Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future

by Peter Thiel

Tolstoy opens Anna Karenina by observing: “All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” Business is the opposite. All happy companies are different: each one earns a monopoly by solving a unique problem. All failed companies are the same: they failed to escape competition.

The perfect target market for a startup is a small group of particular people concentrated together and served by few or no competitors.