> "We could have had the iPhone 10 years earlier, at least."
The fate of prototype techs is almost always to be remembered with these kind of wistful statements about how they could have been [market leader] except for [reasons].
These statements betray an ignorance about just how category-defining products come into being. Making even a moderately successful, let alone category-defining product is super hard and it's nowhere near enough to just have an idea, whether represented on a napkin, or in a demo video, or even in a tangible prototype. Ideas are cheap, even ideas that are rather prescient.
Making successful products also requires TIMING, LEVERAGE, and EXECUTION.
TIMING - build something too early and you waste capital fighting uphill against a market not ready for the idea. Product-market fit is not always possible for any given idea at the current moment in time. For tech, things like battery density, speed, screen tech, internet bandwidth, cost etc are critical to time correctly.
Example: Youtube and Netflix appropriately timed the cost of storage and internet bandwidth so they were ready to go when streaming was just becoming cost-effective, versus earlier efforts like Broadcast.com. It wasn't a leap to conclude video streaming was a good idea even in the 80s or 90s, but it needed to be timed.
Additionally, timing things culturally matters a ton. People need to be ready for an idea, to incorporate a new product into their life. The window of what's cool or acceptable is a moving target, what's uncool now may be cool in 5 years. It's often other interim products that shift this window.
Example: Google's launch of consumer-focused Google Glass and the immediate blowback that resulted.
Finally, pioneers get arrows in their backs. You reveal your grand ideas too early and you've just paid for a ton of concept development R&D that others can just pick off for free.
LEVERAGE - Ideas require business leverage to succeed in market. Things like brand leverage where you're already trusted in the market and have a history of delivering quality, the ability to scale manufacturing to meet demand, business relationships and scale to get access to special components or lower component costs, a well-oiled organization with deep talent bench, etc.
Example: The iPhone would not have been what it is without the iPod. Apple leveraged its talent, its history of manufacturing iPods, its suppliers, and its huge consumer appeal. It also used that to negotiate with AT&T to have complete control of the UX and to get unlimited data plans.
EXECUTION - Lots of high-concept ideas are lousy at the exact details and execution of the idea. Cool, you can send a fax from the beach, but under what conditions? Is fax even the right modality? Is the UX cumbersome, or require a laborious setup process? Its often the little things that separate market defining products from abject failures, even when they check the same boxes.
Example: Galaxy Fold is great high concept product that doesn't execute on its promise because its too fragile and creates a screen crease.
It's also possible to do a great job on details, but within the wrong constraints. You can be efficient (doing things right) but still not be effective (doing the right things). Specifically in the case of this 'iPad of the 90s', they didn't have the enabling technologies to make a great experience - things like fast refresh rates, multi-touch, beautiful screen, etc. They probably did a fantastic job with the pen, but the pen was the wrong constraint.
Basically the creators are severely downplaying the timing, leverage, and execution required to make products successful, and seem to think this cool but barely-launched concept could have been the most successful product on earth (iPhone). I doubt the team would have been able to produce anything more than a PalmPilot or Treo, both of which were OK products for their time, but ultimately are just mostly forgotten preludes to the product that DID define the category.
The fate of prototype techs is almost always to be remembered with these kind of wistful statements about how they could have been [market leader] except for [reasons].
These statements betray an ignorance about just how category-defining products come into being. Making even a moderately successful, let alone category-defining product is super hard and it's nowhere near enough to just have an idea, whether represented on a napkin, or in a demo video, or even in a tangible prototype. Ideas are cheap, even ideas that are rather prescient.
Making successful products also requires TIMING, LEVERAGE, and EXECUTION.
TIMING - build something too early and you waste capital fighting uphill against a market not ready for the idea. Product-market fit is not always possible for any given idea at the current moment in time. For tech, things like battery density, speed, screen tech, internet bandwidth, cost etc are critical to time correctly.
Example: Youtube and Netflix appropriately timed the cost of storage and internet bandwidth so they were ready to go when streaming was just becoming cost-effective, versus earlier efforts like Broadcast.com. It wasn't a leap to conclude video streaming was a good idea even in the 80s or 90s, but it needed to be timed.
Additionally, timing things culturally matters a ton. People need to be ready for an idea, to incorporate a new product into their life. The window of what's cool or acceptable is a moving target, what's uncool now may be cool in 5 years. It's often other interim products that shift this window.
Example: Google's launch of consumer-focused Google Glass and the immediate blowback that resulted.
Finally, pioneers get arrows in their backs. You reveal your grand ideas too early and you've just paid for a ton of concept development R&D that others can just pick off for free.
LEVERAGE - Ideas require business leverage to succeed in market. Things like brand leverage where you're already trusted in the market and have a history of delivering quality, the ability to scale manufacturing to meet demand, business relationships and scale to get access to special components or lower component costs, a well-oiled organization with deep talent bench, etc.
Example: The iPhone would not have been what it is without the iPod. Apple leveraged its talent, its history of manufacturing iPods, its suppliers, and its huge consumer appeal. It also used that to negotiate with AT&T to have complete control of the UX and to get unlimited data plans.
EXECUTION - Lots of high-concept ideas are lousy at the exact details and execution of the idea. Cool, you can send a fax from the beach, but under what conditions? Is fax even the right modality? Is the UX cumbersome, or require a laborious setup process? Its often the little things that separate market defining products from abject failures, even when they check the same boxes.
Example: Galaxy Fold is great high concept product that doesn't execute on its promise because its too fragile and creates a screen crease.
It's also possible to do a great job on details, but within the wrong constraints. You can be efficient (doing things right) but still not be effective (doing the right things). Specifically in the case of this 'iPad of the 90s', they didn't have the enabling technologies to make a great experience - things like fast refresh rates, multi-touch, beautiful screen, etc. They probably did a fantastic job with the pen, but the pen was the wrong constraint.
Basically the creators are severely downplaying the timing, leverage, and execution required to make products successful, and seem to think this cool but barely-launched concept could have been the most successful product on earth (iPhone). I doubt the team would have been able to produce anything more than a PalmPilot or Treo, both of which were OK products for their time, but ultimately are just mostly forgotten preludes to the product that DID define the category.