This job requires Pacific crossing many times a year. Each trip takes about 16 hours, door to door. Shackled on that chair, I always imagined my life leaking out through those jet engines into that vast water below.

Quickly, I learned to load up reading materials prior. I also grab from the tray when boarding the plane: International Herald Tribune, Wall Street Journal, and whatever local newspaper. A copy of San Francisco Chronicle came onboard this time. As I flip to Sports Green and Datebook, I found this front-page article on exactly the event I came to Menlo Park for. Wow! Pretty cool. Read it yourself.

On August 29th, Sun hosted an Emerging Markets Summit. The message is simple: as Internet liberates consumers by giving them information, it also becomes the defining factor of economies. Those emerging markets are leapfrogging their 1st world counterparts with aggressive deployment of cell phones — the pervasive and ubiquitous accessing device to the Internet. Consumers, instead of enterprises, drive IT industry now. USA, with its mere 300 millions citizens, will gradually yield the center stage to more populous countries.

Sun has a unique strategy. We try hard to level the playing fields for everyone. We believe the world is better off when all players compete fairly. Sun will win in the arena that only innovative skills count. With this mantra, Sun open-sourced its software and hardware technologies. We also promote open standards that do not favor any enterprise or country.

We found many friends in those emerging markets when we told them this strategy. Revenue growth soon followed. With successes, Sun plowed back into these market with more R&D. These engineers innovated and contributed back to Sun and their local communities. It is a positive feedback loop.

Imagine the contrary protective strategy. Keep technologies close and proprietary so that customers are locked in. To guarantee no leakage, no core components leave their US-based headquarters. Off-shore centers are minimal and engaged with only menial tasks.

But technologies and products advance quickly. When the next lifecycle arrives, customers would have learned the lessons and choose open solutions. In emerging economies, there are a lot more new businesses than old enterprises. Entrepreneurs learn during their tenures in old enterprises and observe each others closely. The lock-them-in-and-don't-share strategy just does not work, at least not in these markets.

This Boeing 747 settles into the auto-piloted cruising pattern. Passengers start to deploy boredom-fighting techniques. This is a same torturous trip. But I felt satisfied and fulfilled before I drifted into the comatose state.