The primary barrier to an NFL team in Europe isn't financial; it's the excessive travel time impacting player recovery. A startup, Boom Supersonic, could halve travel times, making a two-continent league logistically feasible. This shows how growth in one industry can be entirely dependent on innovation in another.

Act like an investor with your time by forming hypotheses about which industries are most likely to experience your key compelling events. By predicting where M&A or new market entries will occur (e.g., in telecom), you can proactively focus your territory on high-probability accounts before events are announced.

After failing as a city-wide transit solution, the moving walkway found its perfect product-market fit in airports, solving the specific pain point of long treks through ever-expanding terminals created by the jet age.

To vet ambitious ideas like self-sailing cargo ships, first ask if they are an inevitable part of the world in 100 years. This filters for true long-term value. If the answer is yes, the next strategic challenge is to compress that timeline and build it within a 10-year venture cycle.

The decline of moving walkways isn't just about cost or inefficiency. Airports now function like malls, where the business model relies on passengers lingering and spending money, making rapid transit through corridors counterproductive.

Elysian Aircraft's strategy targets regions like the U.S. and Nordic countries where building high-speed rail is infeasible. By leveraging hundreds of existing, underutilized airports, they can create new, efficient short-haul routes, representing a path of least resistance for new transport infrastructure.

Lyft's CEO argues the competition is not a binary battle with Uber for their combined 2.5 billion annual rides. Instead, the true target market is the 160 billion rides Americans take in their own cars. This reframes the opportunity from market share theft to massive market expansion and conversion.

When expanding his law firm, John Morgan uses a 'bullets before bombs' strategy. He first enters a new city with a small, low-cost team and ad budget (the 'bullets') to test viability. Only after seeing positive traction does he commit significant capital and resources (the 'bombs'), de-risking growth.

For decades, the math proved a 40% three-point shot was more valuable than a 50% two-point shot. Yet, the NBA was incredibly slow to adopt this strategy. This highlights how even high-stakes, data-rich industries can be slaves to tradition and status quo bias, ignoring obvious quantitative advantages.