A Startup’s Focus Is the Customer’s Problem, Not Existing Competitors

Originally published 2020-10-05Robin’s commentary plus an external quotation (source of the passage after the divider not identified)

Storage information

Bookmarks and reading positions are stored in this browser. Manage and back them up in My Reading.

Collected in Robin Shen’s Field Notes · Content type and attribution are shown above

English translation of the Chinese post originally published 2020-10-05. Translated 2026-10-31 with AI assistance. Historical figures and claims have not been updated or independently verified. 中文原文

Reading guide

After listening to Keji Daodu, Robin argues that a startup should focus on the problem it seeks to solve and the customer’s fundamental needs, rather than watch existing competitors. Tesla did not focus on Toyota and Volkswagen, and SpaceX redesigned rockets. These examples illustrate his view that concentrating on competitors would merely produce a faster version of a traditional product. After the divider, an external strategy passage discusses dozens of agile small challengers.

Key points

Focus on the problem to be solved and the customer’s fundamental problem.
Tesla and SpaceX redesigned architectures rather than chased traditional competitors.
Watching competitors can lead to copying conventional business models.
Market-capitalization figures are those stated in the October 2020 post, not independently verified and not current figures.

One clear path continues into the distance among several branching routes, suggesting choice and focus. — Entrepreneurship & strategyThematic illustration · AI generated

Full text — English translation

#YourFocusIsNotOnCompetitors #SolveTodaysProblemsFromThePerspectiveOfTheFuture I just listened to Keji Daodu and wanted to share an idea. Your startup’s focus should not be existing competitors, but the problem you want to solve. When Elon Musk built Tesla, he did not focus on Toyota and Volkswagen. While traditional automakers showed little interest in electric vehicles, Musk began designing an entirely new EV architecture. Even the business model broke with traditional manufacturers’ pricing and sales approaches, with large price cuts appearing from time to time. After more than a decade of setbacks and several brushes with bankruptcy, Tesla now has a market capitalization of US$380 billion, compared with Toyota’s US$208.5 billion and Volkswagen’s US$82 billion—more than the world’s two leading automakers combined. If Musk had focused on competitors and tried to surpass them, he might have built a faster Toyota sports car, while retaining a traditional automaker’s business model and worrying about used-car prices. If Musk had pursued his dream of moving humanity to Mars by focusing on competitors such as Boeing and other traditional aerospace companies, he would likewise have struggled to build a rocket with an entirely new architecture. He chose to redesign rockets, giving us SpaceX and subsequent projects such as Starlink. SpaceX even became the first private company in human spaceflight history to send people into space, opening a new era and encouraging another wave of competitors and the transformation of existing industry players. So let me emphasize again: your startup should focus on the problem you want to solve—or, more precisely, the customer’s fundamental problem. Focus on customers and the nature of the problem. Can your startup make the world even a little different? --- Traditional corporate strategy assumes a company faces one or a few competitors whose behavior is somewhat predictable. Under those conditions, competition does resemble chess or war. In today’s markets, however, companies in many industries face not one or two predictable large rivals, but dozens of agile, unpredictable small challengers. These newcomers are difficult to predict because they often use innovative business models and unconventional strategies that can adapt more quickly to changing conditions.

These articles are personal notes, book excerpts, and collected reprints. Figures and events reflect the time of the original publication, are not current information, and do not constitute investment advice.

DISCUSSION

Reader comments

What did this article make you think about? Different perspectives and constructive criticism are welcome.

Comments are public immediately. Do not include personal contact details or external links. Automated checks block suspicious solicitation, prohibited transactions and spam; they can make mistakes.

Comments load when you reach this section.

Administrator sign-in