Most hardware ventures don’t fail because the idea was bad.
They fail in the gap between a working concept and something you can actually manufacture consistently, competitively, and at a margin that keeps the business alive.
That’s the valley of death. It’s where we work.
I’m Matt Granger. I founded Venn Projects to make experienced, big-business product development practice accessible to the ventures that need it most — without the fixed overhead or the bureaucracy. You can’t be a sustainable business if you’re not a profitable business. That’s what we’re here to fix.
I lead every engagement. Depending on the scope, I’ll bring in trusted specialists from my network — experienced people who work the same way I do, assembled around your brief rather than around an agency’s org chart.
One Foot in the Boardroom
I’ve spent 15 years at the sharp end of hardware product development. Not the comfortable, well-resourced end. The ambitious, under-resourced, attempting-to-shift-industries end. The kind of projects where ambition and volatility go hand in hand.
That’s included a seat at board level within a product-led business navigating some of the most turbulent conditions of the last decade. COVID supply chain disruption, the Evergiven blocking the Suez Canal, product recalls and the brutal economic pressures that followed. Not as an observer, but as someone shaping the decisions that kept the business moving. All whilst delivering a product roadmap.
I’ve also lived through three significant business restructures in five years. Those weren’t setbacks. They were an education in what separates the ventures that make it from the ones that don’t.
That experience changes how you see everything. It means I understand the commercial pressures, the stakeholder dynamics and the real cost of getting decisions wrong in a way that most external consultants simply don’t.
When I embed into your team, I’m not just delivering a project. I’m thinking about your business.
Adapting to a changing landscape
The tools available to product developers are changing faster than at any point in history. What took a team of ten and a six-figure software budget five years ago can now be achieved by one person with the right knowledge.
I stay close to that evolution deliberately. Not to bolt on every new capability and bill for it, but to make an honest and ongoing assessment of where my time genuinely adds value and where an off-the-shelf solution will serve you better, faster and cheaper.
That means sometimes the most valuable thing I can tell you is that you don’t need me for something.
That’s transparency. That’s what we do.
Not just bikes…
I’m naturally drawn to projects at the intersection of commercial viability and genuine progress. Active travel, electrification and electrical appliances — both domestic and commercial — are areas where I’ve built deep experience and where I believe the most interesting hardware challenges currently exist.
I’ve been an active contributor to Shift Cycling Culture for over six years, completed the ClimateDraft mid-career accelerator in 2024, and in 2026 was selected for the Design Council’s Design Skills for Embedding Circularity pilot programme — a cohort working to close the gap between product development and the waste management sector, so that circular thinking gets designed in from the start rather than bolted on at end of life.
These aren’t badges. They’re an indication of our curiosity, values and strategic direction.
Well connected
Based in central England, I sit on the edge of the UK’s motorsport valley — one of the most concentrated clusters of engineering expertise in the world. London and Birmingham are both an hour by train, Oxford an hour south, and five international airports within easy reach.
Geography is rarely a barrier. I’m comfortable working across sites, time zones and supply chains.
Ready to take the next step?
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