3 ms·

One class of markets that I suspect is a target-rich environment: disability-adaptation tech. 1. There is a decent chance that existing entrants are tied down

One class of markets that I suspect is a target-rich environment: disability-adaptation tech. 1. There is a decent chance that existing entrants are tied down by a focus on meeting the regulations rather than on delighting users. 2. You might be able to significantly scale-up and thus improve the unit economics. While the market of people who can pass the means-testing to qualify for whatever government-subsidized benefit exists might be small, the nature of bureaucracy means there is often a MUCH wider pool of people who are "quasi-disabled", either permanently or temporarily. Note that there are a few disabilities which are so overwhelmingly common that the market is already saturated. The classic example is eyeglasses. 3. The specific disabled population is a ready-made population of early adopters IF you identify that you can keep your focus on delighting users and just use the regulations to remind yourself of risks and edge-cases. (This really will depend quite heavily on the quality of the regulations -- notice the difference between Japanese zoning and SF-bay housing-approvals) Lots of legacy disability tech: * Has a pretty frustrating maintenance cycle, so you can win on a strong customer service brand IF you can innovate on operations. * Can be pretty frustrating to use, so you can win big on design. A focus on delighting users rather than ticking boxes is naturally going to produce a naturally better product. Here is the key tactic though: lean on the early-adopters for high-detail feedback. This problem occupies a much larger proportion of their lives than the average user of a product. This higher-strength signal of user needs is known as the "Curb Cut Effect". https://thingofthings.wordpress.com/2014/11/15/the-curb-cut-effect-or-why-it-is-basically-impossible-to-appropriate-from-disabled-people/ https://thingofthings.wordpress.com/2014/11/15/the-curb-cut-... This also seems to hint at a good trick to turn any regulatory box-ticking exercise into purpose-driven-design. After all, a focus on privacy-by-design is better than a focus on the letter of GDPR-compliance, right? ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hilariously, I used to work for a YC company unwittingly building assistive tech for my particular disability. Their Curb Cut effect was so ridiculously strong, they've occasionally written ad copy with reference to a symptom I've experienced and I'm pretty sure they still don't even realize it. Looking back, I now really wish I had been self-confident enough to explicitly disclose -- especially when their CEO started using a wheelchair.

rglovejoy 6y ago
The problem here is that the real customers are the health insurance companies, Medicare, and the VA. They don't care about being delighted, they want inexpensive and rugged devices. That's the problem Dean Kamen had with his iBOT wheelchair. They were very cool and their users loved them, but they went for something like $25,000 each and likely needed frequent maintenance.
- refurb 6y ago
  Yup, if you’ve every watched network TV and seen the “Did you know Medicare will pay for X?” and wondered why, it’s exactly this. If you want Medicare to pay for a product, you need a positive Coverage Determination. And if you get it, you just opened up a 50M person market (obviously a subset, since not everyone will need it) and all you need is the patient to say to their doctor “I want that” and it’s paid for. It’s a heavily front loaded business, but if can get reimbursement, it’s basically paid for, you just need customers to ask for it (I’m obviously simplifying, since it varies by product type, but medical equipment is a great example).
- wtracy 6y ago
  Which is why a lot of the real money is in products that have wide appeal for non-disabled users. This is where most of the bizarre "as seen on TV" products come from: The inventor made a tool for people with disabilities, found that the target market wasn't large enough to sustain a business, and frantically tried to pivot. Pivoting is hard when you already have a large inventory of hard products. If you can build something that able-bodied people are not only willing to use but willing to pay extra for, then you're good to go.
  - afarrell 6y ago
    yep, this is my argument

rglovejoy 6y ago

The problem here is that the real customers are the health insurance companies, Medicare, and the VA. They don't care about being delighted, they want inexpensive and rugged devices. That's the problem Dean Kamen had with his iBOT wheelchair. They were very cool and their users loved them, but they went for something like $25,000 each and likely needed frequent maintenance.

refurb 6y ago
Yup, if you’ve every watched network TV and seen the “Did you know Medicare will pay for X?” and wondered why, it’s exactly this. If you want Medicare to pay for a product, you need a positive Coverage Determination. And if you get it, you just opened up a 50M person market (obviously a subset, since not everyone will need it) and all you need is the patient to say to their doctor “I want that” and it’s paid for. It’s a heavily front loaded business, but if can get reimbursement, it’s basically paid for, you just need customers to ask for it (I’m obviously simplifying, since it varies by product type, but medical equipment is a great example).
wtracy 6y ago
Which is why a lot of the real money is in products that have wide appeal for non-disabled users. This is where most of the bizarre "as seen on TV" products come from: The inventor made a tool for people with disabilities, found that the target market wasn't large enough to sustain a business, and frantically tried to pivot. Pivoting is hard when you already have a large inventory of hard products. If you can build something that able-bodied people are not only willing to use but willing to pay extra for, then you're good to go.
- afarrell 6y ago
  yep, this is my argument