Commercial maturity
The CRL ladder.
The TRL measures whether the solution works. The CRL measures whether someone wants it, tries it and buys it. The value of a startup follows, above all, the second.
8 min read
1 · The two thermometers
Why the TRL is not enough.
A project can be at TRL 8 and CRL 2: the technology works, and nobody has bought it. It is the classic fate of the perfect product no customer asked for. The reverse also exists: a brilliant commercial promise that the technology cannot yet keep. That is why an innovation project is measured with two scales at once: the technical one, which governs the cost of development, and the commercial one, which governs the value of the startup. The first is told in the TRL pyramid; this page tells the second.
The CRL (Commercial Readiness Level) adapts the commercial maturity frameworks born in the energy sector (ARENA's CRL and CRI indexes). In parallel, the innovation office of KTH in Stockholm developed them and calls it Customer Readiness Level: the name changes, the idea does not. It has nine levels, like the TRL, because commercial risk outlives technical risk and needs its own thermometer.
2 · The nine rungs
Each rung is climbed with evidence, not opinion.
| CRL | What it means | What proves it |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hypothesis of commercial potential | Own analysis: the potential is formulated, nobody has confirmed it yet |
| 2 | Market and application identified | First problem interviews; the segment and the application have a name |
| 3 | Value proposition and first real counterparties | Documented conversations; interlocutors who devote real time, not courtesy |
| 4 | Business model sketched and tested with potential customers | The model corrected by customers: prices, channel and objections written down |
| 5 | First pilot sales or letters of intent | Signed letters of intent, sold pilots, a real waiting list |
| 6 | Repeat revenue in market conditions | Recurring invoices beyond the pilot; first renewals |
| 7 | Unit economics demonstrated at small scale | CAC, LTV and unit margin measured in cohorts; retention that holds |
| 8 | Model replicated across several segments or territories | A sales playbook that works in a new segment without the founders |
| 9 | A bankable asset: stable revenue, ordinary commercial risk | Predictable revenue; the business can be financed with ordinary instruments |
The column that matters is the third: it is the one the committee looks at.
3 · The product milestones
From POC to mature product, on the ladder.
The POC, the prototype, the MVP, the MMP and product-market fit are not levels of the scale: they are milestones of the product life cycle that rest on it. Placing them, from first to last, avoids the most common confusion in innovation.
| Milestone | What it is | Typical TRL | Typical CRL | What it proves |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| POC (proof of concept) | The demonstration that the principle works | 3–4 | 1–2 | Technical feasibility; it says nothing about demand |
| Prototype | A functional or visual simulation, incomplete, to learn and to show | 4–6 | 2–3 | That the solution can be built; usability; first reactions |
| MVP (minimum viable product) | The smallest product a real user can try | 6–7 | 3–5 | Real use and validated learning: what they truly want |
| MMP (minimum marketable product) | The smallest product a customer can buy: solid for the open market, not only for pioneers (also called MMR, Minimum Marketable Release) | 8–9 | 5–6 | Willingness to pay from customers who are not early adopters; on the path, F9–F10 |
| Product-market fit | Retention and unit economics that hold: demand pulls by itself | 9 | 6–7 | Cohorts that stay and positive unit margin; a practical measure: more than 40% of users would declare themselves «very disappointed» without the product (Sean Ellis rule) |
| Growth product | After the fit, the question changes: scale. Scalability, security, performance and integrations; analytics and automation for mass acquisition | 9 | 8 | Market share that grows with a falling acquisition cost |
| Mature product (cash cow) | Stable share and a consolidated user base: cost optimisation, maintenance and incremental improvements | 9 | 9 | Maximum profit and an extended useful life before decline |
The evolutions of the MVP. The EVP or SLC (Simple, Lovable, Complete) is the immediate evolution of the MVP: few features, flawlessly executed, to delight the first users and create attachment to the brand. The MLP (minimum "lovable" product) seeks emotional connection and lower churn. It is the natural choice in saturated or highly competitive markets, where solving the problem is not enough: the product must be liked for its design, its values or its ease of use. The MAP adds the surprise factor. None of these variants changes the position on the ladder: they change the emphasis, between the MVP and the MMP.
3 bis · The toolbox
Climbing the first rungs almost without spending TRL.
The first rungs of the CRL do not require building the product: they require evidence. There is a toolbox for buying it cheaply, with the TRL almost still. It is the cheapest way to de-risk a project: knowing whether anyone wants it before investing in developing it.
| Technique | What it consists of | CRL it raises | Cost in TRL |
|---|---|---|---|
| MVT (minimum viable test) | Testing a single hypothesis at a time, the riskiest one: a page, a button, a measurement | 1 → 2 | None |
| Smoke test (fake door) | Presenting the product as if it existed (an ad, a form) and measuring real intent: clicks, emails, bookings | 2 → 3 | None |
| Concierge | Offering the service by hand, in full view of the customer, before automating it: the consultant before the app | 3 → 5 | Minimal |
| Wizard of Oz | On the outside, the product looks automatic; on the inside, people run every process by hand | 4 → 5 | Minimal: the façade |
| Piecemeal | Assembling the product with tools that already exist (forms, automations, boards), without writing code | 4 → 6 | Low |
A rule of honesty: these techniques measure, they do not deceive. A smoke test measures purchase intent; whoever leaves their email is told the truth afterwards and treated as what they are, the project's first potential customer.
Method note: here is the asymmetry that makes this approach valuable. Raising the CRL early costs little and decides much; raising the TRL costs much. Ordering them well is the essence of de-risking: first the evidence that the problem exists and someone will pay, then the technical investment. It is the order of the path.
4 · In the method
The CRL on the Volcano path.
On the path, the TRL dominates the R&D macro-phase (F3–F7) and the CRL dominates the market and scale ones (F8–F13). But the CRL starts climbing much earlier: as soon as there is a verified problem, and throughout the R&D, with the techniques on this page. Whoever contributes a network of relationships raises the project's CRL: that is why a network is capital. The exact correspondence between phases, TRL and CRL of a specific project is validated by the committee.
A note on names. Some manuals separate customer maturity (Customer Readiness) from business maturity (Business Readiness, where the draft of the model lives: BRL 3 at KTH). This ladder merges them into a single commercial scale, as the European calls do. That is why the value proposition (CRL 3) is a long rung: the draft of the model is written on entering and tested while climbing.
And a warning the ladder carries engraved: the technical side must never run alone. Every TRL rung climbed without commercial evidence advancing brings the project closer to the valley of death: reaching the MVP with the CRL still in hypothesis is having built a product that now goes looking for a market. That is why the cheap techniques of the next section exist: so the commercial ladder climbs in step with the technical one from day one.
5 · The complete view
The six scales of a project.
The CRL is one of the six dimensions with which the KTH model measures an innovation project, each from 1 to 9:
| Scale | The question it asks |
|---|---|
| TRL · technical | Does the solution work? |
| CRL · commercial | Does anyone want it and buy it? |
| BRL · business model | Do the numbers hold? |
| IPRL · intellectual property | Is it protected, and whose is it? |
| TMRL · team | Are the right people there, aligned? |
| FRL · funding | Is there capital to reach the market? |
The six are independent but interdependent: a project does not have to advance symmetrically, but a difference of more than two or three rungs between scales becomes a brake. The Volcano committee evaluates the six dimensions when fixing each stake and each budget: it is the operational form of the fair and transparent method.
6 · The sources
References.
- ARENA (2014). Commercial Readiness Index for Renewable Energy Sectors.
- KTH Innovation, KTH Innovation Readiness Level, version G (2022). kthinnovationreadinesslevel.com
- NASA, Technology Readiness Level scale; adopted by the European Union in the Horizon programmes.
- Blank, S. (2013), origin of the idea of pairing the TRL with a measure of business maturity.
- Ries, E. (2011). The Lean Startup: the MVP and the validation techniques (Concierge, Wizard of Oz, smoke test).
- Ellis, S., the 40% rule as a practical measure of product-market fit.
From maturity to value
John F. Kennedy, 1962