The brilliance of Jobs

Lot of people have said a lot of things about Jobs. In many articles and web forums, there is a section of people that consider Jobs to be in the same league as Edison, Henry Ford, Walt Disney, etc.

However, I feel Jobs is absolutely streets ahead of anyone else - even the visionaries named above.

The thing is, Edison, Henry Ford, and Walt Disney operated in an era where the state of advancement of technology and business was insignificant. There were no entrenched competitors to fight against, no barriers to success, etc. It was pretty much a given that there would be a dozen companies that would be pathbreaking successes. For the simple reason that pretty much anything anyone did was pathbreaking.

Jobs and Apple on the other hand have succeeded in a totally different era. Where the pace of innovation is mindboggling. Where change is measured in years, not decades. Where even something as revolutionary as the iPhone was challenged by competing devices within 18 months. And in this competitive environment, Jobs has created and/or reengineered several industries. PC (multiple times!), animation (Pixar), music (again multiple times), retail (pushing the envelope in design, performance metrics, etc), telecom (single handedly changed the industry into a different orbit), movies (from how they are made, to how they are sold), publishing (offering the first credible e-device that gave same experience as physical magazines), manufacturing (unibody) and even basic materials (transparent aluminium!), and even shipping (engraved in China, and shipped to your home, in 3 days, for free!).

He has started from scratch multiple times, and created huge successes. Whether it is the original Apple in 1976, or Next in 1986, or Pixar in 1990, or the second innings at Apple in 1997. For that matter, he has started from scratch in several industries and shaken them up completely. Within 3 years, Apple went from 0% to over 50% of the profits of the entire mobile phone industry!

In each one of these areas, Apple has succeeded in the face of exceptionally strong competition. Almost every single time Apple came up with a radical product, the existing players have ridiculed it as a toy or a gimmick.

I dont think there is any parallel anywhere in the world, in any industry, of a company that has consistently challenged the status quo and succeeded.