Don Valentine once said “I like opportunities that are addressing markets so big that even the management team can’t get in its way.” Don founded Sequoia Capital and led investments in companies like Cisco, Oracle, and Apple. Simply put, he is one of the best all-time venture investors so when Don spoke, people listened. Don’s POV on market sizes and the importance of storytelling has informed much of the Silicon Valley “pitch” mindset of the last 3–4 decades, orienting founder <> investor behavior around grandiose pitches on “TAM (Total Addressable Market)” at the earliest stages. Given Don’s success, it’s hard to argue with the approach.

That said, the world is changing. Competition in tech is as intense as in any market out there. This wasn’t the case twenty years ago when barriers to entry were higher and competition was scarcer. Back then, tech startups were just a quirky “niche” in the larger economy. Today, they are the economy. As industries mature it’s only natural for competition to flow to where the returns are — and the returns in tech have been amazing for several decades (even after 2022’s pullback).