> Based on what I read, it wasn't that there was no way to make this work - as you state here.
It totally was! He had no way to solve the fundamental problem of the software - making people use it ALL the time, for multiple (paying) users. If the software was doomed to be one licence for an office of 20, where it is used sporadically for one or two infrequent use cases, it was doomed, and the only hope was a pivot. No one should start a business hoping to pivot.
> It's that you didn't want to stake your future on an uncertain outcome.
Again, no it wasn't. It was that he didn't want to chase hoping there might be a solution, because there may not have been a solution at all. If your whole business plan is "raise cash and hope we pivot to a good idea", is that really a solid plan? Why not just pivot before getting the cash? I have never heard of anyone proposing to raise cash based on an as yet undecided pivot.
> That said, if every founder thought this way we wouldn't have most of the companies that we rely on today
Prove it. No company I can think of knew pre-funding of a huge flaw at the core of their product they couldn't solve, and raised cash so they COULD pivot. Most pivots happen because a company finds a small element people love, so they move towards that. Startups don't go in hoping to pivot to an as yet undecided new plan. I mean, that just seems non sensical to me.
There are other examples in this thread. A pivot is exactly that, something you need to re-engineer or change the market on to make viable.
Reddit is a good example. Burbn/Instagram another. Flikr even better.
If your whole business plan is "raise cash and hope we pivot to a good idea", is that really a solid plan?
As with most things, the answer is "It depends." Taking money can be a forcing function on a pivot. If you have a solid team and know that there is a market, then you seek hard for a solution - if there is no solution in the market then you take the company in a different direction. That's why team is so important - ideas fail.
It totally was! He had no way to solve the fundamental problem of the software - making people use it ALL the time, for multiple (paying) users. If the software was doomed to be one licence for an office of 20, where it is used sporadically for one or two infrequent use cases, it was doomed, and the only hope was a pivot. No one should start a business hoping to pivot.
> It's that you didn't want to stake your future on an uncertain outcome.
Again, no it wasn't. It was that he didn't want to chase hoping there might be a solution, because there may not have been a solution at all. If your whole business plan is "raise cash and hope we pivot to a good idea", is that really a solid plan? Why not just pivot before getting the cash? I have never heard of anyone proposing to raise cash based on an as yet undecided pivot.
> That said, if every founder thought this way we wouldn't have most of the companies that we rely on today
Prove it. No company I can think of knew pre-funding of a huge flaw at the core of their product they couldn't solve, and raised cash so they COULD pivot. Most pivots happen because a company finds a small element people love, so they move towards that. Startups don't go in hoping to pivot to an as yet undecided new plan. I mean, that just seems non sensical to me.