John Warnock
John Warnock
John Edward Warnockis an American computer scientist and businessman best known as the co-founder with Charles Geschke of Adobe Systems Inc., the graphics and publishing software company. Dr. Warnock was President of Adobe for his first two years and Chairman and CEO for his remaining sixteen years at the company. Although retired as CEO in 2000, he still co-chairs the board with Geschke. Warnock has pioneered the development of graphics, publishing, Web and electronic document technologies that have revolutionized the...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionScientist
Date of Birth6 October 1940
CountryUnited States of America
The products associated with the internet are where I spend a lot of my time right now. It is a revolution that is bigger than the invention of printing. It is a revolution that's bigger than the invention of the telephone, radio, or any of the major revolutions that we've had in the past.
The whole market today is a little scary. I'm happy we retain any value,
Publishing now is more than publishing for print, and more than publishing for the Web, ... It's really a content aggregation and redeployment scheme that every organization has to have to get a handle on their communication problems.
I would love to have more women in management. It's been tough getting to that point. Not only finding people who are willing to step up to management, but also people who are qualified and have the background and education to do it. We've had a number of women in senior management positions, and two of them burned out.
You can do some kind of planning, but the future is something you'll never be able to predict. If anybody had told me when I was in high school or when I was in college that I would be running a billion-dollar company, I would have told them, "You're crazy." First of all, I had no interest in business. No interest, none whatsoever. I never took a course in business.
I can't imagine what it's like to hold a child's hand for four hours.
One of the biggest parts of my job is to figure out where the company is going. What are the opportunities? So I stay very immersed and very up-to-date on what new companies are being started, what new technologies are emerging, what new ideas are getting floated in business plans, and things like that. I see a lot of product ideas and a lot of new technologies.
Learning how to communicate your ideas on paper is very important. Get a good, strong foundation in the liberal arts, philosophy, mathematics, biology, physics, chemistry , history. Get a good, well-rounded education.
We anticipated a slowdown in revenue momentum during this period of no new major product releases,
This is really interesting. When I was in the 9th grade, I flunked 9th grade algebra. I couldn't cope with 9th grade algebra. And then I remember taking an aptitude test when I was a sophomore in high school, and they said, "You should probably consider not going to college." Then they said, "Well, what would you like to do?
Adobe's development cost relative to goods sold is almost zero. That's not bad for a knockoff.
We look at their ability to learn, how fast they are, how quick they are. And their experience. What have they done with their life? What concrete accomplishments have they made? Are they a finisher? When they start a project, can they finish the project, or do they start 20 projects and then have them all open-ended?
I'm a pretty happy camper. Look a little more like Paul Newman, maybe. Haha.
I would never speculate on the limit. Every time you speculate, you're way too conservative