Amazon devices chief Panos Panay says hardware failure is required for real product breakthroughs

Amazon executive Panos Panay recently shared a blunt message for startup founders during an appearance at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco: encountering failure is an inevitable and required component of building a successful product. Drawing on a career that spans more than 19 years at Microsoft, the head of Devices, Alexa, and Leo argued that avoiding missteps simply means a team is not pushing boundaries hard enough.

Reflecting on his tenure at Microsoft, Panay pointed to the turbulent launch of the Surface RT—a tablet initiative that resulted in a nearly $1 billion write-down and harsh public criticism—as a defining lesson. Rather than hiding from the misstep, he emphasized the importance of examining the decisions made years prior, from software readiness to inventory management and retail strategy, instead of making excuses.

According to Panay, enduring a catastrophic hardware failure does not require abandoning the underlying product vision. By accepting setbacks immediately and harvesting critical lessons, teams can adjust their trajectory by slight margins rather than abandoning their goals entirely, allowing them to adapt, build momentum, and continue moving forward.