Is it any wonder that lifelong surfer Nick Woodman found the inspiration for his massive technological success on the waves of Bali?
It all began when Woodman, at age 22, gave himself until he was 30 to change into an entrepreneur. Four years and one failed business later, he decided to take his savings and go on a five-month browsing trip to Indonesia and Australia in the hunt for inspiration.
Of course, wave carving was nothing recent for Woodman. When he was eight, the Silicon Valley-born entrepreneur spotted a Surfer magazine centerfold pinned to a friend’s bedroom wall and declared he desired to “live in that world.” In his senior yr of highschool, he began the varsity’s surf team, and when it got here time to go to varsity, he selected the University of California, San Diego mainly due to its proximity to the ocean.
But before he even left, Woodman stumbled upon an concept that became the GoPro idea.
There was just one problem: how you can document it?
Woodman was frustrated that he couldn’t get good photos of himself and his friends as they caught waves. Surfers used disposable cameras strapped to their wrists with rubber bands. He would often fly off in the course of the motion and hit them within the face.
“While preparing for this trip, I came up with the idea of a wrist camera that I could use to surf and document myself and my travel friends,” he recalls. “Ironically, this trip was supposed to inspire me to start another business, and I had the idea for the business before I left.”
Woodman desired to invent a robust, adjustable, flexible band that might attach a camera to the body of an individual practicing an extreme sport.
To finance the project, Woodman and his now wife purchased 600 strips manufactured from sea shells from a market in Bali, Indonesia. They cost them $1.90 each. When Woodman returned to the states, they toured the California coast selling the strips for as much as $60 apiece.
With this money and a $35,000 loan from his mother, Woodman created the primary GoPro camera straps. It took him 2 years to perfect the product.
And now… everyone wants a GoPro.
Source and reference: Business Insider | Everyday Beast | CNBC.com | Executive style
