1.8
TAM / SAM / SOM
A three-layer market sizing convention: the total market, the portion a given business model can serve, and the share it could realistically win.
No single originator; VC and consulting vernacular hardened in 2000s startup literature
What it does
Layers total, addressable and realistically obtainable market. Its genuine function is establishing shared language in an investor conversation.
When it breaks
Produces no decision. The number is almost always reverse-engineered from the desired conclusion, and it never identifies which assumption is the fragile one.
Case
WeWork's 2019 S-1 claimed a $3 trillion total addressable market: 255 million potential members across 280 target cities, times $11,700 per-employee occupancy cost. It said it had captured about 0.2%. The IPO was withdrawn weeks later and the valuation fell from $47bn to roughly $8bn.
Wolf Street · WeWork's $3tn TAM ↗In the wild
Unchecked · not part of the tier
What people have written about this tool in the last twelve months. A machine found these and nobody has read them. Everything above this line was checked by hand.
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