Steve Blank

AUGUST 5, 2010

Consumer Internet investing seems to have split off from traditional Venture Capital, and is creating a new category of VC’s: Lean VC’s. I think you can blame Customer and Agile Development for a small part of it. Electron-based Venture Capital. Here’s why.

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Steve Blank

MARCH 26, 2014

The good news is that corporations have access to resources and capabilities that most startups can only dream of , whether it is free cash flow, a strong brand, a vibrant supply chain, strong distribution, a skilled sales force, and so on. The internal venture must do all this, and more! As Steve would say, this is a big idea.

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Startup Business Model Lean Russia 327

Steve Blank

MARCH 18, 2011

Dot.com Bubble ( 1995-2000): “ Anything goes” as public markets clamor for ideas, vague promises of future growth, and IPOs happen absent regard for history or profitability. They taught you about customers, markets and profits. The goals were “first mover advantage,” “grab market share” and “get big fast.”

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Internet IPO Silicon Valley Agile 334

Steve Blank

APRIL 30, 2009

SuperMac sold our graphic boards for the Macintosh through multiple distribution channels: direct sales to major accounts, national chains, independent rep firms, etc. Maybe It’s Me When I got to the SuperMac, our Marketing Communications group told me about our “award-winning&# retail packaging for our graphics boards.

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Sales Silicon Valley RSS Las Vegas 120

Steve Blank

MAY 22, 2009

If you’re in markets that still exhibit at them (semiconductors, communications, enterprise software, etc.,) ———— T o: Marketing Department From: Steve Subject: Going to Trade Shows Like it Matters Generating Leads Ownership If your company is going to a show to generate leads, then sales owns the show. .

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Silicon Valley RSS California Customer Development 128

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 24, 2009

One is explaining the world as it used to work: the importance of gatekeepers, the scarcity implied by limited distribution, and the resulting quality bar that the industry is so proud of. Mostly it is the time and expense required to create the means of distribution for that industry. It’s just taking some longer than others.

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San Francisco Lean Technical Review Distribution 113

Steve Blank

JUNE 8, 2009

In the last three posts, we drew the relationship of market risk and invention risk with vertical markets and pointed out verticals where customer development would be useful. In contrast to simply executing your business plan, the Customer Development process is built on low-cost and continuous learning and iterating.

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Steve Blank

AUGUST 27, 2009

This series of posts is a brief explanation of how we’ve evolved from Product Development to Customer Development to the Lean Startup. The Product Development Diagram Emerging early in the twentieth century, this product-centric model described a process that evolved in manufacturing industries. None of mine did.)

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Silicon Valley Product Startup Product Development 260

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 19, 2009

I responded to their RFP by proposing that Ardent build the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center a distributed supercomputing environment with hundreds of Ardent personal supercomputers rather than a monolithic Cray supercomputer. Cray called two years ago and bought it back for parts for an unnamed customer still running one.

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Steve Blank

JUNE 5, 2009

You make several first order approximations about your business model, distribution channels, demand creation, and customer acceptance. No building, no money, no customers, no market? These customer and market risks need to be translated into facts as soon as possible. Employ customer development.

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Silicon Valley RSS Vertical California 212

Steve Blank

AUGUST 20, 2009

An Existing Market All four were trying to resegment an “Existing Market.” An existing market is one where competitors have a profitable business selling to customers who can name the market and can tell you about the features that matter to them. Do you know have they distribute their product?

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Silicon Valley Startup RSS Customer Development 181

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 2, 2009

For those of you who have been following the discussion, a Lean Startup is Eric Ries ’s description of the intersection of Customer Development , Agile Development and if available, open platforms and open source. And most startup code and features end up on the floor as customers never really wanted them.

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Lean Silicon Valley Startup RSS 244

Steve Blank

MAY 16, 2016

In companies this would be product line extensions, more efficient supply chain, new distribution channels. In slide 5 they broadly outlined mission achievement for three private sector markets. NarrativeMind further refined their Minimal Viable Product to product/market fit in Slides 11-16. makes an appearance in the class.

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San Diego Metrics Indonesia Silicon Valley 142

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 1, 2009

Top management was trying to coordinate all of the operating details (sales, manufacturing, distribution and marketing,) across all the divisions and the company almost went bankrupt that year when poor planning led to excess inventory (with unsold cars piling up at dealers and the company running out of cash.) car market.

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Silicon Valley United States RSS Customer Development 156

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.

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Steve Blank

DECEMBER 3, 2009

Worries from the garage One of the worries I hear from entrepreneurs (not just my students) is that Customer Development means getting out of the building and sharing what you are working on. In the end, the CEO couldn’t get his board to give us the cash in exchange for the Japanese distribution rights and some equity.

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Steve Blank

JULY 2, 2009

To an entrepreneur, being asked to join a venture firm with an Entrepreneur-in-Residence title means you have been tapped on the shoulder by the VC gods. As Peter began to speak extemporaneously our mouths slowly fell open as he described the video game market, its size, its demographics, the state of the technology, and the state of games.

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Silicon Valley Technical Review RSS Software Review 120

Up and Running

MAY 23, 2016

A description of the problem you’re solving for your customers, and your solution to the problem, which is usually your product or service. A description of your target market or the different market segments you’re targeting. Also, make a bullet list of the marketing activities that will drive customers to your door.

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Software Review Software Delaware Forecast 74

www.instigatorblog.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

Home About Contact My thoughts & lessons learned on startups, entrepreneurship, marketing and other stuff. turtlebarbeque I always believed the equity distribution is primarily based on the worth of the contribution. turtlebarbeque I always believed the equity distribution is primarily based on the worth of the contribution.

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Steve Blank

MAY 7, 2009

I finally understood how valuable these contests can be for students in cities or countries without a venture capital or entrepreneurial infrastructure. And even if they did – customers don’t ask to see your business plan. as one attempt to clearly define how exactly the company is creating value in the market.

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Business Plan Silicon Valley RSS Venture Capital 140

The Next Web

DECEMBER 30, 2012

How to Build a Startup (EP245) by Steve Blank: You’ll learn the key steps of the Customer Development process. How to identify and engage the first customers for your product, and how to gather, evaluate and use their feedback to make your product, marketing and business model far stronger. Khan Academy.

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Artificial Inteligence Founder Private Equity Ruby 156

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 11, 2011

GoTo.com went on to ink huge distribution deals with Microsoft, AOL & Yahoo! Secondly, they had an owned & operated (O&O) website – Google.com – and Overture had shut down GoTo.com at the request of their very profitable and large distribution partners. Immediately thereafter Amazon became a large business.

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Product Tuvalu Dilution Incubator 350

Steve Blank

JULY 16, 2009

The company was founded to build games with embedded video to bring Hollywood stories, characters, and narratives to a market where “shoot and die” twitch games were in vogue. But underlying the company’s existence was a fundamental hypothesis we refused to see or test - customers would care if we did. They think we’re brilliant.

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Silicon Valley RSS Video San Diego 207

This is going to be BIG.

SEPTEMBER 21, 2010

It’s the kind of thing you can repeat in an elevator, simple to understand , universally applicable , and, most importantly, doesn’t burden your tech team with a lot of custom development. Also, business development meetings can be valuable for the information they give you over and above getting the actual deal done.

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www.women2.org

MARCH 8, 2012

After quitting my job and starting Sorced , I spent a few months validating my business concept by creating the product mockups and doing customer development. Prior to Sorced, Elizabeth worked in business development at SecondMarket. Prior to that, she worked in venture capital at OpenView Venture Partners.

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Cofounder Technical Review San Francisco Founder 47

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 29, 2009

Ampex’s first customer was Bing Crosby who wanted to record his radio programs for rebroadcast (and had exclusive distribution rights.) But by the 1960′s the tidal wave of semiconductor startups would find a valley with a growing number of SBIC backed venture firms and limited partnerships. More on this in the next post.

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Silicon Valley SBIC San Francisco RSS 125

techcrunch.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

The timing is perfect, there is more than a little overlap with Vivek Wadhwa’s guest post on venture capital earlier today. I too am looking for someone to work with that knows the manufacturing and distribution end of a solid product. Not everybody can, especially if they need to run with the idea to get to market.

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Technical Review Cofounder Technical Cofounder Software Review 84

steveblank.com

JULY 8, 2011

Home Books for Startups Guide Secret History-Bibliography Steve Blank Startup Tools Steve Blank Entries RSS | Comments RSS Email Subscription Get Steve Blank via your RSS Feed RSS - Posts RSS - Comments Categories Air Force (12) Ardent (10) Audubon (1) Big Companies versus Startups: Durant versus Sloan (39) Business Model versus Business Plan (..)

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www.vccafe.com

MARCH 11, 2013

Venture Capital Cafe > Startup Resources (Updated Mar 2013). Whether you’re wondering what site search you should use or what is the best email marketing tool, knowledge is power. Steve Blank on Lean Customer Development. Inbound Marketing vs Interruption marketing. Email marketing.

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Software Review Technical Review Startup 53