This is a great analogy, basically plotting startup success on an evolutionary NK landscape [0]. Finding optima rests on a healthy balance of exploration and exploitation, as in the behavior of ant colonies searching for food. Apple has been a good historical model of this in business, though for a startup it's often necessary to keep the chips all in on one product. Ideally though, a pivot isn't a random jump, but is rather guided by an incomplete map of the landscape. Herein lies the value of the MVP, but it's curse is being difficult to throw away, especially once it has some traction.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NK_model