How modular systems turn disruption into opportunity

Faster cycles, faster sales, faster profits—at what cost?

We were visiting one of our largest customers, a pioneer in quantum computing, when they gave us what might be the most bittersweet compliment I’ve ever heard. Gesturing toward a multi-million dollar setup, they said: “For six years we haven’t touched the components—your product just works. That’s one big reason why we use it.”

As a CEO, my first instinct was pride. As someone responsible for driving growth, I hesitated. Wouldn’t it be better if they had to replenish that hardware every three years? That’s the logic so much of the electronics industry still runs on: Faster cycles, faster sales, faster profits.

But when we zoom out, that mindset doesn’t hold. In industrial and R&D environments, where uptime, integration, and long-term cost matter, durability and modularity aren’t trade-offs. They’re essential. And when it comes to sustainability, both ecological and economic, they’re the most undervalued edge we have.

Why modular design beats built-in obsolescence

The tech world has long celebrated disruption. But not enough has been said about persistence: about designing systems that adapt over time, rather than needing to be replaced entirely. In sectors like quantum or aerospace, where systems evolve iteratively, modularity is non-negotiable. Engineers need to test, tweak, and upgrade subsystems without rethinking the full stack. A modular platform empowers teams to do that–swapping parts, reprogramming behavior, and scaling performance as the project matures.

That’s not just convenient. It’s efficient, lean, and sustainable.

Take LongPath, a company developing methane monitoring systems for use in some of the harshest environments on Earth. Their product, a game-changer for environmental accountability in oil and gas, must operate autonomously in remote regions for years. Here, repairability isn’t a nice-to-have. It’s critical infrastructure. Waiting weeks for a replacement part or needing to ship the entire unit back to a lab, simply isn’t an option.

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Sustainability isn’t a luxury

The same applies in developing regions or low-resource research labs. When budgets are tight and logistics are slow, reusable and customizable hardware becomes a lifeline. Sustainable hardware isn’t a luxury for well-funded teams, but a necessity for everyone else.

This shift in thinking is already underway, especially among startups and smaller labs that need to do more with less. For them, modularity is a force multiplier. A reprogrammable, open-ended platform lets engineers build prototypes quickly, iterate faster, and extend the same hardware into deployment when they’re ready. It reduces the total cost of ownership, minimizes downtime, and maximizes return on engineering effort.

That’s a radically different business logic than “design for obsolescence,” but forward-looking companies are already embracing it.

Modular, long-lasting design also helps solve a very real problem: electronic waste. The average piece of electronic hardware has a useful life of just 3–5 years, and e-waste is one of the fastest-growing waste streams globally. Hardware that can be updated and repurposed doesn’t just reduce waste. It also reduces manufacturing emissions, supply chain pressure, and the energy burden of constant replacement.

Growth without churn?

And while it’s true that high-durability products can lengthen repurchase cycles, companies don’t need to sacrifice growth to build sustainably. Many modern hardware businesses are scaling by developing ecosystems around their products, offering application support, software integrations, advanced modules, and training resources that extend value beyond the initial unit sale.

If you build trust with your user base, revenue doesn’t need to come from churn. It also comes from the community–through word-of-mouth referrals, user-generated content, open source contributions, and collaborative development that drive adoption, retention, and long-term product relevance.

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A smarter path forward

Modularity also offers resilience. When COVID-19 disrupted global supply chains, teams with the ability to adapt and reconfigure their systems in-house, without waiting on a specific proprietary part, had a huge advantage. That lesson hasn’t been forgotten.

As regulations and expectations around sustainability grow, this is a strategic argument. Products that can be reused, repaired, and reprogrammed are better suited for today’s engineering challenges and the realities of tomorrow’s economy.

We’re seeing growing demand for hardware that’s open, interoperable, and durable. Whether you’re building a particle detector, a remote sensing device, or an experimental lab setup, the ability to evolve your hardware without discarding it is a design advantage, not a compromise. It’s true that building long-lasting products isn’t always the fastest path to short-term revenue. But in the long run, it’s better for engineers, better for the environment, and better for innovation.

And if a customer tells me they haven’t needed to touch our hardware in six years? I’ll take that as a win–every time.

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