Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 4, 2022

The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. Nevertheless, it’s an option that doesn’t cost you equity. Commit to a major customer.

Intellectual Property 261

Intellectual Property Technical Review Incubator Bootstrapping 261

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 28, 2020

But for founders who do their homework, the cost of entry is lower and the opportunity is higher than ever. Building a minimum viable product, with customer validation. Years ago, it cost a million dollars for a new e-commerce site, one that you can now create for almost nothing with current tools and technology.

Intellectual Property 404

Intellectual Property Startup Angel Groups Social Media 404

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 17, 2020

It’s important to learn from your own mistakes, but it’s even smarter to learn from someone else’s mistakes, without paying their high price in time lost, cost, and pain. Offer free solutions to bring in more customers. Don’t get caught in the myth that you shouldn’t worry about monetization until after you have a large customer base.

Intellectual Property 436

Intellectual Property Angel Investor Viral Distribution 436

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 1, 2023

Value factors include your related product breadth and depth, relationships with thought leaders, key vendors, and large potential customers. Your idea is not intellectual property yet, so it has no inherent value. Building the product may be the easy part of your startup challenge. Key to required patents or trade secrets.

Technical Cofounder 247

Technical Cofounder Equity Distribution Cofounder 247

The Startup Magazine

AUGUST 21, 2023

And in certain situations, the low-cost approach makes perfect sense… A template NDA may fit the bill for early discussions with third parties, while a fairly generic employment contract may mean that enough is being done to ensure legal compliance. It’s vital to be clear about who can terminate, and under what circumstances.

Technical Review 111

Technical Review Intellectual Property Due Diligence Early Stage 111

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 6, 2019

The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. Nevertheless, it’s an option that doesn’t cost you equity. Commit to a major customer.

Finance 320

Finance Intellectual Property Technical Review Incubator 320

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 15, 2022

Message delivery must be customized for each investor. It takes more than one person to build a business, so the lone entrepreneur, without support from any visible team, advisors, partners, or potential customers, will not attract investors. Registered patents and other intellectual property.

Intellectual Property 278

Intellectual Property Angel Investor Early Stage Venture Capital 278

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 13, 2023

Don’t forget to consider customer alternatives, like trains versus airplanes. Check for intellectual property barriers in your way. New smartphone apps cost only a few thousand, if you have the programming skills. Choose projects with financial resources within your reach.

Technical Review 267

Technical Review Due Diligence Intellectual Property Internet 267

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 9, 2020

Value factors include your related product breadth and depth, relationships with thought leaders, key vendors, and large potential customers. Your idea is not intellectual property yet, so it has no inherent value. Building the product may be the easy part of your startup challenge. Key to required patents or trade secrets.

Cofounder 435

Cofounder Technical Cofounder Equity Intellectual Property 435

Gust

JANUARY 4, 2012

Last month we covered the basics of intellectual property (IP) for startups, including a simple taxonomy, some common issues and related documents for entrepreneurs to use when forming a new startup. I’m proud to contribute to the effort and always enjoy reading what the other authors have to say.

Intellectual Property 143

Intellectual Property IP Startup United States 143

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 8, 2014

This alternative has been around for several decades, with the generally accepted advantage of reducing costs. Saving cost wont help you if you cant make the daily innovations required to stay competitive. Keep intellectual property keys in-house. Factor in all the cost elements.

Intellectual Property 238

Intellectual Property Non-disclosure Agreement Software Review Offshore 238

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 17, 2020

Don’t forget to consider customer alternatives, like trains versus airplanes. Check for intellectual property barriers in your way. New smartphone apps cost only a few thousand, if you have the programming skills. Choose projects with financial resources within your reach.

Technical Review 434

Technical Review Due Diligence Intellectual Property Internet 434

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 26, 2022

You need intellectual property , such as a patent, trade secret, or process expertise that will be a barrier that you can defend. Many of the business plans I see are built around a dream, with idealistic costs, margins, and customer demand. Calibrate your ability to rise above competitors and copycats.

Founder 262

Founder Intellectual Property Social Media Business Plan 262

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 13, 2020

Message delivery must be customized for each investor. It takes more than one person to build a business, so the lone entrepreneur, without support from any visible team, advisors, partners, or potential customers, will not attract investors. Registered patents and other intellectual property.

Intellectual Property 316

Intellectual Property Angel Investor Early Stage Venture Capital 316

Steve Blank

JUNE 26, 2014

We’re changing the order in which we teach the business model canvas and customer development to better-fit therapeutics, diagnostics and medical devices. “Customer Development” to test the hypotheses outside the building and. Teams talk to 10-15 customers a week and make a minimum of 100 customer visits.

Intellectual Property 281

Intellectual Property Lean IP Open Source 281

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 30, 2019

The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. Nevertheless, it’s an option that doesn’t cost you equity. Commit to a major customer.

Intellectual Property 219

Intellectual Property Technical Review Startup Incubator 219

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 16, 2014

I was having breakfast with Radhika, an ex-grad student of mine who wanted to share her Customer Discovery progress for her consumer hardware startup. Activities define the unique expertise your company needs to deliver the value proposition, customers, channels, customer relationships and/or revenue. (If Customer Development'

Cofounder 335

Cofounder Founder Intellectual Property Business Model 335

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 11, 2012

Intellectual property content. Some country cultures have little appreciation for software as intellectual property. Protect your intellectual property. On the other hand, if it is maintenance and testing on non-core software, use the lowest cost solution. Cost factors. Technology level.

Intellectual Property 222

Intellectual Property Non-disclosure Agreement Non-Compete Vietnam 222

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 20, 2016

This alternative has been around for several decades, with the generally accepted advantage of reducing costs. Saving cost won’t help you if you can’t make the daily innovations required to stay competitive. Keep intellectual property keys in-house. Factor in all the cost elements.

Intellectual Property 120

Intellectual Property Non-disclosure Agreement Software Review Technical Review 120

The Startup Magazine

FEBRUARY 21, 2024

This could involve leasing out unused space, selling off non-core assets, or finding innovative ways to monetize intellectual property or data. Simultaneously, we conducted a thorough operational review to identify inefficiencies and areas for cost reduction.

Technical Review 133

Technical Review Due Diligence Bankruptcy Intellectual Property 133

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 17, 2011

Intellectual property content. Some country cultures have little appreciation for software as intellectual property. Protect your intellectual property. On the other hand, if it is maintenance and testing on non-core software, use the lowest cost solution. Cost factors. Technology level.

Intellectual Property 225

Intellectual Property Non-disclosure Agreement Non-Compete Vietnam 225

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 4, 2019

In my experience, the key steps I look for always include the following: Testing the idea against customers who have money to spend. Build a credible business implementation plan to quantify costs. Prepare your marketing story for customers and investors. Even a non-profit needs income to operate.

Intellectual Property 235

Intellectual Property Elevator Pitch Harvest Technical Review 235

YoungUpstarts

MARCH 7, 2016

Understanding the four main types of intellectual property is a preliminary step to intellectual property acumen as patents, trademarks, trade secrets and copyrights each have their own legal protections. Does my company own its intellectual property? What should my IP strategy be?

Intellectual Property 100

Intellectual Property NDA IP Early Stage 100

Up and Running

JULY 28, 2022

Secure your intellectual property. Intellectual property (IP) is anything created by the human intellect that’s protected by the law from unauthorized use by other people. It pays for medical care, funeral costs, death benefits, and income compensation during recovery. Establish a privacy policy.

Small Business 167

Small Business Intellectual Property Cofounder Software Review 167

Steve Blank

APRIL 23, 2014

If they decide to buy, large companies can: license/acquire intellectual property. A business model is all the parts of a strategy necessary to deliver a product to a customer and make money from it. The founding team is testing for the right combination of product, market, revenue, costs, etc.

Acquisition 332

Acquisition Intellectual Property Silicon Valley Startup 332

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 14, 2014

The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. Nevertheless, it’s an option that doesn’t cost you equity. Commit to a major customer.

Entrepreneur 283

Entrepreneur Intellectual Property Technical Review Incubator 283

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 25, 2018

The cost of rolling out a business has never been lower – it only takes a few hundred dollars to incorporate a Limited Liability Corp (LLC) online, create your own website, use social media to get attention, and you are in business. In the early Internet days, it would cost a million dollars to get this far.

Technical Cofounder 184

Technical Cofounder Intellectual Property Silicon Valley LLC 184

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 30, 2013

For a business, you must define the absolute minimum features you need to satisfy the customer problem, and test it in the market. By using a laser focused approach for the first iteration, you may actually produce something and get a customer without funding. Get a real customer and real revenue.

Intellectual Property 281

Intellectual Property Entrepreneur Sweat Equity CTO Hire 281

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 29, 2023

The critical success factors for a product business are well known, starting with selling every unit with a gross margin of 50 percent or more, building a patent and other intellectual property, and continuous product improvement. If you don’t have a high level of commitment and passion, you customers won’t seek you out.

Intellectual Property 278

Intellectual Property Social Media Business Model Employee 278

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 10, 2018

Value factors include your related product breadth and depth, relationships with thought leaders, key vendors, and large potential customers. Your idea is not intellectual property yet, so it has no inherent value. Building the product may be the easy part of your startup challenge. Key to required patents or trade secrets.

Equity 238

Equity Cofounder Technical Cofounder Intellectual Property 238

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 10, 2009

Early on in my career I took a “we’re moving too fast to deal with lawyers” attitude to patents and Intellectual Property (IP.) At one of my entrepreneurship classes at Stanford, Dan Dorosin , of Fenwick & West LLP guest lectures about startups and Intellectual Property. Intellectual Property.

Intellectual Property 213

Intellectual Property IP Software Review Non-disclosure Agreement 213

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 19, 2013

The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. Nevertheless, it’s an option that doesn’t cost you equity. Commit to a major customer.

Intellectual Property 309

Intellectual Property Technical Review Venture Capital Startup 309

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 18, 2022

How an entrepreneur answers this question speaks volumes about their knowledge of business realities, customers, confidence, and their ability to handle investor funding. Intellectual property as barrier to entry. I look for entrepreneurs that can sell themselves and their offering to discerning customers.

Intellectual Property 334

Intellectual Property Angel Investor Matching Founder 334

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 12, 2018

The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. Nevertheless, it’s an option that doesn’t cost you equity. Commit to a major customer.

Intellectual Property 134

Intellectual Property Technical Review Startup Incubator 134

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 25, 2017

In case you haven’t noticed it, the rapid evolution of do-it-yourself (DIY) facilities for developers, including 3-D printers, SketchUp and makerspaces such as TechShop , have scaled down the cost of prototypes and hardware design by an order of magnitude. Quick low-cost design and fabrication alternatives are extremely valuable.

Technical Cofounder 153

Technical Cofounder Intellectual Property Wiki Cofounder 153

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 31, 2012

For a business, you must define the absolute minimum features you need to satisfy the customer problem, and test it in the market. By using a laser focused approach for the first iteration, you may actually produce something and get a customer without funding. Get a real customer and real revenue.

Intellectual Property 260

Intellectual Property Sweat Equity CTO Hire Fractional CTO 260

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 3, 2020

The critical success factors for a product business are well known, starting with selling every unit with a gross margin of 50 percent or more, building a patent and other intellectual property, and continuous product improvement. If you don’t have a high level of commitment and passion, you customers won’t seek you out.

Intellectual Property 436

Intellectual Property Social Media Business Model Employee 436