Amazon devices chief Panos Panay on the importance of failure and bouncing back from it 

Amazon devices chief Panos Panay told startup founders at the TechCrunch Disrupt conference in San Francisco that failure is an inevitable and required part of building a successful product. Speaking on stage, Panay drew upon his past experience at Microsoft to explain why setbacks matter. Panay pointed to the launch of the Surface RT tablet during his time at Microsoft as a significant failure that resulted in a nearly $1 billion write-down.

He recalled appearing on a newspaper front cover labeled a failure, noting that the real errors stemmed from decisions made up to two years prior regarding incomplete software, inventory mistakes, and retail balance. According to Panay, founders must accept setbacks without making excuses and harvest the lessons learned from previous mistakes.

He advised that recovering from a major misstep does not require abandoning a product's core vision, noting that the Surface hardware line ultimately performed well after those early corrections. Panay stressed that founders should adapt quickly by making small adjustments rather than complete directional reversals. He warned that people often hang on too long simply because they fail to accept the moment of failure.