(Chinese Version)

After disappearing from the public arena for 17 months, Kaifu Lee finally came back with his new book, and an entire new outlook on life.

“I get to treasure my life and health more, and value fortune and fame less. I have decided to devote the rest of my life to things that mean something to the cause of human beings.”

Quoted from Kaifu Lee’s new book Being Towards Death. Before getting diagnosed with lymph cancer, Lee, the founder of Microsoft Research Asia, former head of Google China, and founder & CEO of Innovation Works, worked so hard that he would stay up at midnight and work overtime. Commonly referred to as a “Life Mentor”, “Dream Maker” and “Dream Mentor”, Lee never got satisfied with himself and always set new goals to achieve at that time. However, when he was so ambitious and eager for success, he was diagnosed with lymph cancer (stage 4).

Previously, he also wrote lots of “self-help books” (including Be Your Personal Best, Making a World of Difference, etc.) and did a series of speeches in universities across China. But this time, in his new book Being Towards Death, he stopped talking about fame, dream and success, but chose to merely share his thoughts over death, and the meaning of life. To quote from his new book:

“If I hadn’t got cancer, I might have gone on working hard and making more success stories. However, a cancer in my lymph nodes stopped everything. Nevertheless, I have defeated it and will continue on my work, though my whole outlook on life has already changed.”

Near the end of the documentary Dream Maker Kaifu Lee: Being Towards Death, debuted on June 27th, Lee questioned the audience: what’s left in your life except for fame and achievements?

In this documentary, Lee shared with the audience how he was diagnosed with cancer, how he undertook six-month chemotherapy and how he recovered after nine-month rest. He admitted that for a while he even thought he would die in no more than 100 days. Also, he shared with the audience, for the first time, his letters to his parents when he was studying abroad, his apology towards his deceased father, his gratitude towards his mother and his guilt over his daughter. (More details in the article: Being Towards Death: Kaifu Lee’s Seven Lessons on Death)

Cancer helped Lee better understand the meaning of life. Although he had to give up his work, he harvested friendship and love in return. As is put in his new book, “For the first time in my life, I come to understand the importance of a good health.”

“There is nothing wrong in my previous assertions, such as ‘Be Your Personal Best’ and ‘Making a World of Difference’, but something is wrong with my own balance sheet over life, work and fame. So cancer inevitably ensues.”

Nevertheless, Lee defeated cancer and came back to the public arena more down-to-earth, though still good-mannered and encouraging.

In this February, Lee proudly showed to the media what Innovation Works had achieved in the past few years. By then, Innovation Works had already invested in over 150 startups, 18 among which had already received first round investment, though 3 projects unfortunately soured. These startups conducted business in various industries, including Internet+, cloud computing, hardware investment, O2O, etc.

The following is the full transcript of TMTpost’s interview with Kaifu Lee:

From “unreal” to “down-to-earth”

TMTpost: Many people now find you more down-to-earth than before, do you feel the same? If so, what may have contributed to the change?

Kaifu Lee: In the past, I also spoke my heart, but I tended to only show the positive side of me to the public, and hide the struggles and negative side to myself. That’s why many people found me “unreal”. Even when I was just diagnosed with cancer, I also hid the negative side of me and expressed only my courage and willingness to recover on my Weibo account, with the hope of easing my wife and placating my investors. However, I did suffer a lot and had lots of worries and unpleasant feelings at that time. Finally I dared to show to the public the negative side of me in this new book, and in the documentary Dream Maker Kaifu Lee: Being Towards Death.

TMTpost: Wouldn’t it be hard for you to think back on your suffering and treatment when you were cooperating with Gao Xiaosong on the documentary Dream Maker Kaifu Lee: Being Towards Death?

Kaifu Lee: No, it was more like letting out my feelings. I hardly cried in the past, but after crying and letting out my feelings, I got to see me differently. I would like to pay special tribute to my director Gao Xiaosong’s team, who helped me show my real feelings when making this documentary, which is only 22-minutes long but took us nearly over 10 hours to shoot.

Focus means a lot for any startup project

TMTpost: How do you evaluate on a startup in a short time? What indicators do you have in your mind?

Kaifu Lee: Above all, I’ll see if the owner of the startup is decisive enough in fulfilling one task after another, insightful enough in making decisions, pragmatic enough in carrying out his or her ideas and capable enough in leading a team and winning employees’ trust.

Besides, I’ll have to see if the startup is working on something already existing or entirely new and promising.

TMTpost: That is to say, you value decisiveness and perseverance more.

Kaifu Lee: Yes. But I find that startup owners are generally pretty smart, but the common problem for them is that they can’t wait finishing the existing startup project, but will come up with another idea and give up the existing startup project. Focus means a lot for any startup project, while the lack of focus will only lead to failure.

TMTpost: Are there any projects that you thought highly of but dropped in the end?

Kaifu Lee: Of course. For example, a startup company I once thought very promising ended up in failure, since 50 employees in that company developed over 80 products. If they had focused on only a few products, then they might have succeeded.

Some companies failed because they focused too much on their products but didn’t take the market into consideration.

Other companies failed because their owners didn’t know each other quite well and disagreed over the share and duty of each other when the company is expanding.

TMTpost: Are there any startup projects you think highly of?

Kaifu Lee: Every startup project has the potential to become big. But our aim is to help only 5% to 10% of all the projects we invested in achieve a market value of over 1 billion dollars.

TMTpost: Will you step in and help these companies operate?

Kaifu Lee: Hardly, because a well-organized startup company should be led by its founder and managed by the board. Yet, I do participate in board meetings of a few large-scale startup companies.

Better sleep, higher efficiency

TMTpost: Should young entrepreneurs start from small-scale companies or large-scale ones when they just graduate and have no startup projects in their hands yet?

Kaifu Lee: Both are okay. In general, one learns much more in small-scale companies, since nothing is settled in these companies and one’ll have to be brave to try and make mistakes. In this process, they can learn a lot.

TMTpost: Many young entrepreneurs in China started their first projects after graduation, even in college. Do you find these young entrepreneurs promising?

Kaifu Lee: The advantage is obvious for these young entrepreneurs, since they have started something entirely new and must have learned a lot from their failures. I strongly recommend these young entrepreneurs working for some startup companies before carrying out their own projects, since they’ll get to learn a lot in these startups.

Whether you are still in college, or have already graduated, working in startups will help you gain much experience and nurture your next startup projects.

TMTpost: How should they choose the startup companies to join in?

Kaifu Lee: Those that help you improve on your weakness, instead of those that pay you higher.

TMTpost: What tips do you have on young entrepreneurs who work so hard and have no time to sleep enough?

Kaifu Lee: A good health is much more important that your startup projects. With a good sleep, you’ll get to work more efficiently. Besides, sleeping longer doesn’t necessarily mean “good”, and sleeping for at least 6 hours is the bottom line.

Sharing economy and O2O industry is booming in China

TMTpost: Which industries do Innovation Works mainly invest in? What kind of companies or projects do you think highly of?

Kaifu Lee: We’ve invested in lots of startups in hardware manufacturing industry since we are very confident about the future of this industry. Besides, we’ve invested heavily in sharing economy and O2O industry. Moreover, we did some investment in startups which shoot microfilms and videos. New platforms can become popular overnight in China. In the future, we will focus more on startups providing online education service.

TMTpost: Many content producers now start to integrate social networking function in their products, are they heading for the wrong direction, and how should they strike a good balance between content and social networking?

Kaifu Lee: I believe an Internet startup should develop step by step, that is to say, it should first be able to provide good contents, and then integrate social networking elements into its platform.

TMTpost: What kind of Internet companies do you think are overvalued?

Kaifu Lee: Internet companies that listed on Chinese stock market. While both private shareholders and large-scale investing companies think highly of Internet companies’ stock, most of these companies are actually not as promising as what investors have expected.

TMTpost: Has the goal you set up for Innovation Works changed?

Kaifu Lee: Not yet. I founded Innovation Works with two factors in mind: first of all, I think I am qualified enough as an entrepreneur after years of experience in Internet companies.

Secondly, I want to help more entrepreneurs translate their ideas into real products. I respect entrepreneurs a lot, and will do everything I can to help them. They are indeed the most beautiful group of people in the world.

Not everyone should, and is able to become an entrepreneur. But there should be at least two kinds of people in the world: entrepreneurs who dare to start something new, and investors who support entrepreneurs’ ambitions. Innovation Works aims to be the latter one.

What relates to you is what you really need

During his recovery, Kaifu Lee read heavily (60 to 70 books in total). He also got connected to the world via the Internet. When responding to the assertion that his Weibo updates “are full of empty life lessons”, Lee argued that:

“What relates to you is what you really need. Personally, I believe that a useful piece of article should first of all consist of wisdom gained after years of life experience. Only then will the readers find the article instructive and practical enough after reading it through.

Secondly, this article should never talk big, but relates well to the readers. I am confident that my articles are full of life experiences and relate well to the readers. Those who think low of them must have not read my articles through and jump to the conclusion with only a glimpse of the titles of my articles.

For example, many readers may find articles on how to keep positive in the face of death or how to strike a good balance between work and family boring, but I believe if they carefully read through my articles, they might find them relate well to themselves, since I wrote those stories and lessons based on my own life experience.

Near the end of the new book, Kaifu Lee specially suggested young entrepreneurs that:

“Young entrepreneurs should make something out of your lives, so that you don’t dream your life away. The more capable you are, the more responsible to make your life meaning you are. Come on, guys, devote your time not to things robots can do, or things similar to what you have learned in college, or jobs not challenging at all, but to real life problems. Dare to do things differently, and be persistent in achieving your goals. Keep in mind that you are responsible to make something out of your life and be someone useful and needed in a particular field.”

It’s inevitable for people to constantly get caught into dilemmas during the cause of their life, so how to get use out of them will always be a problem. The subject should be uppermost in the thoughts, and canvassed often.

[The article is published and edited with authorization from the author @Yang Xuedan& Wang Xuan, please note source and hyperlink when reproduce.]

Translated by Levin Feng (Senior Translator at ECHO), working for TMTpost.