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Ask HN: What industries are underserved by software?

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Re: Ask HN: What industries are underserved by software?

#141

Post by janee »

etripe wrote: post #140
toyg wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> industries that are heavy reliant on spreadsheets That would be all of them . Spreadsheets always end up running a business, because the ultimate measure of business is money / resources, which is inevitably expressed in numbers. Dedicated solutions introduce rigidity in handling data in exchange for optimisation in handling business logic. They succeed when benefits in the latter area are worth the loss of freedom…

> the ultimate measure of business is money / resources That's not untrue, but perhaps too reductive a view on business, as it ignores "soft" market factors like being primarily risk-oriented vs revenue-oriented, the company's reputation, leadership vision, employee fitness to perform, technical debt, etc. Yes, they all boil down to more or less revenue, profit and growth, but if you only ever look at the spreadsheet…

> I would suggest good rigidity is the kind that keeps you from making mistakes, forces you to get to know your audience or develop your business

Another reason would be scale. The flexibility in spreadsheets usually goes hand in hand with having to deal with inconsistencies and from what we've seen that mechanism is usually a person or persons which does eventually break down at a certain volume.

e.g. a farmer getting 20 different purchase orders a week, all in their weird unique format and trying to convert all of it into a single format by hand

Re: Ask HN: What industries are underserved by software?

#143

Post by hermitcrab »

smabie wrote: post #129
hermitcrab wrote: post #96

Most software is written by men for men. Try writing something aimed at women.

Like...?

Off the top of my head: related to pilates, menstrual cycle tracking, childcare, crochet, knitting, home schooling, interior design, manicure, fashion, cooking. I would guess that any of these areas are less well-served by software than an equivalent sized market aimed at men.

It used to be that women had a lot less disposable income than men. But I don't think that is true in most western countries now.

BTW I'm not trying to be sexist or patronizing. I know that plenty of women are also into ju-jitsu, riding motorbikes, mountaineering etc. But some hobbies and careers clearly have a higher percentage of females.

I expect that markets for the elderly are also under served. Technical support might be a challenge though!

Re: Ask HN: What industries are underserved by software?

#144

Post by tonyarkles »

gitgud wrote: post #89
jermaustin1 wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some of my very first consulting gigs were around access and excel automation with VBA. They paid well for being a 19-year-old kid still living with mom and dad. Now most of my consulting now is: - Bringing web-apps up to date (mainly by getting rid of a lot of jQuery that could just be JavaScript, or shockingly common could just be CSS) - Refactoring hard/impossible to understand 2000+ line methods (least favorite -…

> Refactoring hard/impossible to understand 2000+ line methods (least favorite - so risky) Maybe I'm just weird, but for me that's one of the most satisfying things to do. Like reaching a big boss in a video game and having to slice pieces off him until he's no longer a problem.

> Maybe I'm just weird, but for me that's one of the most satisfying things to do.

I'm with you, but also agree with the GP. It's super satisfying to get stuff like that cleaned up, but one of the most shocking things I've come across is callers who do absolutely bizarre things that rely on side effects from those methods. More than once, refactoring a big method like that has spiraled out of control fixing all of the callers as well.

Re: Ask HN: What industries are underserved by software?

#146

Post by Stranger43 »

dhruvkar wrote: post #85
Stranger43 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that it kind of isn't because there is no clear way for your app to work with the app their employee's use for taxes or the desktop apps used by their supplier/customers. At the end of the day the 35 spreadsheets represent an workflow that your generic app will likely not automate, it's also not an empty market as every region have 5+ companies selling the magic silver bullet for mid-sized company book…

>> 35 spreadsheets represent an workflow that your generic app will likely not automate This is part of knowing the niche. The "app" doesn't need to be generic, or an app at all. Add-ons for existing industry software, integrations between industry software and generic inventory management app, etc. are all ways to provide immense value. >> not an empty market Yes, but they are often flooded with generic apps. "Inven…

The problem is that you need to be niche specific all the way down to specific region and specific supply chain and customer base for your app not to be "generic" and then we are practically doing custom coding for an specific customer.

Re: Ask HN: What industries are underserved by software?

#148

Post by travisjungroth »

pkalinowski wrote: post #142

Well, navigation systems for competitive hot air balloons pilots could use some competition. The one widely used is from 1998. Total market size is about 50 people, though :)

What do they need that a modern handheld aircraft GPS doesn’t provide?

Re: Ask HN: What industries are underserved by software?

#149

Post by peterwoerner »

thfuran wrote: post #71
peterwoerner wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, there is a nontrivial amount of very useful software which could be written for universities across the science and engineering fields, but very little money to pay for it. Generally, grant money cannot be spent on software so investment in tools is negligible.

>Generally, grant money cannot be spent on software Really? That seems a few decades behind the times.

That was the case for me and I graduated about 2 years ago. Professors were paying from their salary to get e.g. Matlab.

More specifically, software is usually not a direct expense so it needs to be paid from the grant overhead, but the university frequently wants to build new buildings or something else instead. It's the same for private government contractors.

Re: Ask HN: What industries are underserved by software?

#150

Post by dhruvkar »

Stranger43 wrote: post #146
dhruvkar wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> 35 spreadsheets represent an workflow that your generic app will likely not automate This is part of knowing the niche. The "app" doesn't need to be generic, or an app at all. Add-ons for existing industry software, integrations between industry software and generic inventory management app, etc. are all ways to provide immense value. >> not an empty market Yes, but they are often flooded with generic apps. "Inven…

The problem is that you need to be niche specific all the way down to specific region and specific supply chain and customer base for your app not to be "generic" and then we are practically doing custom coding for an specific customer.

I think we're just arguing for the sake of it now.

There is space for both viewpoints.

>> Specific Region - the US.

>> Specific Supply Chain - consisting for 100s of companies

In my metro area alone (not in the top 20), there are hundreds of one type of company, not counting the others in the supply chain.

Catering to a niche like that, i.e. building software where the customer base You are absolutely right, if you niche too far down, you'll get stuck customizing for each customer and that may not be worth it.

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