pick the market before the factory
hardware decisions made early are expensive to unmake later.
hardware teams often plan to choose a market once the design is done and the money is in. we suggest the opposite order.
where you manufacture, which suppliers you use and which components you trust all shape who can buy from you. defense and government customers in particular can require specific supply chains, and sometimes country-specific versions of a product. a choice made for convenience in the first prototype can close a market later, or make changing direction costly.
the same applies to crowded markets. when many teams are building the same complete product, it can be worth looking one layer down, at a component or subsystem that all of them need and few of them make well.
none of this needs a final answer on day one. it needs a decision with reasons behind it, written down, so that the design, the sourcing and the pitch all point the same way.