Many of us are intrigued by the wonder of shouting “THE FUTURE” like a flying car. But sometimes the best inventions are more about brain power than the magic of technology. To thank you for the ingenuity of the boring ones, here are some examples of my quest.
Take the apple supply chain and roof truss.
I was recently introduced to a New Jersey-based online grocery delivery company called Misfits Market.Many companies I had a hard time With cost The complexity of putting bananas and Doritos under our command. Misfits knows this.
The company’s answer to the history of delivery failures is to think small. It saves penny and tries to eliminate small inefficiencies here and there that can make the difference between failure and success.
Here are some examples of what that little innovation looks like: Stores and delivery services tend to sell only the middle chunks of salmon. Misfits buys and sells other cuts that are just as delicious at a discounted price. Abhi Ramesh, CEO of Misfits, also told me excitedly about skipping some steps in a long chain of apple farmers, packers and distributors. Pruning one or two middlemen can save you time and money.
“A boring problem is a problem worth solving,” Ramesh told me. This guy speaks my language. He said that if a company did something a little better, difficult, boring and expensive, it would be a competitive advantage.
There are other food companies Take a similar approach, And I don’t know if the company will succeed. But Misfits is an example of a technology company that knows the industry well and believes it can improve the established practices slightly. This is what technological advances often look like: a novel but perhaps non-flashy twist on what came before.
Roy Bahat, an investor in Bloomberg Beta’s young tech company, said:Hot swap “ It refers to the type of startup that thinks big by tinkering with the current situation. He gave examples such as Flexport trying to streamline the process of transporting boxes of goods by sea or air, and Newfront trying to do the same for insurance brokers. (Bloomberg Beta is an investor in Newfront.)
A characteristic of these companies is that they aren’t aiming for big changes, as Warby Parker did with eyeglasses, for example. He said this type of change can be frightening or threatening, especially for customers in large industries such as freight and insurance. Instead, hot-swap startups promise something familiar, but better.
This doesn’t always look like WOW, but in some cases it does. Aerospace engineer Dan Pat, who I recently talked about drone parcel delivery, talked about something cool near Boise, Idaho, a construction company that uses robots. — To improve the snooze fest.
The company’s House of Design Huge machine It features a robotic arm that automates several steps when building a house or apartment building, including a roof truss.
I had to google what they were. They are triangular wooden segments assembled together to form the skeleton of the roof. Roof truss designs vary and combining them is a relatively repetitive and painstaking task, House of Design sales and marketing executive Michael Lindley told me.
The House of Design promises that its system will be compatible with common construction industry design software, allowing trusses to be demolished faster and with fewer people. The House of Design has the wisdom of technology, but the difference is the creativity of the manufacturing process.
My colleague Conor Dowerty writes about the ups and downs of excitement in automating home construction. Well-known technology start-up company, Katerra, After collapsing last year We tried to streamline every stage of construction, such as making light bulbs in-house.
The history of failure shows the arrogance of believe Whether it’s real estate or groceries, you can rethink big industries. An established way to do things may have been established for a reason. In addition, the inertia is strong, and the current situation is often quite good, and smart technology cannot solve structural problems.
But it’s useful to remember what an invention is. What’s significantly different from the old ones isn’t necessarily unmanned taxis or new smartphones. Often it adopts the product or process we know and gradually makes it a little simpler or cheaper.
Before going …
-
Amazon will try again in healthcare. Amazon has announced that it will acquire One Medical, which operates a primary care clinic in the United States. Amazon Watchers will buy an online pharmacy chain in 2018, rocking ventures (currently closed) to employee health care benefits. Amazon isn’t transforming healthcare.
-
“What I did wrong with Facebook.” Farhad Manjoo, a columnist in the New York Times Opinion section, told everyone to join Facebook in 2009. He recalls his regrets, including not considering the impact of Facebook’s ubiquity.
Related: Facebook is adjusting the app like TikTok, my colleague Mike Isaac reports.
-
Which computer should you buy for your child? Wirecutter’s Kimber Streams, a product recommendation service from The Times, offers tips on diversion of old computers, buying used computers, and choosing new models for school-age kids and college students.
Embrace this
Hello from Mosh, who devours snacksA red panda at the Oregon Zoo.
We want to hear from you. Please tell us what you think of this newsletter and what else you would like to see.You can reach us ontech@nytimes.com.
If you haven’t put this newsletter in your inbox yet Please sign up here..You can read too Past OnTech column..
