WHO WE SERVE · BUILD OR KILL A CONCEPT

Should this concept become a company?

This is for venture studios and the corporate teams that build new ventures. Before you recruit a founder or fund a build, we test the concept with Lensential Consult and Lensential Venture, the research systems our analysts run. We look at the market and who already sells into it, what the build would take, and whether a likely sale is big enough to give its future investors their return. You get one paper that recommends building or killing the concept, and says what evidence would change that. One of our principals reads and signs it, and you make the decision.

WHAT YOU RECEIVE

What a paper looks like.

BUILD OR KILL · RIMEWATERSPECIMEN

The concept: a robot that counts stock in cold-storage warehouses.

Recommendation: kill. The robot can be built, but the likely sale is too small for a Series A.

QuestionFindingLabel
The marketAbout 1,900 US cold-storage sites still count stock by hand. At the planned price they would spend USD 140 to 190 million a year, sized from the top down and from the bottom up.ESTIMATE
Who sells itNine funded companies scan warehouse stock by drone or robot, and two already work in freezers.FACT
The buildSixteen to twenty months to a freezer-rated unit. Battery life in the cold decides the timeline.ESTIMATE
The exitFor the Series A investors to make 3x, the company must sell for USD 180 million. Buyers have paid 2 to 4 times revenue, so it would need USD 45 to 90 million of revenue, or 24 to 64% of the market above.ESTIMATE
The leap of faithOperators will pay for more frequent counts than they take by hand today. Test: three paid pilots before any build.LEAP OF FAITH

What would reopen it: three operators paying a subscription for the stock data itself.

Assumes a USD 12 million Series A at USD 48 million post-money, diluted 20% by the Series B. Specimen. Rimewater is a fictional concept, and every company and figure in it is fictional.

See the deliverables in Lensential Consult

HOW IT WORKS WITH YOU

How we test a concept.

We agree on the question first.

We agree with you on what the paper must answer. It covers the market, the competitors and the gaps they leave, the build and the exit. Each claim is labeled fact, estimate or leap of faith, so you see what has evidence behind it and what does not yet. The paper ends with a recommendation, which is our judgment on the evidence, and the test that would change it.

We keep your concepts private.

What you send us about a concept is never shown to another customer, and our principals do not use it for their own investing. The full rules are in our disclosures, including the one on competing concepts.

One at a time, or an agreed number each quarter.

Order one paper, or retain us for an agreed number of concepts each quarter. Fees are agreed before any work begins.

Read and signed by a principal.

Our analysts run the AI agents in each system. A principal reads every paper and signs it before you get it.

THE SYSTEMS BEHIND IT

Send us the last concept you killed, or the last one you built.

We agree with you on what to test, and run the first test free. Then you compare our read with what you decided.

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