The Reality Check on Building a Real Business

According to veteran investor Marc Andreessen, here's what separates a real business from a failed experiment: demand. Actual, measurable demand from the market.

He puts it plainly—you don't have a business until people actually want what you're building. Not what you think they should want. Not what makes sense on a spreadsheet. But what the market is actively pulling from you.

That distinction matters because most founders get this backwards. They spend months or years constructing the business infrastructure—setting up operations, hiring teams, refining processes—before validating that anyone gives a damn about the product itself.

Here's the harsh truth: that's wasted time and capital.

The sequence should be inverted. First, build something people pull toward. Then, and only then, invest in scaling the business around it. Market traction is the permission slip that justifies everything that comes next.