From the Desk of Dave Saunders Baltimore/DC

Stop building "Science Projects." Start building a business.

Most technical founders don't fail because their technology is bad. They fail because they get stuck in the Commercialization Gap.

You know the feeling. The adrenaline of the "working prototype" has worn off. The TechCrunch fantasy is gone. Now you are stuck in the quiet, terrifying middle—trying to bridge the gap between a cool invention and a scalable, regulated, profitable product.

Maybe you’re buried under compliance tasks. Maybe your engineering team is drifting. Maybe you’re waking up wondering if you’ve built a company, or just an expensive hobby with unpaid overtime.

I know. I’ve been there.

I am not a guru. I’m not a "20-year-old visionary" posting hustle quotes on LinkedIn.

I am a Commercialization Executive. I spent 30+ years in the trenches of Deep Tech and MedTech. I was a Research Manager at Lucent Bell Labs during the glory days. I’ve launched 40+ products and served on commercialization teams for 4 surgical robotics platforms (including co-founding Galen Robotics).

I specialize in one thing: Finishing.

I’m writing a book called Founders Who Finish because I’m tired of seeing brilliant engineers get crushed because they didn't have a flight plan for the boring-but-critical operational details.

I don't care about Unicorns. I care about Revenue, Regulatory Clearance, and Sanity.

Get the Flight Plan. Let’s get to work.

Join the list today and I will immediately send you my Commercialization Flight Plan.

This is the exact "Red Team" Self-Assessment I use when auditing stalled companies. It’s a one-page checklist to help you determine if you are building a scalable business or just a Science Project.

Here is my promise to you

  • No "Hustle Porn": We don't do "grindset" here. We do sustainable operations.

  • The Commercialization Playbook: I share the frameworks I use to fix stalled roadmaps—from navigating the FDA to hiring engineers who don't need babysitting.

  • The Shareholder's Lens: I’ll tell you the hard truths other advisors won’t—like when to fire yourself from a role, or when to kill a zombie product.

I only write when I have something worth saying. Unsubscribe whenever you want.

The book launches soon.

The work starts now.