Wired has a quick interview with James Dyson on their website.

A few things stood out for me, beyond the design ideas that it’s about taking things away, and the current impetus is to make things more efficient and effective to reduce energy consumption etc…

• He started his company 20 years ago, at the age of 45. I seem to be collecting examples of people launching ideas and products in later life as I get older, to disprove the fact that all entrepreneurs, inventors and digital natives are 20 years old.
• He spends a bit of time justifying patents – I think everyone on each side of the patent debates agrees that invention should be rewarded, but the devil is in the detail of how it happens.
• “Well, the moment it works—having built, say, 5,126 prototypes, and you make your 5,127th and it finally works—you immediately lose interest in it. You don’t go off and buy a bottle of champagne and celebrate, because you’re on to the next thing. It sounds like an awful life. Well, it is quite stressful, but it’s hugely enjoyable too, because you spend your time examining why things didn’t work and trying to understand.”
• And the next thing for Dyson is robotic vacuum cleaners. Which is probably where they really enter the mainstream.