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Eric Schmidt: The Greatest Products Were Built for the People Building Them

By Eric Schmidt · Founder Stories · 1 min read

The greatest products were designed for the benefit of the people actually building them. Uber was a private sharing group. Google was built for Stanford — and for Larry and Sergey themselves.

Key Points

The greatest products were designed for the benefit of the people building them
Google started in Larry's dorm room — they ran a power cord to the neighbor's room for a second server
Andy Bechtolsheim wrote a $100K check. Sergey put it in his wallet for a month — they didn't have a company name yet.

The greatest products have almost always been designed for the benefit of the people who are actually building them.

Built for Themselves

Schmidt: If you think about the greatest products, they've almost always been designed for the benefit of the people who are actually building them.

The Uber story — they built this to share rides. In fact, the original Uber was a private sharing group. Larry and Sergey built Google for Stanford, and particularly for themselves.

The greatest products were designed for the benefit of the people actually building them.

The Server in the Dorm Room

Schmidt: The server was in Larry's dorm room. They needed a second server but didn't have enough power. So they ran the cord over to the gentleman next door's dorm room.

They opened up the server for the entire campus and the usage was phenomenal. Andy Bechtolsheim heard about it through David Cheriton. He wrote a $100,000 check. They didn't have a name for the company. Sergey put it in his wallet — without a name on it — for $100,000. Left it in his wallet for a month until they had the name Google.

Andy Bechtolsheim wrote a $100K check. Sergey left it in his wallet for a month — they didn't have a company name.

Google World Headquarters: The Baby's Room

Schmidt: They moved into Sergey's girlfriend's sister's house. They set up servers in the garage and slowly took over each of the bedrooms. This poor woman — who I think was pregnant at the time — kept saying 'the baby's coming, the baby's coming.'

They put Google World Headquarters in the baby's room.

They slowly took over each bedroom. They put Google World Headquarters in the baby's room.