Leaving school and standing at the threshold of the next stage in our life, through this study we have had the chance to take a glance at the 21 st century. We hope to be able to communicate some of those impressions to a wider audience through this book. For entrepreneurs, the book develops a series of concrete propositions which provide hands­ on lessons for creating a successful venture. Thus we hope that this book will be used again and again as an Entrepreneur's Handbook. If we have done our job well, it will soon be full of underlinings, marginal notations and highlighting. It is meant to provide useful advice for people like us, people who want to be entrepreneurs. The book documents empirical research bearing on the question of how to start, build and grow a successful venture. The research is based exclusively on interviews with America's most successful high-tech startups in Silicon Valley and Massachusetts. In these interviews we came across the most tremendous people, entrepreneurs of the 21 st century, first-tier venture capitalists, investment bankers, lawyers and technologists. People who will be driving the economy of tomorrow.