Grafting as a Growth Strategy: Build, Buy or Partner?

• Sahil Harwani
• October 2, 2026
• Blog
• 0 Comments

Grafting as a Growth Strategy: Build, Buy or Partner?

A grafted branch can start fruiting much sooner than a tree grown from seed.

I’ve known that for years. Just never thought of it as a business idea.

My grandfather worked in the forest department, so trees, budding and grafting were always part of conversations at home.

When I was a kid, there was even a chapter in my textbook on how budding and grafting worked. I remember understanding it quite easily because my dad had already explained it to me at home.

And last month, when I went home, my dad was grafting a mango variety onto a tree.

Then he gave me almost the exact same lecture he had given me when I was a kid.

Why budding works.
Why grafting can be better than growing from seed.
How you can take a variety that already produces good fruit and get it onto an established tree instead of waiting years for a new one to mature.

I smiled because I’d heard all of it before.

But this time, I started thinking about something completely different.

Non-linear growth.

We often see companies trying to build every new capability from scratch.

New technology? Build it.
New product capability? Build it.
New market? Build the team and capability ourselves.

Sometimes that’s absolutely the right answer.

But sometimes you’re spending years growing something that already exists somewhere else.

That’s where the analogy started making sense to me.

A seed is building from scratch.

You start with an idea, develop the capability, build the team, make mistakes, and eventually get something that can produce.

A graft is acquisition.

You take a capability that’s already developed and attach it to what you already have.

You get speed, but compatibility matters. The branch has to work with the tree.

A shared orchard is a partnership.

You don’t own the other tree, but you can still access what it produces, learn from it and create value together.

Three different ways to grow.

And I think this is where a lot of the conversation around growth becomes interesting.

The question isn’t whether companies should build, buy or partner.

The question is: what are you trying to grow, and how long can you afford to wait for it?

Some capabilities are worth growing from seed.

Sometimes you graft the branch.

Sometimes you don’t need to own the tree at all.

Non-linear growth isn’t always about growing faster. Sometimes it’s about finding a different way to grow.