Steve Blank

AUGUST 31, 2009

Or at times an even more honest answer, “My senior partners say this is the only way to do it.” Why change something that has worked so well over the last three decades?” Or, “Look at our returns, its always worked for us.” That’s a better return than having 10 out of 10 companies succeed and each return 2x our money.

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techcrunch.com

AUGUST 12, 2012

She attended the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, CA, majoring in Writing and Art, and moved to New York City shortly after graduation to work in the Media industry. The partners are currently in the middle of successfully raising their second fund. Alexia Tsotsis. Thursday, August 9th, 2012. View Staff Page.

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Steve Blank

MAY 22, 2009

While one could argue that a trade show is just another demand creation activity akin to advertising or PR, trade shows are the closest eyeball-to-eyeball contact you’re company is going to have with customers, competitors and partners. These two posts were amazing. Anyways, here’s one question I have.

Silicon Valley 128

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Steve Blank

AUGUST 17, 2009

The second was when a Southern Californian aircraft company decided to break into the missiles and space field by partnering with Stanford electronics expertise. The Navy informs Terman that, “money was not a problem but time was.” and the Soviet Union had nuclear weapons at this point.)

Silicon Valley 142

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Steve Blank

JUNE 5, 2009

You leave the comfort of your existing job, convince a few partners to join you and you jump off the bridge together. One of the key tenets of entrepreneurship is that you start your company with insufficient resources and knowledge. At each startup I couldn’t wait to do this. No building, no money, no customers, no market?

Silicon Valley 212

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Steve Blank

JULY 9, 2009

So I got out out of the building to meet and understand our customers and distribution partners. I remember after a month or two of talking to 14-22 year old male gamers (our potential target market,) I realized that for the first time in my career I had no emotional connection to my customers or channel partners.

Silicon Valley 139

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Steve Blank

MAY 21, 2009

Partners Booths While your booth may be small, some of your potential or existing partners may have much larger ones, in much more visible locations. For a small company this is like throwing your tradeshow money on the floor. Look for locations near entrances, food concessions, rest rooms, seminar rooms, or close to major exhibitors.

Silicon Valley 178

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Steve Blank

MARCH 22, 2009

Their VC firm, In-Q-Tel , has been in business for 10 years, and like most VC firms they have an annual event where they show off their new portfolio companies to their limited partners and other VC partners. And I could have sworn they all had the same badge.)

Silicon Valley 247

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Steve Blank

JUNE 22, 2009

Hewlett’s partner Dave Packard wanted to get into the computer business.) We Changed Our Mind In 1966, 10 years after Hewlett’s memo, Hewlett Packard’s revenue and headcount had grown ten fold; $200 million and 11,000 employees – all from test and measurement equipment.

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Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 5, 2009

Did the partner have a good or bad day, etc. We were able to raise a Seed round from Bessemer Venture Partners on a powerpoint idea, and never found the repeatable customer model. Anything that is not a standard VC dozen format will get thrown away by a junior associate with MBA before it is ever seen by a partner.

Customer Development 262

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Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 9, 2009

I had hired the VP of marketing from a potential software partner who was responsible to get all this 3 rd party software on our computer. I’ve been on the side of your potential partners, and I know that often too much ‘persistence’ is offputting. Oh, and we had no installed customer base. u have to be creative, too.

Silicon Valley 324

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Steve Blank

JULY 2, 2009

If you were a “with it” VC you needed to have a “Content&# or “Multimedia&# company in your portfolio to impress your limited partners – educational software companies, game companies, or anything that could be described as content and/or Multimedia. There appears to be a saturation point within this market space.

Silicon Valley 120

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Steve Blank

JULY 13, 2009

The positive effect of the tidal wave of press was as a door opener for us to raise money from corporate partners. Which at this stage of the company was marketing and financing. At the time I was a true believer that Rocket Science was going to change the gaming world.

Silicon Valley 122

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Steve Blank

JULY 16, 2009

Meanwhile my partner was in heaven working with his newly hired group of game designers directing and producing our first games. No, not really, but my partner owns the studio and tells me it’s spectacular and everyone will love it. Go spend some time outside the building talking to potential distribution partners.

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Steve Blank

JUNE 29, 2009

I packed up my life in Michigan and spent five days driving to California to start work. No one will say work less and go home and spend time with your partner and/or family. You’re Hired, You’re Fired. You’re Hired, You’re Fired. Driving across the U.S. is an adventure everyone ought to do.

Agile 245

Agile Silicon Valley RSS California 245

Steve Blank

JUNE 15, 2009

And one would become my mentor and partner in later companies.) The other thing it helps clarify is that even at work, it’s the relationships that matter most (collegues, customers, partners, etc). Two of my role models for my career were in this company. (And But this story is not about Convergent.

Entrepreneur 276

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Steve Blank

AUGUST 10, 2009

They would also set the standard for the 20% carry for general partners. They would be one the first venture firms to organize their firm as a partnership rather than an SBIC or public company. Tommy Davis would go on to found the Mayfield Fund in 1969.

Silicon Valley 155

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Steve Blank

OCTOBER 29, 2009

The Group is worth noting for: Investing their own private money, Reid Dennis would found Institutional Venture Partners in 1974 First group specifically investing in the valley’s electronics industry SBIC Act of 1958 During the cold war the launch of Sputnik-1 by the Soviet Union in 1957 both traumatized and galvanized the United States.

Silicon Valley 125

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Steve Blank

OCTOBER 26, 2009

Whitney Company by writing a personal check for $5M and hiring Benno Schmidt as the first partner (Schmidt turned Whitney’s description of “private adventure capital&# into the term “venture capital”). set up companies to do just that – find and formalize investments in new and emerging industries. In 1946 Jock Whitney started J.H.

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Steve Blank

APRIL 16, 2009

We were about to be partners in building a new product family. The change in his demeanor – from trying to kill me – to laughing, as it dawned on him where I was going, could only be described as hysterical relief. “40%?” Yes, yes and yes.

Silicon Valley 134

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Steve Blank

JUNE 18, 2009

When I ran Rocket Science our corporate partners were in Japan (Sega), Germany (Bertelsmann) and Italy (Mondadori) and some travel was unavoidable. Thanks to my wife for being a great partner. Being in a startup and having a successful relationship and family was very hard work. Document every step. It takes two.

Entrepreneur 331

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Steve Blank

OCTOBER 8, 2009

Law firm partners often have anger management issues, but the thing about anger is that it is not always wrong to be angry — if somebody is angry at you because you did something wrong, then that anger is valid.

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steveblank.com

JULY 8, 2011

Blogs (VC): Antonio Rodriguez [link] – A very technical VC at Matrix partners who can actually code. Useful blogs and links for startups Click Here ————– 2.

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