My advice is for the creative who decides to turn an idea into a business.Since I took the helm at Kvadrat in 1998 we have started 46 companies around the world, some of them exploring new product typologies and technologies.Turning innovation into a market success is often a long and stony road. Innovation typically takes five to ten years before you have proof of concept and get pricing, manufacturing, and distribution channels right. Most of the time we made up the blueprint for the business as we went along—in other words, flying the plane while we are still building. This has been a major mistake in many cases and nearly crashed some ventures.Thinking end-to-end and working through the ideal blueprint could have shortened the journey. In the case of one startup, it took us five years of R&D before we could start invoicing.Resilience is everything. I call it rolling the stone up the hill. Like Sisyphus, there will be moments of absurdity and despair. But your commitment to the idea and the small wins along the way will carry you through.Another hard fact is that often you will be nearly alone in your belief. When you are building a business, it is all about finding partners who buy into the idea. Most importantly, they need to share your values and have the same time perspective as you. Partners who can help rethink and modify your approach. Being challenged will improve the business, but when things get difficult on the technology or financial front, they will be tested, and you will often be on your own again.We try to build innovative businesses, and we keep on pushing not only because we believe in the concept, but also because it would be too painful financially to take the loss. People with new ideas are often considered too optimistic, even naive, but at the end of the day they are usually the ones who take humanity to new and better places.Sincerely,