Bob Duggan | He Grew Up With Nothing… Then Made $2 Billion In One Day!

0:00Bob, how much are you worth today? Probably somewhere around 12 billion going higher too. Going a lot higher. It's going a lot higher, Bob. Tell him. Yeah, it's going a lot higher. Mr. Bob Duggan, the man that took a struggling biotech company and sold it for$21 billion. How much did you make in that one day when the company sold? $2 billion. $2 billion. More than that can tell. That's not a bad day, Bob. Not a bad day. How old are you today? 82 today. 82 years old. 82 today. That's incredible. Boys and girls, men and women listening, it's all about d***. Whatever you're doing, it is in the d***.

0:27as to how successful you're going to be or how quickly you will fail. What is money? It's energy. You don't pursue money, you pursue the ability to create. You had a son who ended up passing away. He had a blastoma. Yeah, yeah, right. I'm right there at the bedside, right? A day later, he's gone. That's what I'm doing with the rest of my life, is to explain to anybody who's alive that they have genius potential. I want to play a quick game real quick. Yeah, yeah.

0:50Bob Duggan: I got some rapid-fire questions for you, okay? What's harder, making your first million or turning$1 billion into$10 billion? Whoa, that's a really good question. Honestly?

1:02What's going on, everyone? Welcome back to the School of Hard Knocks podcast. I'm James, and I'm here with Jack and Josh, and we have an incredible guest for you all today. We're out in Miami right now with Mr. Bob Duggan, the man that took a struggling biotech company, turned it into a cancer treatment powerhouse, and sold it for$21 billion. Bob, thank you for being with us today, my friend. Yeah. Thanks for having me. We're happy to have you, man. It's good to be with the three J's. I have things to change up my name here. I love it, man. Jimmy. Call me Jimmy. Yeah, yeah. You'll be the fourth one, man.

1:31But before we get started, let the people know, how much are you worth today? I haven't checked it today, but I would say it's probably somewhere around 11, 12, 12 B's, billion, a little over a deck of billion. Did you have ADHD growing up, man? Your dad made$800 a month, man. Come on, come on. You know, when I was six, I knew this was all going to happen, right? No, it's on a gradient. I did, at a young age, I did want to have things. But I was in a middle, maybe a lower middle income family, five kids, my mom and dad, we lived in an 800 square foot house. We had a lot of cherry trees, which told me that we were rich because I love cherries.

2:04And so I never felt that I didn't have a lot of money, but literally my bike cost five bucks. I bought a baseball bat and a basketball combined for a buck 50. And somebody was having, you know, a show and tell on their weekend house. So I didn't, I didn't have a whole lot, but it made me appreciate a lot. I worked for everything that I learned, but I made a buck and a half an hour. I mowed lawns. But then I really did want to have things. And I had an urge from an early age to do things well, to be successful in whatever I was doing. How much of that lack of finance and money around you when you were growing up, did that have an impact on your relationship with the risk and wealth building as you got older?

2:44Well, you know, my grandfather, who was really probably the most important man in my life, my mother's father, ran a Leavenworth prison shoe factory back during the Depression. And what he was noted for is the recidivism in that jail was the lowest in the country because he put his people to work. He taught them how to work. And when they got out, shoes were a big thing. They could make shoes. And he just told me you got you got to be really good at what you do really professional what you do Respect other people that that will help you out And so he gave me the work ethic and he also in his dying days lived at our house And we'd get down to the end of the month and we'd have to scrape up like we want hamburgers that night We got to find some extra money.

3:27He say Bobby just look around I said if you need money, it's always out there. You got to go find it So he planted the money in the you know, I'd be looking grandpa I found a quarter here and a buck over here I knew you would find it you're really good at finding money so he that environment helped me along that don't give up don't stop what you need it's out there you got to go find it and or learning from him you can create it so I never felt a scarcity I never felt like life's not going to work out for me because I just don't have enough to make it work out I always felt that I could make it work out others are making it go work out and wine on me.

4:03Bob, what was that turning point in your life that you were just like, I'm going to go and run my own company? There wasn't a day that that came about, but I was in school, Jack, and I had a professor that was teaching corporate finance. I went to University of California, Santa Barbara to learn business. It was economics. They don't teach business in economics. And in economics, you can't learn how the economy runs because there's this outside variable over which you have no control. It's called money supply. But they did teach supply, demand, etc. They forgot to tell you that the word economics is economos, the Greek word etymology means management of the household.

4:42And so one Nobel Prize winner said, Bob, if you can remember this riddle, you'll understand economics. I said, well, what is it? He said, he whose outgo exceeds his income will soon find that his upkeep is leading to his downfall. I can think of that. I got to make more than I spend. Yeah, exactly. You got it. You do that and you're going to be just fine. So that was always the way I treated myself and looked at business. But this one professor, he knew how to invest in companies. My dad had told me there's nothing for free in life. You got to work for everything you have. This guy said, you know, he makes these investments.

5:21He buys shares of stock and then he can sit back and the stock either goes up or goes down. I'm going, what are you doing to make it grow up or down? He said, I'm really doing nothing. I'm a passive shareholder. So I went back and told my dad, hey, this guy at school seems to be pretty sharp at what he's doing. He's putting his money in. He ain't working. He says, well, he worked for his money. He made his money work for him. All the time I spent with my dad, great guy. He's passed on now. That was the best advice he gave me. He made his money work for him. You work for your money. Right there, I said, I'm into that, man.

5:53I'm into getting my money to work for me. So I think you can all agree that you've got to own equities to really rise up in life and be powerful. So I started investing and then it became more obvious to me that the more responsibility I took for anything, the better that turned out. The more I owned it for the outcome. And I kept creeping up, owning a few more shares. I'd get to the company. and my view was if I want this company to talk to me and I'm in my 20s and I look like I was in my teens, I didn't know a lot about the business. So I would study three or four comparable businesses and come in and say, hey, I found some things out about the competition, what they're doing.

6:35Once in a while, I didn't even know that. I appreciate you coming by and call me anytime. And so I could get a real good line of what was going on in the business. So you have a better chance of predicting business outcome if you know what's going on. So I would work out the income statement for every quarter. I'd work in my mind what it was. I'd see what it was and compare the differences. So I really engaged in these companies. And, yeah, my first 300 investments, we made money. I made money out, really bought 95 % of them. Highly unusual. It's another story as to why it was that good. But I started with$5 ,000.

7:13I wound up with a few years of$500 ,000. and I got to a million, but I also was learning how businesses were run. And I think that's your first step. You start seeing how they're run. You start seeing, you know, I could probably do that if I wanted to. You start as a water boy for a soccer team, someday be a soccer player. Let's talk about that, though, because you didn't start out in the pharmaceutical business. You started out, you were selling cookies, right? Yeah, yeah. So you do the easiest thing you can do. And I really backed into the cookie business. I was managing money for my brother-in-law.

7:48I was the captain, US Olympic volleyball team. He was my height, but he could slam dunk backwards. So the guy was lifting weights every day. Something I didn't get that engaged in. But he came and said, Bob, you're doing great. I'm making money. But I'm in sports. I work my ass off to be a good sports guy. And I'm not doing anything to make my money. And honestly, I don't feel good about it. I have to learn, what can I do to make money? So he came back six months later. He said, you know, during the summer, I am working for Hot Dog on a Stick. And the guy said he'd give me a franchise. And we didn't have to pay extra money for it, but it's gonna cost like 50 ,000 to mock up the facility I said, okay, I'll get you the 50 ,000.

8:23So that was after two corona beers I wake up in the morning. What did I just do last night? 50 ,000 I got to see my is he gonna fail in this or make this happen? I drove around I lived in Topanga Beach out by Malibu. I drove around for about an hour I literally saw 20 different kinds of hot dogs. I mean the hot the the water dog, the baked dog, the oil dog. And I went, okay, this is a competitive business I've got them into. So I'm going to keep my promise and invest the money, but I'm going to watch out over this thing. And one person I saw that was running the hot dog business and his wife was making cookies.

8:59That's a non sequitur. It doesn't follow. You don't sell cookies and dogs together, right? But I asked her, how are you doing? She said, don't tell John, but I sell more cookies than he sells hot dogs. And I'm thinking, I know why, because there's hot dogs anywhere. This is just one type of hot dog. So with Danny, I said, you know what? You do the hot dog. He was doing hot dog on a stick. You take the hot dog, you put it in a batter, and then you put it in boiling oil, and you have this hot dog on a stick. You do a cheese on a stick or a hot dog on a stick. And I went around going, what kind of cookies can I make?

9:31And I said, the kind of cookies I can make is the kind I like. What kind do I like? I like milk chocolate on Nestle's milk chocolate. My mom makes those cookies. Those are damn good cookies. So I'll take that recipe. It's all right there. That's what we'll do. And then we had a problem. Those cookies a day later, they were hard. And I did a little more studying on it. And this is another. The angels in the details. If it works, devils in the details. If it doesn't, boys and girls, men and women listening, it's all about details. Whatever you're doing, it is in the details as to how successful you're going to be or how quickly you will fail.

10:07So I saw on the back of the package that they talked about their cocoa butter and cocoa powder. And then I looked at Ghirardelli's and other chocolate chips that were cheaper. And they had a lower amount of cocoa butter to the cocoa powder, which meant that the chocolate would congeal at a lower temperature. I wanted a gooey chocolate and I wanted it to last for a few days. So the key was use the milk chocolate from Nestle's. And then I went back and said, the oatmeal cookie, the mother's oatmeal, old-fashioned oatmeal cookie, we eat it three days later. It's still soft. So I took a combination of the oatmeal recipe and the milk chocolate recipe.

10:46Use the right chocolate. We've sold billions of these cookies.

10:49Bob Duggan: What I'm hearing from this conversation and how deep you're getting is that people who are successful, it's not because they're a genius, but it's because they're obsessed. Would you agree with that statement? No. And I'll tell you why I don't agree with it. Because you have the common definition of genius. You're right in what you know about genius. Genius is extraordinary so-and-so. Bob Duggan is a genius. The three Js are geniuses, right? Now, well, genius is actually the urge to produce, make happen, bring about from 1700 B.C. to forward. So everybody has the potential to be geniuses, but people apply that potential, and those are really successful people, and they do get into the details because they really care.

11:30We care about what? They care about the end consumer of whatever you're doing. Who is that? You got to know, have that head on your shoulder and make and create what you do. So that person is going, yeah, I'll come back for more. But geniuses applied correctly make things go right. But the good news is everybody has the potential. And that's why I'm here. That's what I'm doing with the rest of my life is to explain to anybody who's alive that they have genius potential. and we're doing it with young kids. And the young kids are the easiest to convince. I've met one young kid. What do you want to be in life?

12:04I want to be like Messi. Oh, that's really cool. I want to be a policeman. I have a friend that's a policeman. And you know what? I'm liking my teacher more and more. So I think I'll be a teacher. I said, you want to be all three of those things? Yeah, why not? I'm not going to ask a 20-year-old something like that and have that kind of response, right? But this little kid had been studying genius. Yeah. So I want to fast forward a little bit, right? Yeah. You were successful in the cookie business. Yeah. Developed some entrepreneurial skills. and you were pretty much an entrepreneur from that point on.

12:29Yeah, yeah. So, you know, the way you got into the pharmaceutical business initially was you had a son who ended up passing away. He had a glioblastoma. Yeah, yeah, right. And so how much of an impact did that have you going into the pharmaceutical business and ultimately becoming a billionaire? Yeah, well, it did have an impact. An entrepreneur, entre, preneur. Entree, bring forward, and preneur is the new. So bring the forward new. So who isn't really, doesn't have some urge to look at new stuff or do new stuff? Bobby, you're a walking dictionary there. Yeah, I am a walking dictionary. And I didn't do really well in school because I hated words.

13:05And you guys are lucky. I can look up any word right now. Knowing those definitions had an impact on your success? It's everything. The difference between knowing words and not knowing words was the ability to confront life and not confront life. To say, I'll get engaged and do it or I won't. when you understand something, when you know, and you will be learning, that you have the 24 traits of genius, they're not that hard to learn. They're not that hard to look at and study. It makes it fun. And then you know one other word, survivre. I was looking up this afternoon in dictionary.com. The Latino meaning of survivre is survive, which is top of living.

13:48The Latin definition, sir, is super, super living. So life is about super living, not just barely hanging in there. Right. So we all get barely hanging. And you laugh. It's funny. How many times have you said, I'm hanging in there? Okay, Jack, you're surviving, right? No, no, no. The first definition of that word is super living. And if we all get that and you have genius potential, then you go, oh, hey, what about me? I mean, it's on you that you're not left behind because I'm leaving or you're leaving it behind, James. They're behind because they're not accepting the definition of their basic core ability.

14:31So, yes, I did. As I learned a little more about each business, thought I could take on more responsibility and have more control. And more control gives you predictable outcomes and predictable outcomes that one leads to another. and as long as you don't get dispersed and deviate or do something you don't understand doing. So when I went to school, I studied economics. My last day there, I said, professor, can you just remind me here, because I've been here four years, studied economics, and I don't recall who's the professor that can predict the economy. Nobody can. And I'm thinking, why the F did I even come to this school and take this subject?

15:08I should have studied engineering or history, for God's sakes, right? So that was informing. but I learned a little bit more when I left. I went to UCLA and studied business there and got along real well because I was into business, right? So do things that you love to do, understand what you do. You don't have to have gone to class there but study the words so that you go, I can grasp this subject and it doesn't mean you'll be good at it but you won't walk away out of like, I just don't get it. You can get anything. Yeah. Bob, I know we have a thousand questions for you. I interrupted you when I was asking you about the definitions and whatnot.

15:47It's so powerful and fascinating to me, just your knowledge on all these things. It's simple terms and concepts, but they're much deeper meanings, like you said. It's like understanding that survive isn't just, woe is me, life's going to pass you by. But it's like making the most of the time that we have here. I want to go back to, though, your son. He had an incredible impact on you and your life. Tell us about that impact that you had. A great guy, Damien, as he went through school, he had seen what I was doing in business. And so he wanted to have the same things that I was able to have. Like I wanted to have what my grandfather had.

16:21I think when you look around, you see people doing really good things. You're not jealous. You're like, you'd like to have it too, right? So we'd get Forbes magazine and Business Week. And I'd come in on Friday and go, where's my magazine? My wife said, well, I don't think they delivered them today. And I'd hunt around the house. I got to his room and there would be under his bed or something. He wanted to read them before I got to him. So he was always interested in business. And he came to me one time and said, you know, I'm seeing that this advertising, billboard advertising business, seems like a pretty good business.

16:53There was a guy named Turner that went on to do broadcasting. Ted Turner. Made a lot of money, Ted Turner. And he said, I'm going to kind of follow his lead here. And I think advertising is something that I want to do. He was a really great swimmer went over to Croatia with his roommate. They swam races over there He came back said dad over there They barely have any billboards over in Croatia and they're moving from communism to capitalism And maybe that's an opportunity for me to introduce billboards. That guy was so charged up about that And he studied the business. I said look there's this business school I want you to attend and go to that just for six months and then you can go So he left and went over.

17:31He met a girlfriend. He learned Croatian, not an easy language to learn, in six months because he had a girlfriend that was 24 hours a day. Her daddy was the only non-member of the Communist Party because he was really good at business. So she had a good business background. So my son was able to learn from that also. And they put up their first billboards. And he said, you know, Dad, you put up a billboard, if they don't pay you within 30 days, they're gone. So it's a cash pay. Where the board's costs, we get two months of rent on the board, or we're break even on the cash and it's money coming in all the way.

18:02And he was competing against the mayors and the city councilmen that would put a few billboards up here and there. And they were going at it slow, but they were making$10 ,000,$20 ,000 a month over their normal salary. That's not what he was interested in. He wanted to make millions. So in three years, he started 10 ,000 outdoor billboards. I funded him with about a million dollars, and he did not need any more money than that. And the business just went crazy. Then he came back one time and said, geez, I had a kind of epileptic fit, and we took him to the hospital. And this guy's got a brain tumor in the frontal lobe of his brain.

18:40And so what are we going to do? He said, well, we take it out and clean it up, and that ought to be good. So they took it out, cleaned it up, and I went back to see the guy again. He said, now you've got to go down the hall and see this other doctor. I went down the hall to see him. He said, we need to do chemotherapy just to make sure. And I read about chemotherapy. I said, this is not a journey that we're going to enjoy here. There's got to be some other solution to this. And we found a man that was in a horticultural business, an unbelievable guy, had a big scar on the left side of his face.

19:11I said, what happened? He said, I had lymphoma, and there was just nothing for it. And they finally just had to carve it out. So my hair is long. So you look at me this way, and everything is cool. But just the nicest guy you ever want to meet. I said my son a glioblastoma and he's facing chemotherapy and I'm running these surveys to see do I do it or don't He says you don't have to do it. He said I have thing called polypeptides L-lysine, L-choline, L-arginine and I Get these down turn them into a liquid form and and I can induce them in high concentration and that'll handle it So we did it and it was not like FDA approved, right?

19:47So you kind of do it behind behind the scenes It was legal to take it, but not legal to provide it. And we did that for three and a half years, and it worked. It worked really well. And my son said, now it's 45 minutes a day having the infusions. I think I'm over with this thing. So he pulled back, and then boom, he had a collapse. It was like we were building a dam, and the dam broke, and the water flooded into town. And so he just said, I don't see how I could really make it. So I took care of him for about six weeks. We were outside in New Orleans at a St. Jude's hospital, and I was giving him his doses every day.

20:26But he got so damaged on that one scene and that one corruption in his brain, and one day he just said, look, I see my body's going this way. I know, I know, I believe in God, I'm a spiritual being, and spiritual beings go on. Now, some people think we come back. Some people think we go to heaven. I'm kind of a comeback guy. He said dad. I really I Can I can be wheeled around and have oxygen and that's not Damien Duggan. I'm an athlete I'm a businessman and so I'm gonna cut it off here And it's like I'm turning this car in I get a new car He said I don't want you to be upset mom's gonna pick the car and you're gonna go along with it So I said okay, we'll do it and this guy you know a day later boom He's gone and I'm saying I'm right there at the bedside right and there's a none here.

21:17She said, boy, I really got to thank you. You and he were the calmest people I've seen. Right down the hall, I have another guy, 45 years old, brain tumor. The family, they can't get along. They don't know what they're doing. They're yelling and screaming at each other. You guys are really calm. I said, me and my son were dealing with each other as spiritual beings. He had a body. I have a body. But I listened to what I knew I'm talking to him. He knew he was talking to me. And so she was she was standing there and and then I heard this what's that pull the sheet back this guy's skin is pink I said dude are you back or what what's happening tell me and now what I think it was is the blockage of he had a aneurysm and a brain block and the blood kind of came through and re went through the body but he wasn't really alive so I didn't get a real communication from him and then it went back down but she's boy I've never seen anything like that and uh so I just told my son okay you're you're in another universe now I'm not in that universe but I've been helping you for five or six years I'm gonna ask you a favor and I I kind of get like well what's that and I go I have challenges in business when I get one I'm gonna ask for your help you'll be sitting out here no one knows you're around and you see the whole damn picture and you can clue me in as to what to do.

22:42He said, what's your first problem? I said, I'm going to go to a meeting with a guy that every time we have a quarterly board meeting, he and I start yelling at each other because I think he's in it. He probably thinks the same of me. He said, what happens? He starts talking louder and louder. He said, okay, what I want you to do is go in the shower in the morning of the board meeting and let those shower beads come at you and consider that's your buddy yelling at you and be there until you be totally calm and not get upset. And when you can do that, then you go in the board meeting and he starts just to be really, really calm.

23:09So I go in the board meeting, the guy starts up, and I finally say, George, you know, you're yelling at me. There's 20 people outside because they know what you and I do inside the board meeting when we close the door. Why don't we just open the door? We just talk calmly, open the door, and let him in. And I didn't get upset at all. And I just calmed everything down, and we got things resolved. And that was one example of me thinking that he was really helping me as a being wherever he was on his way to heaven or wherever the hell he was going. He waited until he could help me out, said, okay, where you and off he went.

23:37So then when I invested in my pharmaceuticals company, they had a product that was handling brain metastasis, and that would include glioblastoma. I said, I'm going to invest in that company and see if I can help them bring this product to market. So we didn't get that product to market, but they started doing some other things that worked out incredibly well. It really took someone like myself that was naive because the product that they had was meant to test whether a Diagnostic tool not a curative tool But I said look if it can diagnose the problem back to my definition a problem defined is one that can be solved They can diagnose the problem.

24:21Maybe it can solve it But you'll never get to try it in human beings. The FDA won't allow that a friend of mine ran a dog clinic for dogs that were like getting later in their stage. I said, could you try this medicine on their dogs? He said, yeah, I've got colleagues. They live one-seventh the life of humans. When they get diseased, they move forward seven times the speed. Give me some of it. We'll see. We gave them for 12 dogs. Nine of them got better. Nine out of 12. I said, well, that can't be that far off from human. And then we went back to the FDA, and we got the ability to move this product through phase one, two, and three.

24:55And when it got to humans, we had 80 percent drug activity, 70 percent, you know, year after year after year, taking three pills. They're better. No pain, no suffering. And turned out to be a blockbuster drug from a company that was literally almost out of business from May 8th of 2008 to May 26th, 2015. It went from, you know, got down to six million valuation. We sold it for twenty one billion dollars. And it was doing a billion in revenue and got up to$7 billion. So it worked out for everybody. How much did you make in that one day when the company sold? $2 billion. $2 billion. More than that can count.

25:35That's not a bad day, Bob. Not a bad day. You know how long it takes you to count Jack to a billion? 34 years. I won't be asking you to do it. Make him do it, Bob. Make him do it. Make him do it. It's long.

25:44Bob Duggan: We'll be sitting here all day. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I got to ask, what did that day look like when that money hit your account? Did you go celebrate? What did that day look like for you? You know, you're really a little bit, I mean, I grew up, I had some money at the time, but it's just like, you really can't even believe it. It's beyond calculating. So it just is, and I didn't get any new jewelry. I didn't do anything really special, but I just said, I'm going to continue to reinvest that money the same way that I made it. and yeah, that's been challenging and rewarding at the same time. But you're grateful, but it's just a little bit overwhelming, quite frankly.

26:34So Bob, I mean, you made$2 billion in a day, and that was the biggest day ever, and obviously you built some other companies, but how did you compound out to a decabillion-dollar net worth? Like you're worth over$10 billion now. How did you build that net worth? And$10 billion going higher too. It's going a lot higher, Bob. Tell them. It's going a lot higher. uh well it's just step by step you do you take one step and you look and you see what's happening you you get to know the details of what you're in i've been in a business now that that has appreciated from 2022 the stock was a dollar 69 today it's at 45.

27:08bob do you think that once you're able to make a lot of money that you'll never lose that skill in other words like bob you'll never lose you're attractive to money it doesn't matter what you'll touch you'll be successful at it. So James, so what is money? Money is a piece of paper that reflects something. Either you printed it, or somebody did something for it, and you wind up with it. You have to exchange for it. It's energy. So on paper, it's got that thing why people can't predict the economy because someone can print the money. But money is just a form of energy. It's not happiness. If I put$100 down here and nobody touched it for 10 years, It'd still be right there.

27:46It can't there's nothing money can do you can do something with it though So you really have to get that straight and you don't you don't pursue money You pursue the ability to create and this is where I love the genius. It said in every human being God has made There is an urge to be productive Okay productive for what then you learn and I did lately what is survive? It's the super living that I really think we're here on this planet in this universe for super living. Survive, not just barely getting along. So how do you survive? You make things go right. Like what? I don't know. Plants, vegetables, food, farming, cell phones, access to intelligence.

28:30Guys that are good at what you're up to and what you're doing. Sharing wins with others. Putting studios together so the pictures are clean. They're smart. They're good. You do things that forward life. That's what you really have to do. So how do you feel when you forward life? How do you feel when you have a good video? How did you feel two days after hours, this thing is jumping to 4 million, and you were the guy running the damn interview? That was a good one. We had a winner down there in Brickle, you know, right? James, can we see this guy? Let's get another meeting with him. I got to meet this dude.

28:59So you're happy. You're energized. So it's a form of energy that reflects energy put into something that mattered, that made a difference. A lot of people make products and they fail, so they're out. But if they don't fail and they're good, you know, people buy them.

29:14Bob Duggan: Bob, I want to play a quick game real quick. Yeah, yeah. I got some rapid fire questions for you, okay? Yeah, yeah, cool. And so the one ask is we got to keep the answers succinct because it's supposed to be rapid fire, okay? And so number one, we have you believe in a company more than anyone else, but every person you respect tells you you're wrong. Do you double down or you listen to their take? You double down because if you're right and they're wrong, You're gonna be the freaking hero if they're right and you're wrong. They say I told you so and they're gonna go on You know, it's an indicator, but nobody believed in robotics.

29:50Nobody believed in fresh baked cookies It was like if you freshly cookies everybody bacon fresh if that was good. So I know it's a rapid fire But I if I believe that's that's the key if I don't do what I believe then whose life am I leaving?

30:03Bob Duggan: That's good right there. So I want to take you back to 2008 and at this point pharmaceuticals is struggling, right? Right. Someone gives you the chance to go back to 2008 and sell your pharmaceutical exposition for a guaranteed 500 million. Do you take it or do you live through the uncertainty again? Well, listen, I mean, this was it was going out. I mean, it went down to 67 cents and my first buy was nine dollars and I was buying on the way down. So I did what I really wanted to do. But if it was at 67 cents, somebody offered me a half a billion dollars, dude, it's all yours.

30:44I mean, come on, man. There's a point where you got to go for the money.

30:49Bob Duggan: You have two CEOs to choose from. One is a world-class scientist who struggles to lead people. The other is an incredible leader who doesn't deeply understand the science. Who gets the job? Whoa, that's a really good question. Science is knowing knowledge as opposed to science. Science is one person. I take the science and then run the business on his behalf. But give me a good scientist. Good scientists are rare. So I want that good scientist. But to run the business, you got to get the guy that can run the business. And a really good scientist is capable of being led. My last one for you is what's harder, making your first million or turning$1 billion into$10 billion?

31:29Bob Duggan: The first. Making your first million. Yeah, yeah. Why is that? Because you have nothing. I mean look at the multiplier you have nothing you got to go from nothing to a million even if you had a dollar you got to make a million times what you had but but it can be done it's like I have a friend a very good friend I say that I own this company and my stock went from two to four and I said you own a company and your stock went from 100 to 150 he said yeah I made 50 and you only made two I said dude it's not about two and one it's about the percent I had 100 ,000 and I made$100 ,000. So when you get that kind of a million times your money, take it.

32:07You'll come back and do something else with it. You won't go away. You're not over. You get that million dollars, it'll burn a hole in your pocket. And you'll do, I mean, if something's worth nothing, you get an offer of a half a million or a million. If you have to call me, I'll take a 10 % commission and tell you what to do. Take it right now.

32:26Bob Duggan: So something that we talked about prior to the podcast is talking about how important it is to be careful what you're consuming. Yes. Right? And Bob brought some clippings of the Wall Street Journal, and I'm going to read some of these headlines out loud. So he has monsoon floods death toll tops 100 in Pakistan. We have Keev. Next day. Yeah, Keev pounded as anti-missile stockpile dwindles. Greece fights wildfires as Europe crisis spreads. Yeah. assad death sentence stirs hysteria all of these headlines are incredibly negative with pictures with with pictures you don't even read them you see the picture the picture life is crazy and so one of the things that you mentioned earlier is that when you talk to children you can instill belief into them because no one's ever put them in a cage no one's ever put them in a box but if you talk to a 20 year old they don't believe they can accomplish anything yeah so when you're talking to someone and they're 20 years old or maybe they're just going through life and they just don't have a lot of self-belief what would be your message to that you bring up an incredibly good point it's it's really is probably the most important thing i'll say in this whole interview these little kids when you give them the chance they they feel they can create something right they're sitting there i can be a policeman i can be maybe not messy but i can be a good soccer player and also i'd be a good teacher you know why not they can create what you begin to see what I saw would turn my life around, you can also create and accept the negativity in life.

34:01You can read that headline and go, you know, why should I even get out of bed? I'll roll over. I'm going to smoke a joint. I mean, I'm going to bypass that. They're not going to get me down. I'm going to use synthetics to get myself higher. Okay. But you're creating that. When you realize that you are creating your condition, you can out create it. If you, if you don't accept that you've created your condition, however good or bad it is, if it's good, it can get better. If it's bad it can get worse when you realize that you you've got now now you you're you're making life go right you're now taking these 24 traits of genius and applying them drive courage devotion to goals knowledge honesty optimism adaptability flexibility curiosity imagination and you you learn about these things and it does not take that long you go holy jesus i can you know praise to God, I have been given the ability to make something happen and then go on and do it.

34:56You will do. There is nothing that you, that any of us can't really do if we put our time, attention and love into it and have a good purpose. So set yourself an aim. You can even chase money if you want to. I want to have more money. Then you realize, you know, money is a reflection of production. So what do I want to produce? Well, what do I know how to produce? Why don't I join my brother and we'll get in the video presentations and we'll start there and you guys are going to wind up making a movie animation movie. Sometimes it's going to sell zillions that you have the same thing happen to you that happened to me like holy dude.

35:32We you know and that really that will happen. You're in the business of producing enjoyment information that makes a difference in a person's life. But the key thing here is we dream of what we can do. we don't take responsibility for who we are right now you are who you are right now it's not god didn't put you here to be a loser if you're losers because you did losing things you did not follow the dictates you see what i'm saying yes sir that's it everybody can play that game it's almost like so many people who are like upset and they blame everything else a lot of those problems would go away if they would just take responsibility for a lot of the thing for for everything that's going on with me.

36:14If they just realize that I'm the one in control. I think I heard Jeff Bezos say one time in an interview, what's stress? Well, stress is when you're thinking about the things you can't control instead of just thinking about, okay, what can I control? What can I put in my power and take responsibility for? Exactly. And I would say with Bezos, he would take what I can't control, break it into his component parts and say, hell, I can't control it. I can control it. Yeah. That's where it comes down. But you've got to look at the big problem. And if you look at it appropriately and own it and say, how did I get into this?

36:50You know, stress. Look the word stress up. It is an assessment by you, by your judgment, that things that are happening you're not able to control. I might look at it and go, oh, shit, this is what I love to do. Play a violin in front of 100 people. I have stress. James may say, I'm a first violinist. I do that in a second. You see? So it's not the thing. It's not inherent in the thing. It's inherent in what you think about it. It's your perception. It's what you think, dude What do you think and thinking is a spiritual thing? It's not your brain doesn't think it calculates but who that's who you are So be the best you can be and then help others be the best I I learn really well when I help others and I have Call it a good habit or bad habit when I do something.

37:36I think other people can do it, too So I go, you know, you used to see me when I was in Westwood in my two years there. I was telling everybody, get in the stock market, man. I said, like, everybody can make money. Well, it wasn't exactly true, but I thought that it was. I had a lot of people buying stocks. When they bought the ones I was in, it worked out. And, you know, eventually they went on and did other things, right? But you have to share your knowledge. You have to be a teacher. You have to teach in life from the viewpoint that you're here to make life go right, not just Bob's life, Jack's life, your life.

38:08We got to make the whole, and which is what you're, I told your brother, he said, you are popular because you are helping life go right. That's the last thing I said to him. That's why you're good. You are helping life out. I love that. Life's going to love your house. Bob, I actually want to say, you know, I want to go back to, you know, were you initially in the pharmaceutical business prior to what happened to your son? Or like, was that the moment that got you in there? Well, James, I did have, my mother was chief of training nurses at Los Angeles Hospital, the largest one, and her brother ran a couple of hospitals.

38:41So when I was a kid, I knew them and hung out with them, and I saw them, people knocking on the doors, I need this, I need that. Nobody was paying anybody anything, but I just could see my mother felt good when she was helping other people, and that is medicine. So that got me in, they're in the healthcare business, right? And I will tell everyone, one of the big business opportunities is healthcare, Because you're born you live I tell tell you die but along the way nobody goes from birth to death perfect It is disease something happens broken bones and they need healthcare treatment first four letters of health or H-E-A-L You learn how to heal in any way shape or form you're gonna have a job So I was indoctrinated into it with a kind of a pleasant like they're enjoying this They're having there, you know It gives them pleasure and and I would see people leave you get a big hug ago That's actually probably a pretty good business.

39:33And so I didn't have any back off when I was looking for an investment. I'd run a robotics company, which I backed into. It's one of the first robotic surgery companies, right? Yeah, the first robotic surgery company. We now do 3.2 million procedures a day. I was at the 25th celebration, getting touted as one of the founders, which I can accept and I can have because I was there. I did do it, and it was amazing. First, early on, every two weeks, someone would do a robotic surgery. Now one's done every six seconds. So these things happen. When I left that business, I want to stay in health care, but I'll go over to the drug side.

40:13In the medical side, when we fixed a person, complex reconstructive procedure, they were better 100 % of the time. In medicine, it was like 15 % better. You took the medicine, chemo, radiation. As I studied, I went, this has a lot of room for improvement. I mean 15 % versus medical hardware 100 % and so I thought I would go in and I Well, I took with me what I took out of robotics. It was patient-friendly So I want to be the patient-friendly guy in into this drug medicine business and I was laughed at like that's never you're naive Good luck, but you're gonna get you know Your money's and it would soon depart from you and the the perp what happened there?

40:55Nobody else was in it. I got in it. Nobody was competing. Our drug became friendly because we we strove for that to happen And it did and we made billions of dollars Was that all it was though because the company you took over and invested in bot was it was struggling $21 billion. What did you do? My first two words in my interview with your I get rich or you had money. No, we didn't have any money and I said it's really is it's all about ideas and attitude. That's what it's about. The idea, health care, there's a big need there. And I went after that, and I thought, as I like to use the word as instead of if, as I could do something about it, because I can do something about anything, let me look and see.

41:41This guy was giving up, plus the guy that ran the company was misleading investors. And I also learned, when it comes to investing in money, be as honest as you can be, whether it has to do with heaven or not, Just do not tell a lie. Why not? When I lie, I'm basically trying to alter your perception, right? I'm telling you something that's not true. I score six points. I'm telling you age, so you think I'm a big winner or something. And when I alter your perception where you don't see the truth, my perception gets altered. I don't see the truth. It reflects back on me. Now, how am I going to be successful if I don't have good vision?

42:18That's not going to happen. and man when i recognize that i eliminated 90 i eliminated 10 of my lies i only like 90 of the time now that's a joke i i just if i catch myself i i clean it up right away because i want my perception to be the best that it can be and i want yours to be the best because you could be my partner even if you're not my partner i want people in life to have good perception otherwise some idiots gonna press a button and blow half the hemisphere up and you go I Didn't realize what I was doing, but okay now we have half of the hemisphere, you know under under nuclear dust so Again own it be a participant know where you are Know what survive is about know that the energy is another good in the physical universe Conservation of energy right it's only so much energy.

43:10There's no more no less, but it does something the spiritual universe which you're all spiritual beings. En is the first two letters of energy. That means inner, like engage, get yourself engaged. Erg is a Greek word. Erg, it means to work. So work, actually, etymology of work means completion of intention. How'd the interview work out? At the end, did it get to what you want to do? And why, in a mathematical sense, is no borders and no boundaries, as in the y-axis. So in the spiritual sense which to me is totally senior to the physical universe We're here spiritual beings trying to get the physical universe to be a happy place, right?

43:51That's our game. How do how do instead of being a victim of the universe? How do we become a causative? So if energy is inner the ability complete cycles of action no borders and boundaries That means it's all up to you and me, man. It's it's up to us We're gonna get where we create Bob You're one of the most successful health care entrepreneurs on the planet You built one of the biggest pharmaceutical companies in the world. Yeah. What I want to ask you, and I want you to be honest with me, are most big pharmaceutical companies evil? No. There are evil people in them, but they're not. I've met many, many good people, many good people in that business, and they do want.

44:29I gave a talk to people at Johnson & Johnson. I said, how many of you are proud of the business you're in? I said, why aren't you proud of the business you're in? well we get attacked and we have you know our drugs are having problems and I said okay so let's look at the word drug and it's a compound substance in support of the purpose of medicine let's look at medicine medicine is there to cure or alleviate or diagnose pain are these okay things yeah they're okay things so while you're working for your company just make sure you come in with the best products you can I came into the business I'm going to create patient friendly with definition A friend in a world dictionary is third definition an ally in support of a cause of struggle You've all been patients right and you look at the doctor am I gonna get better?

45:16How quickly I'm better when's the pain gonna go away and when I'm back to normal I broke a bone on my thing and that's all I wanted to know when's the pain going away when I get back to normal so I said you ever Make it make you make your company do the things that will make you feel proud and so they should be so there are drugs that do bad things. There's no question about it. But there's knives that cut meat and stab hearts. And there's AI that is going to lead people into doing the wrong thing and the right thing. I'm a liberal to say, let innovation go forward. But I'm conscientious awareness.

45:52Let's make sure that we're doing the right thing and coach and handle and don't give a little kid that can't handle fire and a knife and matches. because it's probably not going to work out too well, but make them responsible and learn. So I have great hope for life. I love what you all are doing. I want to be a part of it. I want to help you and make things go right. And I really think we can turn life around just on this damn little definition of genius. When people find out that they've got that potential and you've heard the word survive, what are your thoughts right now versus two hours ago with regard to life and little kids?

46:28Bob Duggan: I think there's so much potential that is untapped, and we just need to pour into that more. Less of the fear-mongering about everything that's wrong in the world and more about, hey, what's positive? What's going on with the right? And I'm not saying that people shouldn't be out of touch with what is going on in terms of the negative things, but instead of highlighting everything that's going wrong, let's highlight what's going right. Right. Exactly. There's a blend. You have to be able to look at both of them. And again, that one point in life, you have to confront who you are and what you're doing.

46:59And if you don't like it, change it. But don't sit there and deny that you are what you are. I was a kid that didn't have a whole lot of money. Okay, good. I got it. What's one thing I can do? Go mow a lawn. I got tired of that. I went down to Stickney's. I was washing dishes for three hours. And I said, how much am I getting paid? A bucket and a nickel? I said, I want to get out front and wait tables. When did I get to do that? He said, if it ever comes, it'll be months away. I said, I'm taking my robe off. I said, I'm going out the door. He said, I owe you three bucks. He said, you don't owe me anything.

47:32I learned all I needed to learn here. I'm not into washing dishes at Stikney's. Yance and Huang wash dishes at Denny's.

47:40Bob Duggan: I'm his little finger. Well, I think it's just an important concept of where you start. It's not necessarily where you finish, as well as I think people who are very successful, they take accountability for everything that happens in their life that we talked about. if I was to get rear-ended in a car accident, even though it was not my fault, I would have blamed myself. I was like, well, I probably woke up two minutes later than I should have. You know, I waited a little bit too long to get dressed today. And it's all my fault, even though the direct accident, whatever, may not be because of my direct actions.

48:13But at the end of the day,

48:14Bob Duggan: I put myself in that scenario to have that happen to me. And so I think more people need to take control and ownership of everything that happens in their life, good or bad. So success is way, way, way up there, right? Let's say there's a ladder from where you are to this way up there success. I can guarantee you the steps are comprised of wins and losses. And I ask people, who loses the most, losers or winners? Winners. Yeah, because they keep on going. Loser stops at the loss. That's it. I lost twice. I'm such a smart guy. You'll never see me do that again. I made my last investment. Your next one could have been up 100-fold.

48:52Bob, why did you move from California to Miami? Honestly, taxes. How much money did you pay in taxes in California? I made$100 million. I walked out the door. So that's too much. It's just too much. But it's also, really, it's the environment here. I mean, Miami is an environment. Beautiful weather, really beautiful people like yourselves. They're great people in California, too. I mean, I was born and raised in California right in the middle of Silicon Valley. So I owe that environment. You talked about sports and what are you going to do in business? I'm working for a label company as a kid making three bucks an hour with three of the guys that were blue-collar workers.

49:34I told them I was going to the University of California. You're going to be rich. And I go, that's good. Tell me more about it. You can invest. I said, what do you guys do? We invest in stocks. These are blue-collar workers that were high school graduates investing in stocks. They got me to invest in 10 shares of a$28 stock. And I went to school that year. I came back, said, hey, what's your$28 stock doing? We all invest in it. I said, I know it's$110. Right. So you put$280 in. You have$1 ,000. You don't even work here now. I said, no, I want to get another$1 ,000 and keep on going. When I went to school, you will never work for Fidelity.

50:11You'll never work for Bank of America. You need four or five different degrees. You're not going to be a stock market analyst. That's what the professors told me. The guys with blue collars, invest, make money, get rich. I want to give you one of the best compliments I think you can get. Can I give you one? Yeah. Do I have permission to give you one? Yeah, yeah. So I went up and down our comment section on the video that we did together, and it had thousands of comments. It's impossible to read through every one. Yeah. But there were a handful, five to ten comments, and also we got private DMs.

50:41I should have screenshotted them and sent them to you, of people that worked with you within your companies, various ones. Oh, really? Some were part of different companies, right? Yeah, yeah. Every single one of them had people that said, the guy you just interviewed, Bob Duggan, he is the exact same person, you know, when they worked with you, man. And I just think that that's a testament of the person that you are as an entrepreneur and the profound impact that you had on people because that reputation is very important, right? And a lot of people, they don't treat people good behind the doors.

51:10It may just be all about squeezing as much out of them as possible for the success of the company. So I think that says a lot about you as like the leader. And, you know, maybe if there's, you know, somebody that aspires to one day build a billion dollar company, is there any really important leadership advice on how you were able to have that same effect on other people? So you want to build a billion dollar company, think of something that would be worth a billion dollars as you did it well. Find people that can share that same attitude because you will not do it yourself. So have that have that aim.

51:40Look at why do you really want to do that? Because that's what's sustainable. You know, you can you just need to know why do I want to do it? And it might be because I want everybody to prosper. I mean, I really, I want life. I'm a part of life. I want it to prosper. Let's say I come back. Maybe I do. Maybe I don't. Let's say I do. Do I want to come back to a hell hole? No, no. Any of those headlines? Absolutely not. I want to come back to meeting guys like you and get things up, rolling and going and have fun in life. So, yeah, have a good purpose. But share your winnings with your employees and make sure that you're, every quarter, I tell people, look in the mirror and do you feel you know more and doing better now than you were three months ago?

52:22And that's on me. I owe that to you and you owe it to yourself. We owe it to each other together. So unbalanced, that's what happens. Business is not easy. It requires discipline. It requires strength and courage to make things go right. Last night I had a person that I'm going to have to let go and I'll be telling him on Friday and it's not fun but it's not working with this person you know so I will give him very clear understanding of what wasn't working we worked for years a few years together it hasn't changed and so he'd go find another place or he can change and if he changes comes back in a year or two he could come back and work for us but the way he's operating isn't going to work.

53:07So you have to be able to make those calls as well. And yeah, yeah, yeah. You have to have a good purpose, good aims, love life. It's not that hard to do. Bob, we like to end these podcasts off with two questions for our guests. I'll start, Jack will finish it. But Bob, I'm going to ask you the same question I asked at the end of our first interview that we did. It's that if me and you died tomorrow and you could leave one more message with the younger generation, what would that be? I tell you, it's not going to change. I want them to know that life is all about super living and that they're a part of it they're responsible for it and do everything they can and they asked me one more question what's my best so just go find the 24 traits and characteristics of genius they're there they're magical you have them in you they're just going to remind you this to there and you're going to lead a great life and you'll be looking to thank me there's 24 characteristics right there of genius yeah yeah yeah if somebody wants to become a billionaire in today's world what's the most important trait for them to master well the most important trait It's not a trait for them to master is that gen means to bring about and make happen.

54:09So what are the ways? Look at drive, courage, devotion to goals, knowledge, honesty, optimism, ability to judge, enthusiasm, willing to take chances because you learn from your mistakes, dynamic energy, enterprise, persuasion, outgoingness, ability to communicate, patience, perception, perfection, sense of humor, versatility, adaptability, curiosity, individualism, idealism, imagination. Now, is anybody listening and go, I'd throw one of those out? I dare you. I mean that won't happen. And if you ever see me, you tell me which one you like. I will show you they're integrated. It's one where it's like ice cream.

54:42Ice cream is a big word. If you really know ice cream, you've never had ice cream. You don't know what to think of ice cream, ice and cream. Maybe you wouldn't even like it, but get get into this and then you'll learn. You won't you won't you will not step back. These are traits that James, they're in you. God has given them to you don't embarrass them use them don't knock on his door and say let me in the back door I didn't quite earn it use these and you'll earn it that door's going to be wide ass open for you and Bob we ask this to every guest that comes on the podcast how old are you today?

55:1582 today 82 years old that's incredible 2 years older than Trump 14 years younger than Warren Buffett there you go there you go so for you how do you want to be remembered? how do I want to be remembered? Bob came to life contributed to life and we're glad he was there and like I told James if we start another planet we're asking Bob to join us I'm taking all of you three with me I do one we're all coming to join it Bob yeah Bob thank you so much for being with us today we appreciate you my friend yeah in Spanish for those that see Spanish como mucho gusto English thank you very much it's my honor and my pleasure and we're not done there'll be a lot of things we can do together for everybody watching right now be sure to like and subscribe for amazing content amazing episodes coming every week to the Hard Knocks podcast.

55:58We're gonna put the links down in the description for you all to follow along, Bob on Instagram, as well as the links to his companies that he's currently building right now because he's still doing some fascinating things in the healthcare and pharmaceutical world. Lastly, we're gonna put a link down in the description to join the School of Mentors, which is the number one most powerful entrepreneur community in the entire world that myself, Jack and Josh launched a couple of years ago to give you guys direct access to live calls we host every single week with the eight, nine, 10 and 11 figure entrepreneurs we interview on the school of hard knocks.

56:27So we can't wait to see you on the inside of the school of mentors. And with that being said, we'll see you in the next episode. And one day you're going to be the interviewee and you're going to be the billionaire yourself. It can happen. God bless you. I love it. Let's go. That was awesome.