Agreed, for hardware and manufacturing related development it is very difficult to see out past 5 years where anything new is being attempted. Within 3-5 years

Agreed, for hardware and manufacturing related development it is very difficult to see out past 5 years where anything new is being attempted. Within 3-5 years you are largely constrained by current available manufacturing, fabs, and processes, but farther out there may be better choices. You may be better served by doing the research (or collaborating with a supplier) to build new production capacity (understanding their challenges) for anything further out. Look at DUV lithography where a huge industry flipped on its head in 5 years, while X-ray lithography had been in development (and written off) for so many decades it had to be renamed. That required real R&D not tweaking current available equipment, which led to asymetric advantages and huge profits (Zero to One).