Steve Blank

AUGUST 17, 2009

Pitching the idea to the President of Stanford, Terman enthusiastically said, “In the event of all-out war , Stanford would become one of the giant electronic research centers…&# (A bit optimistic about the outcome perhaps, given that both the U.S. Stanford had a Customer Development loop going on inside their own lab.

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Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 24, 2009

The new “discovery&# will be a continuous series of events, starting with a niche following and, for the successful artists, gradually transitioning into mainstream success. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? 12comments: Dougvs said.

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Steve Blank

JUNE 15, 2009

If I did go to social events, all I would talk about was my new company. Or if you have kids, it will get asked when you’ve missed another one of their plays, soccer games or school events because you were too busy finishing that project or on yet another business trip. My company became the most important thing in my life.

Entrepreneur 291

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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.

Silicon Valley 269

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Steve Blank

APRIL 22, 2009

Customer Development.) Calculate the Odds The heuristic I suggest is: hear the corner case objections, make the objector calculate the odds, if the potential damage estimate is low (probability of the event occurring multiplied by its ability to put you out of business) keep the meeting focussed and move on.

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David Teten

SEPTEMBER 23, 2017

Chris Dixon, Partner, A16Z, observes , “ Success in VC is probably 10% about picking, and 90% about sourcing the right deals and having entrepreneurs choose your firm as a partner”. The VC Software Stack — the Untouched Vertical. 3) Originate investments. We have a long way to go! Private Equity Software and Services Directory.

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Steve Blank

MAY 21, 2009

Is the company hosting/co-sponsoring some event? Customer Discovery Sitting inside of your company you’ve made a whole bunch of assumptions about who your customers are and why they will buy. Now there are thousands of real live customers walking around the show floor with facts.

Silicon Valley 203

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Steve Blank

MARCH 22, 2009

And you’d like me to do my talk on Customer Development and startups?” “No, we’re the other CIA.” 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.

Silicon Valley 267

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Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 12, 2009

The presentation didn’t have a single word about Lean Startups or Customer Development. I am a young entrepreneur here, absolutely dying to hear the talk. Your “Customer Development Process&# has really resonated for me. The VC firm delivered a term sheet for an 8-digit second round that afternoon.

Venture Capital 239

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Steve Blank

AUGUST 3, 2009

The second series of posts, the rise of “ Spy Satellite Valley ,” starts in 1956 with two game changing events– one very public – the valley’s first semiconductor company and one very, very private – the valley as the home of the first optical and ELINT spy satellites and submarine-launched ballistic missiles.

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Steve Blank

MAY 18, 2009

In this admittedly very unscientific survey I’ve found that between a quarter and half of the students I consider “hard-core&# entrepreneurs/founders (working passionately to found a company,) self-identified as coming from a less than benign upbringing. I’ve been surprised at the data. Let me know what you think.

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Steve Blank

JULY 2, 2009

Entrepreneur-in-Residence After SuperMac I had been approached by one of our venture investors to be an entrepreneur in residence (EIR), a Silicon Valley phrase which says one thing but means another. I offered to introduce him to the firm whose Entrepreneur-in-Residence offer I had just accepted.

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Steve Blank

APRIL 20, 2009

And throughout my career as an entrepreneur I kept asking questions of my VC investors and friends; Where did entrepreneurship come from? Berkeley Haas Business School was courageous enough to give me a forum teach the Customer Development Methodology. How did Silicon Valley start?

Silicon Valley 297

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Steve Blank

JULY 16, 2009

His point was that it was in the VC’s interest in having entrepreneurs swing for the fences. However the VC’s are managing a portfolio while you, the entrepreneur are managing one company – yours. Customer Development says having a vision, faith and a set of hypotheses are a normal part of the startup experience.

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Steve Blank

MAY 7, 2009

In exchange, these VCs/companies get early looks at new deal flow and offer aspiring entrepreneurs feedback and advice on their business plan. And even if you don’t win, participation in the event itself can open up your network and lead to possible future possibilities.

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news.ycombinator.com

SEPTEMBER 16, 2011

We already have some competitors in the vertical and while there is no point in trying to hide the actual idea, there are differences in the way we implement stuff that can get us an advantage over the competition. >> Investors are looking for proven entrepreneurs to enter this emerging market and they will get well funded too.

Stealth 41

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Steve Blank

AUGUST 24, 2009

Discovering that your worldview is wrong or mistaken can be a life-changing event. Dinner in a Strange Land When I was in my mid 20′s working at ESL, I was sent overseas to a customer site where the customers were our three-letter intelligence agencies. It’s part of growing up but can happen at any age.

Silicon Valley 210

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Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 5, 2009

It could be fixed by refactoring the code itself, or by partitioning the data horizontally or vertically, or by adding additional capacity at the point of the bottleneck, or by shaping end-user demand, or even by removing the feature itself. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

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Steve Blank

JUNE 18, 2009

But entrepreneurs can be great spouses and parents. Never miss an event. And I made sure I was in town for the major events.) As a single entrepreneur I had a philosophy of, “ I live to work ” – nothing was more exciting or important than my job. My ideas about Customer Development started evolving around these concepts.

Entrepreneur 333

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Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 4, 2009

For example, Friendster was famously vertically partitioned at one time in its growth curve. I normally recommend you just store this directory on your master database, but you could use a standalone vertical shard (or even a key-based partition!) This type of vertical partitioning sharding scheme wont work in most cases.

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A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

OCTOBER 24, 2011

” Introduced a few months ago as an Austin event, I’m now doing this live audio advice column to the web, taking phone calls from startups around the country. So that means stuff like thinking about what a business model might be, it does mean customer development. So I have a question for you, Jason.

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www.rocketwatcher.com

NOVEMBER 8, 2010

. # of Prospects – these are folks that in some way have indicated they have an interest in your product/service by filling in a form, hitting a sufficient number of pages on your site, attending an event, speaking to someone at your company at a show, etc. # If you enjoyed that, you should subscribe!

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steveblank.com

JULY 8, 2011

Poplytics – online surveys and analytics AskYourTargetMarket – market research surveys SurveyMonkey - granddaddy of on-line surveys Amazon Mechanical Turk – you can set up a question and get answers PickFu – A/B testing $5 for 50 opinions Collaboration Dropbox – store, sync, and, share files online.

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