?'

Those that believe this is merely a downturn are mad. Our industry is going to mature and as something matures, the rate of innovation does slow.

When you live your life in different ways, it makes people around you become uncomfortable. So deal with it. They don't know what you are going to do.