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Everyone has forgotten about something they bought. Maybe it was a gift card tucked into a drawer or a stock purchased years ago and left untouched. NBA legend Shaquille O’Neal forgot he invested in Google. It took a newspaper to remind him that one casual lunch had turned into one of the best investments of his life.
“We had a meeting with them and it looked good and I put some money in and I forgot about it,” O’Neal said at TechCrunch Disrupt 2023. “And then the newspaper told me how much I made and I couldn’t believe how much I made.”
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The investment started with an unexpected lunch at the Four Seasons. O’Neal said he was chatting with a group of businessmen after entertaining their children when one of them began talking about a startup called Google. The pitch was simple: one day, people would be able to type in anything they wanted to find online. O’Neal liked what he heard, agreed to a meeting and decided to invest.
One Lunch Became One of His Biggest Wins
At the time, Google was still an up-and-coming startup, not the tech giant it would eventually become. O’Neal said he didn’t spend years watching the investment or tracking its value. Instead, it faded into the background until a newspaper story revealed just how much his stake had grown.
The experience became one of the defining moments of O’Neal’s investing career and helped shape the way he thinks about backing young companies.
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A Philosophy Built Around Changing Lives
While reflecting on his investing journey, O’Neal said the approach dates back to advice he heard from Amazon founder Jeff Bezos years before.
“I went to a conference in ’97 or ’98 and I heard a beautiful bald-headed man by the name of Jeff Bezos say if you invest in things, it’s going to change people’s lives,” O’Neal said. “When I heard Jeff Bezos say that, I started investing in things that’s gonna change people’s lives. And that’s been great for me, and I don’t like to sit up here like I’m an expert, but that has always been my style.”
That idea has influenced investments across O’Neal’s portfolio, including Edsoma, an AI-powered reading platform designed to help children improve literacy. He also acknowledged making mistakes earlier in his investing career by trying to get rich quickly before deciding to focus on businesses with long-term purpose.
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Looking for the Next Company That Solves Real Problems
O’Neal’s strategy still resonates with investors searching for promising startups. Rather than chasing hype alone, many look for companies building products that could become part of everyday life.
One example is Immersed, a startup developing AI-powered productivity software and lightweight mixed-reality hardware that creates expansive virtual workspaces for professionals. Like any early-stage company, it carries risk, but its focus on practical technology reflects the kind of mission-driven business O’Neal said has guided his investing decisions for decades.
Google turned into a memorable payday, but O’Neal’s biggest takeaway wasn’t about the money. It was that backing companies with the potential to improve people’s lives can sometimes produce returns that are impossible to imagine when the investment is first made.
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Building Wealth Across More Than Just the Market
Building a resilient portfolio means thinking beyond a single asset or market trend. Economic cycles shift, sectors rise and fall, and no one investment performs well in every environment. That’s why many investors look to diversify with platforms that provide access to real estate, fixed-income opportunities, precious metals, and even self-directed retirement accounts. By spreading exposure across multiple asset classes, it becomes easier to manage risk, capture steady returns, and create long-term wealth that isn’t tied to the fortunes of just one company or industry.
Arrived
Backed by Jeff Bezos, Arrived Homes makes real estate investing accessible with a low barrier to entry. Investors can buy fractional shares of single-family rentals and vacation homes starting with as little as $100. This allows everyday investors to diversify into real estate, collect rental income, and build long-term wealth without needing to manage properties directly.
FarmTogether
Farmland has historically held its value through market volatility and delivered returns uncorrelated to stocks and bonds. For accredited investors, FarmTogether offers direct access to high-quality U.S. farmland starting at $15,000 — fully managed, with no landlord headaches.
Fundrise
Private real estate and private credit can add income and stability to a stock-heavy portfolio. Fundrise offers access to diversified private real estate and credit strategies through an easy-to-use platform, with professionally managed portfolios designed to generate passive income and long-term growth.
Realberry
Institutional-quality real estate has traditionally been difficult for individual investors to access. Realberry gives accredited investors direct access to private real estate opportunities backed by a team with 35 years of experience, $3.4 billion in assets under management, and $481 million in cumulative distributions paid to investors as of Q4 2025, according to the company. With a portfolio spanning 13 million square feet across seven U.S. states, Realberry focuses on acquiring, developing, and managing real estate with an emphasis on long-term value creation while its principals often invest alongside clients to help align interests.
Immersed
Immersed is building technology for the future of work through spatial computing. Known for its AR/VR productivity platform that enables users to work across multiple virtual screens, the company has grown to more than 1.5 million users worldwide. Immersed is also developing Visor, a lightweight headset designed specifically for professional productivity, positioning the company at the intersection of remote work, extended reality (XR), and next-generation computing.
BluSky AI
The rapid adoption of artificial intelligence is creating significant demand for data centers, power, and compute infrastructure. BluSky AI is building modular AI data centers designed to support next-generation AI workloads while aiming to reduce deployment timelines compared to traditional facilities. For investors looking beyond AI software and applications, the company offers exposure to the infrastructure layer that makes artificial intelligence possible.
Vinovest
Fine wine and rare whiskey have historically moved independently of the stock market, making them a compelling alternative asset. Vinovest manages authenticated, insured portfolios of investment-grade wine and whiskey starting at $5,000 — sourcing, storage, and insurance all handled for you.
EquityMultiple
For accredited investors looking beyond stocks and bonds, EquityMultiple provides access to vetted commercial real estate deals starting at $5,000, with only ~5% of opportunities passing their due diligence process.
Mode Mobile
Mode Mobile is changing the way people interact with their phones by letting users earn money from the same apps and activities they already use every day. Instead of platforms keeping all the advertising revenue, Mode Mobile shares a portion back with users who engage with content, play games, and scroll on their devices. Named one of Deloitte’s fastest-growing software companies in North America, the company has built a large beta user base and is scaling a model that turns everyday smartphone usage into a potential income stream.
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This article Shaq Invested in Google After Meeting a Guy at the Four Seasons — Then Forgot About It Until a Newspaper Told Him. ‘I Couldn’t Believe it’ originally appeared on Benzinga.com
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