25 Innovations will kill startups profitability and will make the bubble burst in 2008-2018 | Hacker News Reader

25 Innovations will kill startups profitability and will make the bubble burst in 2008-2018

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3 pointsszczupak5 comments

I don't see 25 innovations and predicting a market downturn by 2018 isn't a bold prediction. Regardless, I'll add a few more accelerating trends.

The disposable razor was invented in 1895 and patented in 1904. It took 70 before a razor had two blades. Nowadays, five blades are widely available. If this trend continues, we'll have a shaving singularity before 2015 ( http://larvatusprodeo.net/2006/03/25/to-infinity-and-beyond/ ).

Lucky Charms were first sold in 1963 with four types of marchmellow. In 2006, this had risen to 14 and we'll have a Lucky Charm singularity by 2012.

"To be successful startups will have to:

    1. deliver completely new solutions or significantly improve existing services
    2. compete with clones which provide low quality services and spoil the market
    3. invest in some marketing to be faster than major companies that can easily copy ideas and optimize them "

And this is different than the current situation how?

I question the premise that a fast moving market is negative for startups. In fact, its precisely these things that makes it possible for startups to compete with big players. A quickly changing market will just make it easier for small companies to grab a niche and hold on to (or sell) it.

Most of Hewlett Packard’s revenues come from products that did not exist 24 months ago.

The only way this could be true is if you count new models as entirely new products, a mistake I think only a novice could make.

"Everything that can be invented – has already been invented."

- Charles Duell, United States Patent Office Commissioner, 1899

Any relation?

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