Entrepreneurship is a ‘marathon’ and a ‘long-term game,’ says Smart Studios CEO Johan Zammit

Smart Studios Founder and CEO Johan Zammit on Friday shared that an entrepreneur should focus on long-term results, rather than giving up at the first hurdle.

In order to best explain this, he referred to the journey that Elon Musk had to make it to the very top and become SpaceX CEO, Tesla Inc CEO, Twitter CTO, and a host of other senior positions at some of the world’s largest companies.

Mr Zammit drew upon a quote from the prominent entrepreneur, who was recalling his rough start, saying: “I had no money whatsoever. We found out that renting an office was cheaper than an apartment, so we found a place with a leaky roof. I lived and worked there, and showered at the local YMCA!”

Mr Zammit noted that this was back in 1995, when Mr Musk was still starting off his career, and had to rely on connecting directly to the internet by “drilling a hole” in the floor of the office and connecting directly to the service of an internet provider which was located on the floor below.

In 1995, Mr Musk, together with his brother, founded Zip2, an online business directory, that also happened to be their first company. After just four years, it was sold to Compaq for $300 million (€272.8 million) and merged with Altavista search engine. He then co-founded x.com, which later on became global payments company PayPal. He went on to become one of the most notable entrepreneurs in the world, with Forbes reporting last month that he has the highest net worth in the world, sitting at a staggering $240.7 billion (€218.9 billion).

“The first step is always the hardest,” Mr Zammit explained.

“But entrepreneurship is a marathon, a long-term game. Today we see Elon [Mr Musk] relaunching x.com, yet he has been relentlessly elaborating and working on this idea for more than 25 years,” he added.

“And it all started by sleeping on an office couch and showering at the YMCA,” he concluded.

Led by his passion for people, technology and innovation, Mr Zammit founded Smart Studios in 2017. The company enables leading brands and emerging startups to “plan and execute world-class AI and digitisation solutions”. He is also a Board Member and Chair of various startup and innovation organisations, and holds a Master of Business Administration in E-Business and a Bachelor of Science in Information Technology, both from University of Malta.