What the design industry will never say out loud. Written for those who have to make the decisions anyway.
The most consequential pitfall of a product launch does not happen at launch. It happened thirteen months earlier, when the founding team decided to validate the feasibility first and figure out the design later.
What you're looking for in a design partner might be working against you. Every industry builds its own market blindness; by design. The studios that reshape categories are rarely the ones who knew them best.
Industrial design is a business decision-making discipline disguised as a creative discipline. The companies that understand this build products that occupy positions their competitors cannot replicate. The ones that do not build very good versions of what already exists.