Market leader is developing a feature that obsoletes our product. Is it over?

[curiousunflower]

We found a market gap with some early-stage VC-backed competition.

I struggled with that problem myself at my day job, so I knew there weren't many good options out there in the market.

The competition that we did find was mostly early stage, and we planned to differentiate from it by choosing a different niche and improving upon pricing.

This all worked out quite well until today, when we found that a huge company (market-leader type), is currently developing a feature that would more or less provide 80% of most of what we planned to provide in our MVP.

Our product was supposed to be used atop of that market leader (and others) and provide that extra functionality. It is not directly coupled to that specific provider and can be integrated with their competition as well.

Companies who are using that provider (which is a huge share of the market, they're definite market leaders), wouldn't really need our service or could justify paying extra for it, as they're already paying the tax to that provider.

Should we pivot with the idea?

On one hand, it feels unwise to compete with a multi-billion dollar company. We can narrow down our ICP to all of their competitors, but it seems plausible that they will pull the same stunt.

On the other hand, it feels like there is a validated market gap if a multi-billion dollar company starts to cover it.

What would you do? Would appreciate some veteran advice!

[rossdavidh]

So, just a random HN reader here, but:

1) the big competitor might validate the need for the thing in customers' minds, without providing a good implementation, which could conceivably actually accelerate your success.

2) if they're that big, then if only 10% of their customers want or need the 20% of your product which the big company doesn't provide, that could still be a big amount of money for your product.

3) if their product does poorly, their CEO might decide to buy a small competitor in order to fix things; you could be that competitor, if you are the best one available, so it might be worth sticking around for that check.

Of course, it might be that none of this happens, your big competitor's new features squashes you, and that is that. You would want to ponder how to handle that scenario, both as a company and personally. But maybe it would not be good to assume so quickly that they will do things well; plenty of big companies with successful past track records flounder at rolling out a new feature.

[curiousunflower]

Thanks, that's reassuring. We're still in the validation stages with our product; we haven't invested too much into it yet.

Would you think that in general, we stumbled across a good or a bad sign? Should we pack up and put our efforts elsewhere, since we didn't pour too much effort into implementation yet?

[rossdavidh]

Good or bad sign? Both.

[I_Am_Nous]

There's definitely a difference between an 80% solution and the full 100% solution providing the fully rounded experience. Will the market leader 80% features be included as an upgrade for free or available as a value-add for a one time or monthly fee?

Others have mentioned checking the track record of said company to see how often they follow through on new features, but also their general development pipeline to know how long you have to respond if they develop and release on a similar schedule after announcing, such as it taking 2-3 quarters to fully implement vs longer.

[curiousunflower]

Thanks, that's some good input.

How would you go about checking their track record, and the time it takes them to develop features?

I'm clueless at this, would appreciate some inputs

[defrost]

Social engineering - scope out their support forums, their annual reports, media releases.

Identify as many customers of theirs as possible in a few days, then start making notes on those customers; size, people that post in tech | social forums, their media releases.

Follow up with cold calling | DM's via socials etc. to ask about experiences with { problem domain | bigger supply company | software } etc.

It's a hard one to lay out in advance, the path forward will often reveal itself as you scope out more and more.

[helsontaveras18]

It’s all in the execution. Not all multi-billion dollar companies can build and iterate on product quickly enough. Internal politics and promotions mean that what’s best for the individuals isn’t (always) what’s best for the company.

Not all hope is lost. Do your homework as others have suggested and get an idea of how successful they’ve launched new products before. Set deadlines and think through the worst case scenarios so you can be honest with the progress. Lastly, try out their product and see for yourself once it’s out.

[curiousunflower]

I managed to get beta access to the product. It is about 70-80% of what we planned to deliver on our MVP.

The thing is, we're still in the validation stage. We can abandon this idea completely without any harm. I'm not sure if what we managed to find is enough for us to decide to put our effort elsewhere or not

[Terr_]

Musings of a rando:

1. What track-record does that big maybe-competitor company have in terms of projects reaching completion? Do they have a history of cancelled projects or saying things just to spook people away? Are they strongly marketing it, or just hinting that they're considering it?

2. Is there anything you can provide which that company won't (or can't) because they're too afraid of cannibalizing or distracting from another product of theirs?

[curiousunflower]

Thanks!

How would you go about checking their track record? Never done this before and I feel as if it's an important metric

They do not promote it overly strongly, but it is hinted at in their docs as an upcoming feature. No data is disclosed though, and the feature still feels immature at this stage.

[neximo64]

You'll need to pivot or adapt in some way, you saw a gap they saw it too.

That they validated your idea is kind of still an unproven, since they are selling it as ancillary to their service whereas it is primary to yours. If it cant work on its own its not a product on its own.

[pestatije]

well if their "developing" you should prepare for an eventuality, but it is as over as a flying partridge is ready for dinner