The founding fathers of these immensely successful firms skimped on food, never went by cab and regarded a long tramp in the countryside as all the holiday anyone could need.
One of Russia's richest men, Mr Prokhorov ran and part-owned Norilsk Nickel, an immensely complex mining firm operating north of the Arctic circle, and is nobody's fool.
For Zabel, by contrast, the hedge-fund industry was native ground: his father was a founder of Schulte, Roth & Zabel, an immensely successful law firm that served hedge-fund clients.
That is because the organization responsible for exposing my data is the immensely powerful venture capital firm of Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers (KPCB --the same firm recently written up for its new "green" energy pursuits in The New YorKPCB --thegazine, and the source of funding, according to its own web site, for "such household names as Amazon, Sun, Genentech, Intuit, Verisign and Google".
It was a possible sign that investors fear that the S.E.C. complaint will damage Goldman's reputation and its ability to keep its hands on so many sides of a trade — a practice that is immensely profitable for the firm.
"There were stories back in the 1980s of conspicuous consumption," recalls Ann Winblad, general partner at Hummer Winblad Venture Partners in San Francisco, Calif., an immensely successful venture capital firm.
Small innovative firms benefit immensely from interacting with such an ecosystem.
These firms have benefited immensely from government funded research.
The custom-made handles on the cabinets, smart-looking little devices called Lock-it, are made by his firm, George Ranalli Designs, and he is immensely proud that they are in the collections of the Denver Art Museum and the Indianapolis Museum of Art.
They are far less well-known than the oil firms that hire them, but immensely lucrative.
