A fundamental problem (let's not assume there's just one!) is this thinking right in the first paragraph:
> ... if he sells a new oven to the country’s pizza makers, pastry chefs, and bakers, he only needs to capture 10% of the market to become a billionaire.
i.e. the founder assumes that "ovens" is a single $10b-sized market, and it isn't, because reality has a surprising amount of detail (as sibling comment also notes).
You could interpret this whole story as a saga of very inefficient oven market(s) research, the end result of which is the forum post at the end:
> On the forum an old user warns “Make sure that you support rotating bases day 1”.
> ... if he sells a new oven to the country’s pizza makers, pastry chefs, and bakers, he only needs to capture 10% of the market to become a billionaire.
i.e. the founder assumes that "ovens" is a single $10b-sized market, and it isn't, because reality has a surprising amount of detail (as sibling comment also notes).
You could interpret this whole story as a saga of very inefficient oven market(s) research, the end result of which is the forum post at the end:
> On the forum an old user warns “Make sure that you support rotating bases day 1”.