Execution is easy. (Profitable) Ideas are hard.

Conventional wisdom in the software industry states that investors invest in people rather than ideas. For as long as anyone can remember, this approach has been based on the belief that the success of the venture is primarily dependent on the determination and perseverance of the team executing the idea rather than the strength of the idea/vision itself. I, however, have asserted the opposite for years; execution is easy, but it is extremely difficult to come up with the type of idea that all investors desire, one that will result in significant and/or substainable profits.

The tech industry's history is littered with failed products from both startups and industry giants alike; most notable of late are the Google Wave and Microsoft Kin products. Each of these launches was backed by an industry giant and executed by an experienced, rock-star team with access to virtually infinite financial and technical resources. So, it is extremely difficult to understand how anyone could argue these products did not gain traction because of poor execution. I charge, in each case, the execution could not have been any better. The products were simply based on ideas that could not be monetized.

The failures of the dotcom bust - govWorks, Kozmo.com, etc. - can also be attributed to product ideas/visions that were not solid. A simple way to confirm this is to count the number of failed dotcom products that have reappeared during Web 2.0. If the idea hasn't been recycled with a new team and/or implementation, it must have sucked to begin with.

Let's take a look at the other end of the spectrum, Facebook for example. According to the trailer for the movie about the founding of the company, The Social Network, the idea at the heart of the phenomena was, "taking the entire social experience of college (Harvard) and putting it online." The site then apparently received 22,000 hits in its first two hours, expanded to Stanford, Columbia and Yale, moved to Silicon Valley, and had over 1,000,000 users in less than twelve months all without venture capital funding. This product launch was initially backed by no one significant, and executed by inexperienced, undergraduate dropouts with access to minimal resources. Yet, Facebook, the website, has been a huge success, simply because it was based on a solid idea.

In the 80's, Microsoft along with IBM brought a cheaper computer to market. In the 90's, Google built a better search engine. After the millennium, Facebook built a more efficient way for people to interact with their social network. In each case, the product was successfully launched by a relatively inexperienced team in its early 20's, and the product was perceived to be significantly "better" than competitive products or methods in at least one critical category; price, performance or ease of use.

History has shown, time and time again, in general, "Build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door." The formula appears to be that the required strength of the management team is inversely proportional to the strength of the idea. For example - and I know this is ridiculous - if I created a "Fountain of Youth" application - can we agree that EVERYONE is seeking the fountain of youth - how strong would the management team truly need to be? Conversely, if I created something that it turned out very few people wanted, the team MUST consist of superstars in order to find a way to make it successful. And, we've already proven a superstar team doesn't guarantee success.

Giving the people what they want (execution), is not rocket science. Neither is figuring out what potential users will find of value (idea), but the latter sure is hard.