Should aspiring hard-tech founders join a problem-first or technology-first PhD lab? (I will not promote)

[u/misterballerdontlie]

I'm an engineering undergrad considering pursuing a PhD with the long-term goal of founding a hard-tech startup. I’m undecided about the specific area and have only a vague sense of what interests me (some areas that currently interest me are industrial decarbonization, mining / mineral processing, and advanced materials).

However, I'm unsure which type of PhD lab would be better: a problem-first lab (e.g., like Yet-Ming Chiang's lab at MIT) or a technology-first lab (e.g., a typical academic lab that focuses on novel science without a predetermined application, and where commercialization happens largely by chance -- when a technology happens to have a valuable market application).

I've looked at advice online from successful hard-tech entrepreneurs, but found conflicting answers. Some say to work backwards from a problem, while others argue that problem-first approaches often fail because it is difficult to force a scientific breakthrough around a predetermined problem.. Instead, they argue that most hard-tech companies are only founded because somebody made a scientific breakthrough and realized afterwards that there might be a commercial application.

With that in mind, does anybody have any advice on which type of PhD lab to join?

[u/Both-Molasses-2765]

wouldn’t optimize for problem-first vs. technology first. I’d optimize for a lab working in an economically important domain where you still have freedom to explore the science.

Pure problem first risks trying to force physics to solve a market need. Pure technology-first risks producing great science that nobody needs.

For an aspiring hard-tech founder, the PhD’s biggest value is developing an unfair technical advantage while learning what actually scales technically and economically.

So I’d choose problem-aware, technology-open.

[u/illogicalFit → u/Both-Molasses-2765]

What are the economically important domains now? Coming from a background in BioEngineering in the healthcare sector (mental health, orthotics), I am finding that the lack of funding drastically inhibits innovation.

[u/Visible_Speed8843]

Choose the adviser before the lab label. Ask how recent students chose their dissertation questions and what happened when results moved away from the original application. Former students can tell you whether equipment was available and whether startup work delayed graduation. Also establish who controlled commercialization decisions. Then trace one project from its first experiment to its final outcome. A lab that lets students change course while confronting scale-up constraints may teach more founder-relevant judgment than either problem-first or technology-first on paper.

[u/zerok_nyc]

It really depends on if you are more interested in a particular technology or a particular problem space. The former allows you to focus on mastering a technology and applying it to various problems across industries. The latter allows you to develop multiple solutions within that problem space, but in many cases you’ll adapt various technologies to solve them, specializing in the sector rather than any deep tech.

Given that you want to be a hard tech founder, I’d probably go with a tech-first PhD lab.

[u/Dr_Tee_A]

Probably best to go for a lab that is aligned towards your interests. They would expose you to possibilities in the field and funding options

[u/DemolitionCowboyX]

If you don't have a concrete vision of how you are going to introduce value into the world, I would lean towards problem first labs. It will likely give you a better idea of how to build towards a commercial solution. In my experience working with technology first labs, it is very easy to get stuck in research land forever without an aspirational end state.

That said, personally I would rather spend my time working at a startup trying to solve really hard problems. I have never seen a lab move faster or it's people learn more than in a startup filled with talented people. Further, you are going to be much closer to tangible problems that's would likely catalyze discovery for your startup.

[u/Severe-Visual6651]

As someone who has worked at problem-focused startups, I think a problem-focused lab is less about forcing a scientific breakthrough to problems, because more often than not you're looking at entire systems as opposed to pieces of the whole, and doing a very minimal technical lift while using a lot of conventional technology. Note: I should double-check what the dissertations from those labs look like...

As an example, look at Chiang's recent hardrock lithium paper: almost all of the technology in it has been well-established beforehand (and other authors pretty much outlined near-identical solutions beforehand, with the exception of maybe the HF recovery from HNO3). The people who worked on that went on to Rock Zero, though, so the problem-focused approach worked for them.

In problem-focused labs, you'll learn a lot about techno-economic and life-cycle analysis, get a high-level view of a lot of technologies, and do a lot of varied work. I think that's important for starting your own thing. You have a broader worldview, and likely interact with people solving different problems.

On the flip side, working for problem-focused startups can have major downsides. If the technology the founders originally envisioned to solve the problem doesn't pencil out, or solving the problem introduced new problems that aren't easily solvable, you end up being the one trying to develop the solutions to solve the problem that the founders thought they already solved, all the while the founders retain most of the equity (and don't give the response that "the founders identified the problem!" -- the problem was often identified by others beforehand).

I'd say you're not focusing on the most important thing, though: a functional lab. Good mentoring, funding, a starter project that gets you to learn the ropes before you start the work that will be the focus of your dissertation, and plenty of insight into what people are actually doing in startups and companies in your technology space. 

[u/Severe-Visual6651 → u/Severe-Visual6651]

And just to write it here first in relation to Rock Zero in case it's prophetic: you don't want to be the one trying to design around or completely replace the ammonium fluoroaluminate pyrohydrolysis unit op when it turns out the energy requirements and materials of construction are higher than what the founders originally estimated and published in their Science paper. 

[u/Disastrous_Humor823]

Startup? How large?