Zero to One_ Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future ( PDFDrive )

THE SECRET QUESTION
Every cleantech company justified itself with conventional truths about the need
for a cleaner world. They deluded themselves into believing that an
overwhelming social need for alternative energy solutions implied an
overwhelming business opportunity for cleantech companies of all kinds.
Consider how conventional it had become by 2006 to be bullish on solar. That
year, President George W. Bush heralded a future of “solar roofs that will enable
the American family to be able to generate their own electricity.” Investor and
cleantech executive Bill Gross declared that the “potential for solar is
enormous.” Suvi Sharma, then-CEO of solar manufacturer Solaria, admitted that
while “there is a gold rush feeling” to solar, “there’s also real gold here—or, in
our case, sunshine.” But rushing to embrace the convention sent scores of solar
panel companies—Q-Cells, Evergreen Solar, SpectraWatt, and even Gross’s own
Energy Innovations, to name just a few—from promising beginnings to
bankruptcy court very quickly. Each of the casualties had described their bright
futures using broad conventions on which everybody agreed. Great companies
have secrets: specific reasons for success that other people don’t see.