5 pointsby sohitkeshri5 hours ago1 comment
  • RetroTechie4 hours ago
    "What I believe is - the moat is domain understanding"

    Author believes wrong.

    A moat is having something that others don't, that for would-be competitors is difficult (if not impossible) to replicate.

    In this article's example: yes, domain-specific knowledge could be a moat. If it's knowledge your employees have, competitors don't, and would take a lot of effort & time to obtain.

    But if same knowledge would be out in the open, waiting to be scraped from the internet on a sunny day, and competitor could derive similar value from it easily, then it's not a moat. Same with

    "And may be tomorrow we can have specific chips which will help optimize and solve problem in certain domain."

    Sure, that could be a moat if chip is only in your hand, lead times are long, and no competitor got started yet.

    But let's assume lead times are short, or competitor is 95% done when you reached 100%, that's no moat. The day is yours, but tomorrow there's 2.

    The moat is the time-distance competitors need to get where you are. Well that, or some unique non-public source of info.