1. Why Axon Passes the “Snap Test”
One of the most important mental models I use when assessing a company is what I call the “Snap Test.”
It’s simple: If you snapped your fingers and the company disappeared overnight, who would feel it?
If the answer is “everyone”, you’re probably looking at an essential company.
Axon passes this test—emphatically.
If Axon were to vanish tomorrow, law enforcement agencies, governments, public safety departments, and courts across the U.S. and the world would feel a severe and immediate operational shock. Their workflows would break. Their accountability systems would vanish. Their ability to serve communities safely and effectively would regress by decades.
Axon is not just another tech company. It is a mission-driven infrastructure layer for modern public safety—and it has embedded itself so deeply into its customers’ ecosystems that leaving would be unthinkable.
2. The Flywheel: Hardware That Enables Software, and Vice Versa
Axon began with a single mission: make the bullet obsolete. Its iconic TASER product was just the beginning.
Today, Axon’s offering spans a tightly integrated hardware–software stack, including:
- TASER devices (non-lethal weapons)
- Body-worn cameras (Axon Body)
- Digital evidence platforms (Evidence.com)
- Automated reporting systems (Draft One)
- Records management software (Axon Records)
- Fleet management tools, virtual reality training, AI redaction, and more
This ecosystem is more than the sum of its parts—it’s a flywheel:
- Hardware adoption → drives data capture
- Data capture → drives software usage
- Software usage → drives retention and upsell
- Retention → funds further innovation
- New innovations → further lock in and expand use cases
The network effect is structural. Once a department uses Axon’s systems, switching would mean breaking up a vertically integrated command and accountability stack. They don’t just lose tools—they lose efficiency, interoperability, and trust.
3. The Mission Behind the Model
Axon’s flywheel is underpinned by its mission-first culture. They’re not selling shiny gadgets—they’re solving real, headache-level operational and societal problems:
- Reducing police–civilian conflict
- Improving case resolution time
- Enhancing officer training and situational awareness
- Automating paperwork so officers spend more time in the field
This is software with a soul—and that’s one of the most durable moats in any industry.
4. The Runway: TAM Expansion Through Product Innovation
What excites me most about Axon is that its Total Addressable Market (TAM) is still expanding—not just through geography or customer acquisition, but through product creation.
Many of the tools public safety departments need haven’t been built yet—and Axon is the best positioned company in the world to build them.
Why?
- They are deeply embedded with their customers
- They have direct feedback loops from frontline users
- Their existing platform provides the launchpad for modular extensions
- Their brand is trusted in an otherwise bureaucratically slow sector
From automated video summarization to incident auto-reporting, VR-based de-escalation training, AI redaction, evidence-based analytics, and international expansion—Axon’s product roadmap is effectively a TAM-expanding machine.
5. Role in My Portfolio
Axon sits in both my G2 and G3 Funds—it’s a category leader, showing EBIT strength, and yet still innovating like a startup. It’s mission-led and margin-aware. It’s got:
- Strong Rule of 40 performance
- High customer retention
- Long-duration contracts
- A growing subscription revenue base
And critically, it has asymmetric upside—not because of a moonshot product, but because of systematic execution across a compounding ecosystem.
6. What I’m Watching
Going forward, I’m monitoring:
- The rollout of Draft One and Axon Records to more departments
- Penetration into federal and international markets
- Unit economics of Axon Cloud vs Hardware
- The evolution of AI/ML features inside Axon software
- New verticals (e.g., justice, corrections, health security)
7. What Would Break My Thesis
Risks I watch closely:
- Government procurement cycles slowing down
- Budget cuts in public safety departments
- A security or privacy incident involving sensitive evidence
- Mission drift—where growth overtakes focus
To date, Axon’s leadership has remained remarkably mission-aligned and disciplined, and I continue to back their execution.
Final Reflection
Axon is one of those companies that most people don’t think about—until it’s gone. And that’s exactly what makes it powerful.
It passes the Snap Test, fuels a self-reinforcing flywheel, expands its market by solving unspoken needs, and does it all while improving the lives of both law enforcement officers and the communities they serve.
If my children ask me one day why I invested so heavily in a company that makes police tech, I’ll say:
“Because they weren’t selling tools—they were building trust, saving lives, and reinventing public safety from the inside out.”
