Impact vs Scale Assessment

Brett Adcock shares his philosophy on evaluating startup opportunities and making high-impact decisions. His approach focuses on identifying opportunities with clear demand and technical feasibility.

Key Decision Making Framework

• Strongly believes in touching the mass market or having significant impact with few users
• Evaluates opportunities based on clear existing demand rather than having to create demand
• Focuses on solving fundamental problems rather than incremental improvements

Hardware vs Software Approach

Software Challenges

• Requires convincing people to want the product
• Infinite options on what to build
• Must hope you're building the right thing
• Complex emergent properties like retention and competitive threats
• Constant feature development needed

Hardware Advantages

• Clear existing demand for solutions
• Bounded by physics and known rules
• Simpler puzzle to solve:
  • If you can build it, people will want it
  • Success depends mainly on technical execution
  • Rules and equations are already known

What Really Matters

• Technology development is the key focus
  • How often you're iterating
  • Progress between iteration cycles
• Less important factors:
  • Marketing
  • PR
  • Who you raise capital from
  • TechCrunch articles

Risk Assessment

• Willing to go "all in" on opportunities with:
  • Clear market demand
  • Technical feasibility
  • Large potential impact
• Focuses on solving fundamental problems that:
  • Haven't been addressed in decades
  • Have clear customer pain points
  • Show obvious demand if solution exists

Example: Figure Robotics

• Clear existing demand from labor shortages
• Physics and rules are known
• Success depends mainly on technical execution
• Customers saying "we'll buy a million if you can build it"
• Demand is "almost unbounded" if technical execution works