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You Negotiate Commodities, But You Seize Opportunities

Steve Blank

Advisory Board. In the early days of Rocket Science I realized that we needed high-level advice on multiple fronts; technology, game development, video game distribution, etc. For lots of reasons that never worked out, but I liked him so much that the following year I tried to hire him as the VP of Engineering of Ardent. (He

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Ardent War Story 5: The Best Marketers Are Engineers

Steve Blank

I would discover that there was a more effective alternative in building a marketing department than hiring traditional marketers with MBA’s. I set up an advisory board as a vehicle to get these industry experts engaged with the company and product. At the time this was a pretty controversial decision.

Engineer 198
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Ardent 1: Supercomputers Get Personal

Steve Blank

I had last been in Chapel Hill on a winter’s day in 1986, traveling with the VP of Sales of our new supercomputer startup, Ardent. I’ve convinced the team you’d be perfect, come join us as the VP of Marketing.” I knew we almost had him convinced when our sales guy and Andy started talking to each other in Dutch.