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Highlights
Building the “Google Maps of Water”: A Founder’s Journey Through Climate Tech Go-to-Market
Most founders face the challenge of bringing innovative products to market. But what happens when your product is so forward-thinking that the market itself isn’t quite ready? This is the reality for climate tech founders racing to build solutions for problems that many companies are only beginning to understand.
In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, one founder shared a refreshingly candid perspective on navigating this challenge. Javier Marti, who’s building a water risk data platform, pulls back the curtain on the realities of gaining traction in an emerging market where traditional growth metrics don’t tell the whole story.
Creating a New Category
When explaining his company to strangers, Javier keeps it simple: “I’m building the Google Maps of water.” This analogy instantly connects with people because, as he notes, “everybody understand what the Google Maps is, and we all understand how traffic is affecting our ability to go from a to b and how useful that is to many industries.”
But unlike Google Maps, which serves an established need, Javier’s platform addresses a problem many businesses are just beginning to grapple with: understanding and quantifying water-related climate risks. The challenge isn’t just technical – it’s educational. As Javier explains, “we know more about a pit stop coming our way than a flood event that may happen in your doorstep.”
The Reality of Market Timing
Rather than paint an overly optimistic picture of rapid growth, Javier offers a clear-eyed view of the market reality: “The traction is sort of slow.” But this admission comes with important context. When you’re building something truly disruptive, he explains, where “market is still like, yes, we know that there is climate change that is risk associated to the water. We don’t know how to tackle that at large,” slower initial traction is to be expected.
This perspective offers a valuable lesson for founders building in emerging markets: sometimes the most important metrics aren’t traditional growth numbers, but rather indicators that you’re laying the groundwork for future adoption.
Finding Early Adopters
Javier’s approach to finding early adopters is refreshingly straightforward: “It’s a tedious process… but there’s always one early adopter, every hundred people that you talk to.” The key is persistence and understanding that early adoption often comes from a place of frustration with existing solutions. As he notes, many early customers come to them saying, “we tried everything, we tried this, we tried that, and then it was stumbling to the road and what you’re offering. This actually makes sense.”
Partnership-Led Growth
Perhaps the most tactical insight from Javier’s experience is his emphasis on strategic partnerships as a go-to-market lever. “Work on your partnerships,” he advises, “surround yourselves and your company with partners who can help you understand how to get to the ultimate market adoption.”
This isn’t just about distribution – it’s about positioning. Javier’s company deliberately positioned itself between two established market segments: sensor companies selling hardware solutions and data companies building risk models. This strategic positioning helps frame partnership discussions and creates clear value propositions for potential partners.
The approach has yielded partnerships with major players like “Dosha Telecom, which is the number nine brand in the world at the moment, according to Forbes, and other partnerships with very well known, respected companies such as Databricks, SRE and Thales, SAS and others.”
Building for the Long Term
Looking ahead, Javier’s vision extends beyond just creating a successful company. He sees a future where water risk data is democratized: “I really hope that we can have everybody using our water risk insights to understand the water risk that is around themselves.”
For founders building in emerging markets, Javier’s experience offers a valuable blueprint: focus on partnerships, maintain direct customer contact to inform product development, and most importantly, recognize that sometimes the market needs time to catch up to your vision. As he puts it, “The future is there, that exists. The reality today is that we are still working towards that future.”
Actionable
Takeaways
Embrace Global Experiences:
Javier’s international background enriched his perspective and problem-solving skills, emphasizing the value of diverse experiences in entrepreneurship. For B2B tech founders, incorporating global insights can lead to more innovative solutions and a broader understanding of the problems you aim to solve.
Pursue Passionate Side Projects:
The journey into e-commerce wine sales highlighted the importance of exploring varied interests. These ventures can unexpectedly shape your entrepreneurial path, providing valuable lessons in direct-to-consumer marketing and supply chain logistics.
Identify and Address Niche Problems:
Javier’s shift from space engineering to tackling water data scarcity underscores the importance of focusing on specific, impactful problems. Founders should seek out underserved or emerging areas where their technology can make a significant difference.
Utilize Public and Proprietary Data:
Divirod’s approach to solving water data scarcity with a mix of publicly available information and proprietary technology offers a model for leveraging existing resources while innovating to fill gaps in data availability.
Focus on Partnerships for Growth:
Early-stage startups, particularly in disruptive markets, can accelerate growth through strategic partnerships with established industry leaders. These collaborations can provide credibility, scale, and access to new markets.
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