6 Comments
User's avatar
KK's avatar

I read an article on Google (?) praising the EV produced by the smart phone manufacturer Xiaomi. The writer was wondering why Xiaomi suddenly started a totally new product, and can do it so successfully - 150,000+ were sold in the first ten months, in China alone and with six months delivery waiting time. Western media didn't know or didn't want to report Xiaomi's motivation. I read the revelation of their CEO on Chinese media. He said he called a meeting with senior executives after learning that the US was going to impose sanctions on Xiaomi for alleged supporting the Chinese military. The meeting agreed that they have to diversify into new products - EV. The result is that they can design and build the SU7 in roughly 3 years. This shows how attempted suppression on a capable competitor will backfire.

Expand full comment
Mike Funnell's avatar

I find it quite interesting that it’s the Chinese start-up which is “working smarter, not harder” while the US ones seem to be working more by brute force and buckets of money.

Aren’t our prejudices supposed to incline us towards thinking it’s more likely to be the other way around?

Expand full comment
Ronke Babajide's avatar

Part of the problem is the MVP mentality in Silicon Valley. As soon as they have something minimally functional they release it and then they have no choice but to throw resources at it and no possibility to pivot to a better solution

Expand full comment
Mike Funnell's avatar

I’m quite sure you’re right in some sense.

Other adages are around “first-mover advantage” and “network effects”. And yet..

Where is Alta Vista’s “first-mover” advantage? How did the “network effects” of ‘everybody’ using them (for a while) help when Google came along?

I’ll confess my guess: a lot of that is ex-post-facto claiming of personal brilliance for what really amounts to “right place; right time; got lucky” dumb-arsed luck *and* (at least sometimes) the addition of what really was a better, more clever, approach.

Expand full comment
Ronke Babajide's avatar

This exactly. A lot of what is perceived as genius is pure luck and network

Expand full comment
Mike Funnell's avatar

All too true - I’ve been there and “missed it by that much” 😂☹️

I’m not the only one - by any measure!

Expand full comment