HACKER Q&A
📣 zufiusrufus

Heuristics on Designing a Product from a Technology?


I'm building a tool that solves a problem, worth solving. I've established communication with some investors, and some are willing to invest.

The conversation though is paused at the question: "Would you invest in this?". The answer I get is "Yes, I see the technology but I can't see the product and I'd invest in a product".

Any generic tips and thoughts on how to go from "that's a useful tool" to "that's a product"?

Sorry, I can't disclose too many details.

  👤 Etheryte Accepted Answer ✓
Thinking you can't disclose too many details is a misnomer. Ideas are worthless — however good you think your idea is, there's many people who've had it, and probably many who are considering it right now. Executing is the only metric that really matters. The iPhone wasn't such a success because it was a good idea, there were many smartphones on the market before that, it was the execution that mattered. Same for Dropbox. Or Airbnb. Or any other example you'd like to pick.
👤 jschveibinz
So this is a common hurdle in innovation. Everyone, including university researchers, faces this same conundrum. The best path to a solution is iteration: you build a small prototype, and you demonstrate it. Sometimes this is convincing enough to get a little money. Then, you use that money to build a better prototype and some performance data and you demonstrate some more. Maybe you convince someone to give you a bit more money. And this process continues until your prototype starts to look like something that could actually become a product. Now you can start to gather market interest data with serious specifications. Now you will get a serious look from investors.

TL;DR it’s an iterative process