I mean, I wouldn't really call him a 'hardware person' either. If you consider a hardware person to be someone who does electrical or computer engineering, like designing PCBs or microcontrollers, etc. He comes across to me like a savvy consumer.

I don't remember him doing any of those things, I think Alex is their resident engineer... In my eyes Linus is just a nerd and a salesman.

That's why you hire software/design people.

He's neither.