Millions of Americans struggle with getting enough sleep daily. In fact, around 40% of them struggle with it, according to polls by both Gallup and YouGov. You likely know the feeling that comes with not getting enough sleep and all the detriments associated with it. However, that feeling, known as sleep inertia, is a well-documented scientific phenomenon. While not getting enough sleep can contribute to it, one of the most influential factors on sleep inertia, and tiredness in general, is during which part of the sleep cycle you wake up. In fact, being woken up abruptly can have the same effects as getting less sleep. Edison Co.'s goal is to help reduce sleep inertia when first waking up through a more natural approach to the morning routine.

Unsurprisingly, Americans don't get enough sleep. American sleep has been on the decline for years, and Gallup found that more than 40% of Americans and nearly 3 out of every 4 high schoolers said they didn't get enough sleep. And indeed, many studies have shown that even if you get enough sleep, being jarred awake while in deep non-REM sleep can make your sleep less efficient, and can have the same physiological effects as if you got less than 4 hours. If getting jarred awake from the wrong part of a sleep cycle can cause you to effectively lose sleep, then a normal alarm is essentially leaving your day up to chance. This is why Edison Co. decided to try and solve the problem of sleep inertia and jarring alarm clocks.

Before entering any market, industry research is crucial. One can't validate their problem without a good idea of what the market will be like. After some searching, Edison Co. was able to find that the alarm clock industry is of a pretty reasonable size, approximately $150 million, and growing at just under 4.5%. That said, there are some concerns to be had. An Australian study claimed that only 48% of adults actually used a morning alarm. Of those individuals, an informal poll showed that 83% of Americans used their cellphone as an alarm. The key will to a successful product will be to differentiate from the smartphone alarm. However, even assuming that no smartphone users would give Edison Co. products a chance, the companies' conservative estimates place 6,547,000 Americans using a traditional alarm clock. If that's the baseline, there is clearly potential for the market.

When researching this product, the team came across several solutions that had already been introduced into the market as well as many patents relating to it. One of the products which was most in alignment with their problem was a bedside alarm which slowly illuminated in the morning while playing relaxing sounds which slowly got louder and louder. This is similar to what Edison Co. would like to do with its product. The group also found many patents which would track a user's sleep cycle and wake them up in a certain time range when they hit the correct sleep cycle stage.