The Bagel Shop Decision: How Canary Speech Chose a Problem That Takes a Decade to Solve

The Bagel Shop Decision: How Canary Speech Chose a Problem That Takes a Decade to Solve

Most founders optimize for speed. Find the fastest path to revenue. Pick problems you can solve in 18 months. Minimize risk. Build something venture capital understands. The conventional wisdom says choose the quick win.

In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, Henry O’Connell, CEO and Founder of Canary Speech, shared how he and his co-founder Jeff Adams spent six hours in a bagel shop making the opposite choice—committing to solve a problem that had stumped researchers for 35 years and would take a decade of their lives.

The Six-Hour Conversation

Eight years ago, Henry met Jeff Adams in a bagel shop in Provo, Utah. They’d known each other for 40 years. Jeff had just finished leading the Amazon Echo team and had previously created Dragon NaturallySpeaking at Nuance.

They sat for six hours. Two hours in, Henry asked the question that changed everything.

“About 2 hours into that meeting, I asked him a question. I said, Jeff, you know, recognizing the impactful career he had, I said, what do you want to do at this point? How would you apply what you have done and the skill and the expertise you have?”

Jeff’s answer: “I’ve always wanted to use speech and voice to identify human condition and disease and make an impact.”

That started Canary Speech. But the real decision was choosing to attack a problem everyone else had failed to solve.

The 35-Year Track Record of Failure

For 35 years, the best research institutions—MIT, Carnegie Mellon, Cambridge—had tried using speech analysis to detect disease. Every attempt failed to produce commercially viable technology.

“For the last 35 years, thinking within that box had not produced a product that was commercial, that was practical enough to be important in a healthcare setting,” Henry explains.

Most founders would see this and choose a different problem. Thirty-five years of failure doesn’t suggest opportunity—it suggests impossibility. But Henry and Jeff saw something different: everyone was solving the wrong problem.

The Insight That Made the Decade Worth It

The conventional approach analyzed what words people spoke. But Henry shared an observation with Jeff that revealed a different path.

He told Jeff about calling his daughter twice weekly. “When she answers the phone, and it has absolutely nothing to do with the words she’s speaking, and it’s irritatingly accurate. And I don’t have the physical cues anymore. I can’t see her walking. I can’t see her face, but I know whether it’s a good day or a bad day.”

He asked Jeff how we do this. Jeff’s response: “I don’t know, but it has little or nothing to do with the words that people are actually speaking.”

That changed everything. If everyone had been analyzing words for 35 years and failing, maybe the answer was in sub-language elements—pitch, rhythm, trembles, pauses.

This wasn’t incrementally better. It was orthogonal. And that meant they weren’t competing with 35 years of research—they were opening a new path.

The Question That Determines a Decade

The decision to commit a decade to a problem comes down to Henry’s question: “What do you want to do at this point?”

Not what’s the biggest market. Not what can you build fastest. What do you want to do with your expertise, at this point in your life?

For Jeff, after building the Amazon Echo and Dragon NaturallySpeaking, the answer was applying speech to disease detection. For Henry, with neurological disease background, it was the same.

“You’ve got to put the stake in the ground, and that stake may be three years out, it may be eight years out, it may be ten years out.”

The critical part isn’t the timeline—it’s the willingness to recognize and commit to it. Most founders lie about timelines, then fail when reality doesn’t match. Henry and Jeff chose honesty about the decade ahead.

The Framework for Impossible Problems

Their decision framework was practical. First, they had unique capability. Jeff had built foundational speech technologies. Henry understood neurological disease.

Second, they had an insight everyone missed. The 35-year failure record meant analyzing words wasn’t working. Sub-language was unexplored.

Third, they had resources to survive the timeline. Not capital—they started without funding. But willingness to generate project revenue. “We actually did multiple ones with United Healthcare, probably eight of them, which really helped our company.”

Fourth, they genuinely wanted to solve this problem. The decade commitment only works if you want to spend the decade. “I believe individuals that are inspired to work together can do things that are considered impossible. And as the saying goes, it simply takes a little longer.”

What Makes the Risk Worth Taking

Eight years later, Canary Speech has raised $26 million, holds twelve patents, and analyzes vocal biomarkers with 93-96% accuracy for Alzheimer’s. They work across Japan, Ireland, England, the Emirates, and Saudi Arabia. Microsoft invested $1.5 million in non-dilutive grants.

But the validation didn’t come in year eight. It came in that bagel shop when they chose alignment between expertise, insight, resources, and genuine desire.

“The journey that you take to where you get that sounds ridiculous, but you never know. You just don’t.” The uncertainty is the point. You can’t know if a decade-long bet will work. You can only know if it’s worth the decade regardless.

The Decision You Need to Make

If you’re considering a years-long problem, the bagel shop framework applies: Do you have unique capability? An insight others missed? Resources to survive the timeline? And do you genuinely want to spend years solving this?

Companies that matter often come from founders who chose decade-long problems everyone thought impossible.

Henry’s advice: “Not every idea is a good one, and that includes my own.”

Humility to be wrong combined with conviction to commit a decade—that’s the paradox. Believe enough to start but stay humble enough to adapt.

Thirty-five years of failure became eight years of breakthrough because two people spent six hours asking what they wanted to do. Not about market size or exits. About applying expertise to a problem they cared about.

That’s the real decision. Not whether the problem is solvable in your lifetime. Whether it’s worth your lifetime to try.