Beware Tech Tycoons with Piranha Tanks - with Katie Prescott

About this episode

The episode discusses the rise and fall of tech entrepreneur Mike Lynch and the lessons learned from his story.

Mike Lynch was often lauded as Britain's answer to Bill Gates. Born into a working-class family, Lynch's incredible intellect and passion for computers led him to become a billionaire tech entrepreneur.   But behind the scenes, Lynch was a bully who couldn't bear criticism and was prone to creative accounting. When computer giant Hewlett Packard bought his company, Autonomy, it triggered one of the biggest fraud scandals in Silicon Valley history. Tim talks to Katie Prescott, Technology Business Editor at The Times and author of the book  The Curious Case of Mike Lynch ,  about the lessons we can take from a story no one could have predicted . For a list of sources see timharford.com See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

People in this episode

Host: Tim Harford

Guest: Katie Prescott

Topics covered

• tech entrepreneurship
• fraud scandals
• business ethics
• Silicon Valley
• technology
• media

Keywords

• Mike Lynch
• Bill Gates
• Hewlett Packard
• fraud
• technology
• entrepreneurship
• Katie Prescott

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Hewlett Packard, Autonomy

Books & works: The Curious Case of Mike Lynch

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