If your hardware start-up was going to tell me to buy a new product if it broke after a year, then I've no problem if it doesn't get going in the EU.
We don't need more cheap tat, we need things that can have a reasonable shelf life. We used to expect that from products as standard. Then when more things became electronic, it started to drift into obsolence after X years.
But there's so many products that don't need to be replaced. I don't need a state-of-the-art pedometer or weighing scales, I just need one that does the job it did when I bought it.
If Apple, Samsung and the Chinese manufacturer isn't compliant, then Fairphone just got handed a market of 500 million people with no real competition. Some US electronics manufacturer who doesn't want to deal with EU regulation, is handing over the entire market to someone who will, and that company can still sell everywhere else.
Down the road, if we make it, we will have access to funds for a few roles that maintain spare parts and a repair (more likely replace/refurb) department, that will coordinate with our manufacturing houses.
None of this blocks innovation or velocity for early stage startups. Unless you have more concrete examples I'm somehow missing?
People act like these are industry shattering requirements, but hard tech is already subject to a plethora of requirements we have to handle every day. We will always have some kind of process for CE certification, battery safety requirements, GDPR, or open source licensing and toolchain access, etc, etc. This is just another (honestly, minor) process to roll in with the rest of them.