There are probably a plethora of good ideas out there that just haven't had either the dedication or the funding to really get off the ground.
When an existing concept - generally in the realms of either science or technology - does find itself a keen developer and an even keener investor, sometimes it can end up transforming markets.
One such product could be on the verge of doing just this, with the developer and investor - even at this stage - both glad they gave it a shot.
The product is a bullet-proof alternative to Kevlar and was recently featured on the well-regarded pages of CNN Money.
The CNN Money article - entitled 'A Kevlar killer comes to market: With help from the Pentagon, a carbon nanotubes innovator takes on DuPont' - hails the product as a potential market changer (as the title in no uncertain terms suggests).
The potential success of the product certainly won't be hampered by the beneficial online PR it will have received from featuring on the news provider's pages.
At the helm of this potential market snipe is Nanocomp Technologies, which is the first business in the world to make sheets of carbon nanotubes - micro tubes that are lighter than plastic but stronger than steel.
Steering the company through the development process is David Lashmore. Far from inventing the concept, Mr Lashmore simply saw the potential of it and pursued it further.
Carbon nanotubes have existed since the early 1990s, but it was only in 2003 when Mr Lashmore started experimenting with them at a high-tech incubator that things started to take shape.
Beforehand, nanotubes could not be produced any longer than one-fifth of the width of a human hair. Now they are producing sheets of the stuff.
And recently, thanks to vast investment from the US Army - the 'even keener investor' - and years of research, the real breakthrough has come.
In April of this year seven sheets of the material were shot at with a multi-caliber gun, which dispatches its bullets at 1,400 ft per second.
Three of the sheets showed no signs of damage.
Even Mr Lashmore himself was a little surprised. He said: "We didn't expect it to work at all."
The breakthrough could herald the rise of a genuine challenger to Kevlar's market monopoly.
Regardless of whichever company is ultimately triumphant in this battle for best bullet-proof product, one thing is for sure - there are not likely to be any major casualties.
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