Brilliant, Crazy, Cocky: How the Top 1% of Entrepreneurs Profit from Global Chaos [Kindle Edition]

Sarah Lacy (Author)

Book Description

An unforgettable portrait of the emerging world's entrepreneurial dynamos Brilliant, Crazy, Cocky is the story about that top 1% of people who do more to change their worlds through greed and ambition than politicians, NGOs and nonprofits ever can. This new breed of self-starter is taking local turmoil and turning it into opportunities, making millions, creating thousands of jobs and changing the face of modern entrepreneurship at the same time. To tell this story, Lacy spent forty weeks traveling through Asia, South America and Africa hunting down the most impressive up-and-comers the developed world has never heard of....yet. The individuals profiled in Brilliant, Crazy, Cocky are distinct products of their own cultures, yet they share that same unmistakable cocktail of delusion, ambition, and brilliance that drove Bill Gates, Fred Smith, Donald Trump, and every other iconic American entrepreneur of the last few decades.

Editorial Reviews

Review

'...gripping...a fabulous paean to hard-core entrepreneurial spirit...original, penetrating and brilliantly entertaining.' (Telegraph.co.uk, February 2011).

From the Inside Flap

There are many paths to entrepreneurial success, but none of them are easy. Each requires a compelling and intoxicating combination of guts, hard work, talent, timing, and luck. In a world where new superpowers are emerging from the chaos, colonialism, and confusion of the twentieth century, those stakes have been raised and the potential to create new billion-dollar powerhouses has been multiplied. Massive resources are coupled with unprecedented levels of risk, making the journey towards building truly innovative new businesses more unpredictable than ever.

Sarah Lacy is an international journalist with more than a decade of experience covering the ups and downs of global innovation. In Brilliant, Crazy, Cocky, she spends more than forty weeks in eleven countries to bring a bold perspective on what can make or break new high-growth businesses in developing countries.

From Rwanda to Brazil, from Israel to India, Lacy travels from exploding megacities to sprawling slums, meeting the daring and inspiring entrepreneurs who are turning local chaos and basic human needs into often-staggering profits. Through her eye-opening reporting, she tells the true story of opportunity in this globalized world, and it goes well beyond call centers and outsourcing.

Brilliant, Crazy, Cocky delivers dramatic narratives from the front lines of countries stirred by turmoil and teeming with billions of people who have nothing to lose and everything to gain by embracing global investment and technology.

In doing so, it shines a spotlight on the slowing growth of business in America. In forty years, the United States will be the only current G7 nation that will remain one of the seven largest economies in the world. Only by studying the rising entrepreneurial stars of our future economic neighbors can we learn how to compete and thrive within this new world order.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• File Size: 454 KB
• Print Length: 261 pages
• Page Numbers Source ISBN: 0470580097
• Publisher: Wiley; 1 edition (January 6, 2011)
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
• Language: English
• ASIN: B004IPPIKK
• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
• X-Ray: Not Enabled
• Lending: Enabled
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #237,450 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars What a tour de force February 1, 2011

By Amit Garg

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

I have never met Sarah Lacy as of writing this and am posting this review right before the book's official launch. I grew up in developing countries, have lived through rawness, and work in technology in Silicon Valley -- this book really hit home. Lacy has really done her research and written a compelling and current analysis of our world. I thought the focus on China, India, Brazil, Indonesia and Rwanda as top emerging economies, and what that means for the US, was very apt. The personal stories of people who overcame overwhelming odds to build and rebuild their societies, especially the opening chapter on a Brazilian entrepreneur, were deeply moving.

I felt inspired and bought two more copies to gift to others.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Big Risk, Big Ambition, and Big Heart! March 23, 2011

By Glen Moriarty

Format:Hardcover

I read Sarah Lacy's new book Brilliant, Crazy, Cocky: How the Top 1% of Entrepreneurs Profit from Global Chaos (URL), several weeks ago. It has been simmering in the back of my mind; my attention turning back to it again and again in light of recent events and the role of social media in unseating societal structures throughout the Middle East.

Brilliant, Crazy, Cocky is an excellent book. She takes you around the world in her travels to emerging countries. You feel like you are in the room (...or village hut) with her as she interviews these brave and risk-loving entrepreneurs. You get a real feel for the struggles their countries face, the real hardships the people encounter, AND, more importantly, how these key people are revolutionizing their corners of the world by solving real problems. Paul Carr has done an excellent job of highlighting a few of these personal stories here: [...].

The key idea is that entrepreneurs in emerging economies are, and will increasingly be, huge forces in revolutionizing our global economy. Lacy starts off by illustrating how the Valley has lost its way by becoming too risk averse. She then shifts, through several poignant narratives, to highlight how entrepreneurs around the world are strikingly different in their ambition, heart, and risk. They experience the world fundamentally differently. They have lived with little, survived in war zones, and escaped genocide. They know what it feels like to struggle and are not afraid to return or to continue to struggle. Consequently, they can take big risks. They have little fear.

Global entrepreneurship is hugely powerful. Lacy writes, "High-impact entrepreneurship can do what aid, military intervention, traditional diplomacy, and revolutions can't. Every country knows they want it..." It isn't about the developed world vs. the emerging world. It isn't about taking sides. It is about taking a meaningful, collaborative stance. It is about companies and investors moving beyond their comfort zones to help these ventures grow and expand. It is not an either/or situation (either we win or they win); rather, it is a both/and situation. We both win. Lacy, ever the business reporter and information synthesizer cannot resist coming to this conclusion. Interestingly, it is almost like the data forced her to see it. In her epilogue she writes:

"This book began as a study in one thing: greed-based entrepreneurship in places emerging out of chaos and giving rise to enormous Greenfield opportunities the Western world no longer has. The last thing I wanted to write was another book about global politics or feel-good social entrepreneurship. But over the course of my reporting, the topic of emerging market entrepreneurship became too big to be just about greed and fear. It was also about the wonder of technology and making the world a better place. It was about the ambition and ego and vision of a class of founders who wanted to topple the status quo for fun, for money, and for the little guy."

Michael Horn ([...]) and I agree that Sarah is one of the brightest people out there. She clearly sees and gets things way ahead of the curve. I think her take in this book is spot on. I fear, however, that most people will not realize it until it is too late. They'll miss investing their time, energy, and money in collaborating with these folks. I don't want that to happen to us ([...]). I hope we are smart enough to take what she has said to heart. After all, big risk, big ambition, and big heart sound like the same ingredients needed to transform education.

10 of 13 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Inspiring! January 13, 2011

By Marcos Tanaka

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

In my point of view the book is inspiring yet realistic, it is very well written and as it mixes the stories of each entrepeneur with country information it takes you on the Joirney the author took. It cojveys positive and realistic opinion om entrepeneurship and business in emerging economies. I read it all the way in four hours!

More About the Author

Sarah Lacy knows great entrepreneurs. After more than a decade covering business in Silicon Valley, Lacy decided to follow the flow of capital into the developing world. She bootstrapped a two-year, 40 week journey through the Middle East, South America, Africa, India, China and Southeast Asia looking for the best entrepreneurs Silicon Valley had never heard of. The result is her second book "Brilliant, Crazy, Cocky: How the Top 1% of Entrepreneurs Profit from Global Chaos," which is being published by John Wiley & Sons in January 2011.

Lacy is well known in tech hot spots around the world for finding great entrepreneurs before most other reporters or venture capitalists do. She is a senior editor at TechCrunch.com, the largest blog on tech entrepreneurship in the world and the author of the critically-acclaimed "Once You're Lucky, Twice You're Good: The Rebirth of Silicon Valley and the Rise of Web 2.0" (Gotham Books, May 2008). Called the definitive book of the Web 2.0 movement, "Once You're Lucky" tells the story of how Web 2.0 was born through the eyes of the founders of companies like Facebook, Twitter, Slide, Digg, LinkedIn and others.

Before that, Lacy was a staff writer for BusinessWeek and the founding co-host of Yahoo! Finance's daily show "TechTicker." Lacy is a regular guest on NBC's "Press:Here" and various TV and radio outlets in the United States and around the world. She is a sought-after speaker on the topic of entrepreneurship, delivering keynotes throughout the United States and in London, Paris, South Africa, Israel and Indonesia. Her books are taught in several entrepreneurship courses in colleges and Universities around the world. She lives in San Francisco.