Steve Jobs Named The Greatest Entrepreneur of Our Time By Fortune

Fortune lists Steve Jobs As The Greatest Entrepreneur Of Our Time

Company: Apple


Sales: $108.2 billion


Market Value: $546 billion


Employees: 63,300


Advice: Say no to focus groups and market research. 

Earlier today, the new issue of Fortune came out with a cover story - "The 12 Greatest Entrepreneurs of Our Time and What You Can Learn From Them." The late Steve Jobs topped Fortune's list of  "12 Greatest Entrepreneurs Of Our Time"

Perhaps the most astonishing fact about Jobs was his view that market research and focus groups only limited your ability to innovate. Asked how much research was done to guide Apple when he introduced the iPad, Jobs famously quipped, "None. It isn't the consumers' job to know what they want. It's hard for consumers to tell you what they want when they've never seen anything remotely like it."

Steve Jobs is the reason why Apple was able to conquer the world market within a few span. It was his innovative ideas and the research that he had put into which led Apple to make blockbuster products like the Mac book Air, iPad, iPod and the iPhone. It was because of Jobs that Apple was always ahead of its competitors. Jobs believed that consumer is unsure of what they want, market research fetches no help here. It is the responsibility of the manufacturers to make something that would be adopted by the consumer.

On the day Apple launched the Macintosh, a reporter from Popular Science asked Steve what type of studies Apple had conducted to ensure there was a market for the computer. In a nearly offended tone, Jobs retorted, "Did Alexander Graham Bell do any market research before he invented the telephone?"

The list of 12 Greatest Entrepreneurs Of Our Time includes the following entrepreneurs :

1. Steve Jobs (Apple)  
2. Bill Gates (Microsoft)
3. Fred Smith (FedEx)
4. Jeff Bezos (Amazon)
5. Larry Page and Sergey Brin (Google)
6. Howard Schultz (Starbucks)
7. Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook)
8. John Mackey (Whole Foods)
9. Herb Kelleher (Southwest Airlines)
10. Narayana Murthy (Infosys)
11. Sam Walton (Wal-Mart Stores)
12. Muhammad Yunus (Grameen Bank)