Mine's Bigger: The Extraordinary Tale of the World's Greatest Sailboat and the Silicon Valley Tycoon Who Built It - Softcover

David A. Kaplan

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0061374024 ISBN 13: 9780061374029

Publisher: HarperPaperbacks, 2008

Synopsis

As the dominant venture capitalist of Silicon Valley, Tom Perkins had seemingly done it all--from amassing a billion-dollar fortune to getting himself convicted of manslaughter in France. But his ultimate dream was to create the biggest, fastest, riskiest, highest-tech, most self-indulgent sailboat ever built.

With keen storytelling and biting wit, bestselling author David A. Kaplan takes us inside the mind of an American genius and behind the scenes of an extraordinary venture: the birth of Perkins's $130 million marvel The Maltese Falcon. This modern clipper ship is as long as a football field and forty-two feet wide, with three rotating masts, each twenty stories high, and a bridge straight out of Star Trek. The riveting biography of a remarkable ship and the remarkable man who built it, Mine's Bigger is an unforgettable profile of ambition, hubris, audacity, and the imagination of a legendary entrepreneur.

About this title

Review:

"Inspired." -- Denver Rocky Mountain News

"Engaging and revealing.brought vividly to life by the adept Kaplan...." -- --Daniel Okrent, Fortune

."..definitely worth the read." -- USA Today

"An exhilarating account of how Tom Perkins...created 'the perfect yacht'...the Maltese Falcon."--American Heritage

"The man, his ego and his boat are examined with insight and precision."--Forbes

"I opened Mr. Kaplan's book with a great deal of interest; I was not disappointed."--Pete Du Pont, former governor of Delaware, The Wall Street Journal

"Inspired."--Denver Rocky Mountain News

"Perkins' two worlds--high-stakes, big-ego, cutting-edge sailing technology, and high-stakes, big-ego corporate politics--are inextricably linked in MINE'S BIGGER."--New York Post

."..definitely worth the read."--USA Today

"Engaging and revealing...brought vividly to life by the adept Kaplan...."----Daniel Okrent, Fortune

Synopsis:

Tom Perkins, the venture capitalist behind such companies as Google, Genentech, Amazon, and AOL, doesn't do things halfway. When he collected vintage cars, for instance, he had the world's largest collection of Bugatti automobiles. And when he decided to pursue a lifelong dream and build a sailing yacht, he went the whole nine yards: He decided it would be the world's largest yacht - big enough to fit Noah's Ark on its deck. He wanted it to sail at a record 26 knots, under unprecedented physical forces. And, he thought, having built this marine wonder, why not use it to try to smash the 155-year-old world sailing record from New York to San Francisco around Cape Horn? So Perkins built 'the perfect yacht' - as long as a football field, 42 feet wide, and with three masts so tall they will just fit under the great suspension bridges of the world. The Maltese Falcon, as he dubbed his ship, uses technology no clipper skipper ever imagined - a rig with no sheets, no stays, no halyards - just free-standing, rotating carbon fiber masts with 18 sails surging freely in the wind. At $130 million, it is a technological marvel - as complex as the man himself.

About this edition

• Publisher: HarperPaperbacks
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0061374024
• ISBN 13: 9780061374029
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 288