"I'm a techie nerd. What I like is intellectual stimulus. It's fundamentally what I enjoy."
He was smitten by Silicon Valley as a teenager in New Delhi in the 1970s. Every week, he would rent and carefully read worn-out copies of what was then the startup publication of record, Electronic Engineering Times.
In the 1990s, he was inspired to concentrate on optical communications while reading books on the physics of optics -- during a vacation in Hawaii. On another typical summer break, he studied complex systems at the Santa Fe Institute; to prepare, he worked for six months with a tutor, brushing up on calculus and linear algebra.
When he got interested in climate change, he prepared an extensive briefing book for himself, loosely based on Danish political scientist Bjørn Lomborg's book, The Skeptical Environmentalist.
Khosla's almost obsessive thoroughness carries over into his private life. In the late 1980s, before hiring a designer for his new 12,000-square-foot home on a woody hillside, he read more than 100 books on architecture. He likes to set goals that can be measured.
To remind himself to spend more time with his eldest child, he used to keep a jar of jelly beans on his office desk, removing one each Monday; those that remained were the number of weekends until she would go off to college. Although he travels frequently, he requires himself to be home for dinner at least 25 evenings a month; his administrative assistant monitors his performance.
Image: Photovoltaic solar panels are mounted on the west wing roof of the Oregon State Capitol in Salem, Oregon. | Photograph: Melanie Conner/Getty Images
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