“The worst investment decision of all time was not to bet on the crazy Elon Musk”, confesses a billionaire who backed Jeff Bezos and Larry Page

Billionaire investor John Doerr claims that he regrets passing up the opportunity to invest in Tesla in 2007.

“Conventional wisdom was that venture investors weren’t going to bet on electric vehicle companies or car startups,” Doerr, president of venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins, explains. Bloomberg Television.

“We had to choose between backing a brilliant car designer named Henrik Fisker or a ambitious and slightly crazy entrepreneur named Elon Musk with Tesla. In the end we made the wrong decision.”

In 2008, Kleiner Perkins invested more than $10 million in Fisker Automotive and about 5 years later the company filed for bankruptcy. the car designer created another company of electric vehicles called Fisker Inc. in 2016, using the same logo and the same brands. Since then, the company has gone public on the New York Stock Market, but has fallen far behind Tesla.

In 2007 Tesla was still a start-up company in transition. Its co-founder Martin Eberhard was in the process of stepping down as CEO, and Musk didn’t take on the role of CEO until the following year.

The company did not produce its first car until 2008, almost 5 years after it was founded. Today, the electric car maker is valued at nearly $1 trillion.

The 8 big challenges of the electric vehicle market and where the opportunities are for start-ups, according to investors

“It’s probably the worst investment decision of all time”explains Doerr in Bloomberg Wealth with David Rubenstein. “I don’t obsess about it, but I will never forget it,” adds the billionaire.

Despite not having recognized the potential of Tesla Initially, Doerr has been heavily involved in several major companies such as Amazon, Google and Twitter. The billionaire claims he instantly connected with Jeff Bezos when he met him.

“We were both kind of computer geeks,” he says. “He had a vision, which is true to this day, that if he had the widest selection, with the most affordable prices and the best customer experience, that flyer could grow to be customer obsessed.”

Doerr says he believed Amazon would be successful, but had no idea it would grow into the company it is today. The investor explains that Bezos had a clear business plan, while his decision to invest in Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page was more of a leap of faith.

“It was very controversial,” says Doerr. “They had no business plan, no income.”

How electric cars can pave the way for future mobility

The billionaire explains that neither he nor the founders of Google had any idea of ​​the importance that the Internet search function would have.

Tesla wasn’t the only company Doerr regrets overlooking. The billionaire, who has a fortune estimated at 5,800 million dollarsaccording to him Billionaires Index Bloombergsay what it also missed out on opportunities to invest in Cisco and Sun Microsystems.

We would love to give thanks to the writer of this short article for this amazing material

“The worst investment decision of all time was not to bet on the crazy Elon Musk”, confesses a billionaire who backed Jeff Bezos and Larry Page