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My assumption has long been that ~50% of startups fail because they never actually create a useful product. But, looking at those failures does not tell you much about startups just the basic pitfalls of product development.

Similarly, many companies that fail made perfectly rational bets, but things outside their control killed them. Likewise many successful companies may simply have gotten lucky due to things outside their control, even if their initial odds where poor.

Which is why I feel like success and failure on their own tell you very little.



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