Overview
- The Three Elements: Startups have three core components—team, product, and market—with wide variation in quality across each dimension.
- Market Wins: In a great market, even mediocre teams with basic products can succeed; in terrible markets, even brilliant teams with amazing products fail.
- Rachleff's Law: The #1 company-killer is lack of market—when great teams meet lousy markets, market wins every time.
- Product/Market Fit: The only thing that matters is reaching product/market fit—being in a good market with a product that satisfies it.
- BPMF vs APMF: A startup's life divides into before and after product/market fit; before it, focus obsessively on achieving it above all else.
Takeaways
Marc Andreessen wrote this essay in 2007 as part of his startup guide series. The central insight is that market selection matters more than team quality or product excellence—successful startups reach product/market fit, while failures never do.
The #1 company-killer is lack of market.