Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by anovikov 4355 days ago
There can be a successful startup in the processor arena. But it can never succeed by trying to do same thing better/cheaper. You want to offer replacement product on the other hand - very different but serving the same purpose.

You don't succeed in automotive industry by trying to directly compete with BMW, this is absolutely hopeless. Tesla has a real shot on success on the other hand.

Same here: next Intel won't be doing anything similar to Intel. But someone offering real quantum computing may get there. Someone making a chip with thousands of simple cores and somehow 'bringing Moore's law back' [1] may get there. But this one is just too similar. Intel's established, polished business processes on all levels can easily beat this.

1. http://www.paulgraham.com/ambitious.html

1 comments

Sorry, I just find your argument without any merit. Contrary to your claim, Tesla does compete directly with BMW, for the same sales dollars, in the same part of the market, providing a solution to the same audience, and even segment, and in the same problem space. If we can't agree on even the definition of "compete", it's unlikely that we can further each other's understanding.

Also, the idea that 'if they succeed' (not a quote) then " this will only diminish returns in the industry as whole so will be anyway bad investment" (your comment) is just contrary to the experience of any other startup that succeeds.

It's just bad economics. I would question whether you've ever seen a successful startup - there is no shame in saying you haven't. But if you want to contribute meaningfully, then IMHO I would look into some.

Sorry if I'm blunt.

Just a note that despite a downvote on this response, my specific example is enormously vindicated 3 days later as Tesla just announced the Model 3, which sites headline as "Tesla Model 3 to challenge BMW 3 Series", writing: "Tesla founder and CEO Elon Musk has revealed plans for a new electric BMW 3 Series rival, including its name – Tesla Model 3."

https://www.google.com/search?q=model+3