When a Startup Can Serve Every Industry, Where Should It Start?
There is one sentence that comes up surprisingly often when I work with researchers and technology startups.
“Our technology can be used in healthcare, agriculture, manufacturing, defence and energy.”
The statement is usually followed by a sense of excitement. And honestly, I can understand why. After years of developing a technology, discovering that it has applications across multiple industries feels like a good thing. In fact, it is a good thing. It means there may be multiple paths to creating impact. But I think this is where many teams get stuck.
They assume that identifying multiple opportunities is the end of the exercise.
In reality, it is the beginning. The difficult part is not finding opportunities. The difficult part is comparing them and making choices.
Which market has the most important problem?
Which customers are actively looking for solutions?
Which customers can we realistically reach and learn from?
Which market is willing to adopt something new?
Which one gives us the best chance of learning quickly?
These are not technology questions. They are market questions. And they are often much harder to answer.
What I have observed is that teams are usually very comfortable talking about the capabilities of their technology. But they are much less comfortable discussing why one opportunity should be pursued before another. Sometimes there is a fear of missing out.
What if we choose healthcare and defence turns out to be bigger?
What if we choose agriculture and manufacturing moves faster?
So the natural tendency is to keep all options open. The problem is that startups do not have unlimited time, money or attention. At some point, every team has to decide where to start.
Not because the other opportunities disappear.
Not because the technology suddenly becomes less valuable elsewhere.
But because learning happens much faster when a team focuses its efforts.
Interestingly, I have found that some of the most successful teams are not the ones with the fewest opportunities. They are the ones that are able to evaluate many opportunities and then deliberately choose where to begin. I sometimes tell startup teams that identifying ten opportunities is often the easy part.
Choosing one is where the real work starts. Because the moment you choose, you are not saying “no” to the others forever. You are simply deciding where to learn first.
In my experience, that is one of the hardest decisions for researchers and technology founders to make.
