Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 16, 2009

I was in New York last week with my class at Columbia University and several events made me realize that the Customer Development model needs to better describe its fit with web-based businesses. And without revenue how do we know if we achieved product/market fit to exit Customer Validation?” It’s an impressive portfolio.

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Customer Development Web Developer Customer 219

Steve Blank

JULY 7, 2015

My guests on Bay Area Ventures on Wharton Business Radio on Sirius XM Channel 111 were: Eric Ries , entrepreneur and author of the New York Times bestseller, The Lean Startup. Eric was the very first practitioner of my Customer Development methodology which became the core of the the Lean methodology.

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Lean Technical Cofounder Silicon Valley Channel 120

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 1, 2014

Guest post by Lisa Regan, writer for The Lean Startup Conference The Lean Startup Conference is next week--and now that we can step back and see all the speakers and mentors, we have to say: Wow. As the emeritus Chief Technology Officer of the United States, he still connects government and Silicon Valley.

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Lean Fractional CTO Part-Time VPE Fractional VPE 165

Steve Blank

MARCH 3, 2015

Starting in the 1950’s, Stanford’s engineering department became “outward facing” and developed a culture of spinouts and active faculty support and participation in the first wave of Silicon Valley startups. At the same time Berkeley was also developing Cold War weapons systems. That has changed in the last few years.

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Business Plan Silicon Valley Saudi Arabia Lean 120

Up and Running

DECEMBER 6, 2012

Today, I want to introduce you to a new concept for starting and growing successful companies: Lean Planning™. Before I dive too deeply into the Lean Planning methodology, it makes sense to talk about its history and where it comes from. Lean Planning is born.

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Lean Silicon Valley Forecast Technical Review 147

ConversionXL

SEPTEMBER 6, 2013

The product or website (be it software, e-commerce, or a service) might be awesome , but if it puts itself in front of the wrong market, or packages itself so the right market can’t figure out why it’s awesome, the startup will fail. This is a customer development problem. So What is Customer Development?

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Customer Development Conversion Developer Customer 126

Steve Blank

MAY 9, 2017

I’ve watched the Valley go from Microwave Valley – to Defense Valley – to Silicon Valley to Internet Valley. And I’ve been lucky enough to watch innovation happen not only in hardware and software but in Life Sciences – in Therapeutics, Medical Devices, Diagnostics and now Digital Health.

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Restful Silicon Valley Puerto Rico San Jose 222

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 8, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Saturday, November 8, 2008 What is customer development? For software, we have many - you can enjoy a nice long list on Wikipedia. But too often when its time to think about customers, marketing, positioning, or PR, we delegate it to "marketroids" or "suits." This is a common mistake.

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Customer Development Developer San Francisco Customer 168

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 13, 2010

But to give you a sense of how fast they are moving, it’s only been a week since I posted the syllabus for our new Stanford entrepreneurship class Engr245 ( The Lean Launchpad.) Here’s the course announcement from Professor Vergara (in English): Customer Development Course in Chile – Lean Launchpad.

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Chile Silicon Valley Lean Agile 235

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 19, 2009

He would go on to be a co-founder of two mechanical engineering software companies.) And they were responsible for helping our 3 rd party software group reach the right application providers to port their software to our computer. Back in the 1960’s and 70’s no sane MBA’s would work for a Silicon Valley startup.)

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Engineer Silicon Valley Part-Time VPE Advisory Board 198

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 9, 2009

This required convincing software vendors to move their applications to our unique machine architecture. Oh, and we had no installed customer base. 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. – was his job.

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Silicon Valley Software Review RSS Technical Review 324

Up and Running

MAY 23, 2016

Since the term “cloud computing” was coined in 1996—at least as we have come to understand its meaning—the software as a service industry has exploded. Step 1: Start with a lean plan. I started UpKeep after seeing and using traditional enterprise software. Introducing Lean Planning: How to Plan Less and Grow Faster.

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Software Review Software Delaware Forecast 74

Steve Blank

MARCH 19, 2009

Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. While I was consulting for them, I got a call from a recruiter for a company called SuperMac, which made add-on products for the Macintosh. To Order Outside of the U.S. Now In Print! Blog at WordPress.com. Theme: Digg 3 Column by WP Designer.

Silicon Valley 146

Silicon Valley Software Review Technical Review RSS 146

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 7, 2009

Customer Development We were starting Epiphany, my last company. I was out and about in Silicon Valley doing what I would now call Customer Discovery trying to understand how marketing departments in large corporations worked. He continued: “I’d like to convince my boss so our company can be your first customer.”

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Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 4, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Tuesday, November 4, 2008 Principles of Lean Startups, presentation for Maples Investments Image via Wikipedia Steve Blank and I had the opportunity to create a presentation about lean startups for Maples Investments. Agile software development. Customer development.

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Steve Blank

JUNE 29, 2009

My first job in Silicon Valley: I was hired as a lab technician at ESL to support the training department. It makes you appreciate that the Silicon Valley technology-centric culture-bubble has little to do with the majority of Americans.) You’re Hired, You’re Fired. Driving across the U.S. I was stunned.

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Agile Silicon Valley RSS California 245

conversionxl.com

SEPTEMBER 10, 2013

It’s Not a Conversion Problem, It’s a Customer Development Problem. The product or website (be it software, e-commerce, or a service) might be awesome , but if it puts itself in front of the wrong market, or packages itself so the right market can’t figure out why it’s awesome, the startup will fail.

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Customer Development Conversion Developer Customer 60

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. Peter described the first company in which “Hollywood meets Silicon Valley” and we were enthralled.

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Silicon Valley Technical Review RSS Software Review 120

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 23, 2009

I’m a software engineer by trade, so I’m always interested in some better way to do things, whether they are in software or in business processes or organizations. Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. We’ve managed startups like this forever; there is no other way to manage them.”

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Silicon Valley RSS Venture Capital Customer Development 125

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 5, 2009

The culture and work ethic of Convergent had earned it the title “the Marine Corps of Silicon Valley”. Never mind The first idea for our new company was a software product that looked something like Hypertext. Reply Karma in the Lean Startup Era , on January 28, 2010 at 5:26 pm Said: [.] To Order Outside of the U.S.

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North Carolina Silicon Valley Fractional VPE Part-Time VPE 125

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 8, 2009

For this startup we had assembled some of the best and brightest hardware and software engineers in the computer industry. Customer development isn’t just for [.] Reply Customer Development Oriented Lead Developer for Start-up – EventSession , on November 9, 2009 at 4:27 pm Said: [.]

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Silicon Valley RSS Customer Development California 271

Steve Blank

JUNE 25, 2009

These companies would take our computers and put their name on them and resell them to their customers. Business customers were starting to ask for “office automation solutions” – word processing, spreadsheets, graphing software on a desktop. Hiring a VP of Sales in customer discovery typically sets a startup back.

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Technology Silicon Valley Fractional VPE Part-Time VPE 138

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 21, 2016

Hacking for Diplomacy takes the Lean Startup methodology and applies it to problems sourced from the State Department. Teams are continuing their relentless interviewing of customers, or beneficiaries as we call them in this class. For the deputy secretary, such a dialogue in Silicon Valley is not a matter of charity, but necessity.

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Silicon Valley Washington United Kingdom Lean 120

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 21, 2016

Hacking for Diplomacy takes the Lean Startup methodology and applies it to problems sourced from the State Department. Teams are continuing their relentless interviewing of customers, or beneficiaries as we call them in this class. For the deputy secretary, such a dialogue in Silicon Valley is not a matter of charity, but necessity.

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Silicon Valley Washington United Kingdom Lean 120

Steve Blank

JANUARY 20, 2014

When Customer Development and the Lean Startup were just a sketch on the napkin, Dino Vendetti, a VC at Bay Partners, was one of the first venture capitalists I shared my ideas with. Over the years we brainstormed about how Lean entrepreneurship would affect regional development. Silicon Valley Transplants.

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Silicon Valley Oregon Lean Venture Capital 312

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 12, 2009

I grabbed one of each piece of literature, stuffed into my bag, and wandered through the exhibit hall looking at other hardware and petroleum software companies. Ardent 3: Supercomputer Porn « Steve Blank (tags: customer-development product-management startup) [.] Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice.

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Silicon Valley RSS Software Review Technical Review 147

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 11, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Wednesday, February 11, 2009 The free software hiring advantage This is one of those startup tips Im a little reluctant to share, because its been such a powerful source of competitive advantage in the companies Ive worked with. Especially for a startup, not taking maximum advantage of free software is crazy.

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Software Review Software Hiring San Francisco 68

Steve Blank

MAY 11, 2009

And I got to experience a type of customer buying behavior I had never seen before – the Novelty Effect. Present at the Creation It was early 1991 and Apple’s software development team was hard at work on QuickTime , the first multimedia framework for a computer. The software was idiot proof.

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Video Silicon Valley RSS California 164

Steve Blank

MAY 30, 2016

Four decades ago my first job in Silicon Valley was with ESL, the first company to combine computers and signals intelligence. The founder of this 1964 Silicon Valley startup was Bill Perry. Using the Lean LaunchPad methodology our teams do much more than just build a product or understand customer problems/needs.

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Silicon Valley San Diego Technical Review Incubator 120

crowdSPRING Blog

MARCH 15, 2013

Lean Business: Capacity Management, Overhead, and Your Business – [link]. Bad Customer Development Questions and How to Avoid My Mistakes – [link]. Money matters: why women founders struggle in Silicon Valley | The Verge – [link]. Crowdsourced Workforces Rising | Xconomy – [link].

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Social Media Small Business Design Media 105

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. When I first came to Silicon Valley the world of Venture Capital looked pretty simple.

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Lean Internet Silicon Valley Venture Capital 258

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 10, 2011

This week, the startup tribe from Harvard Business School is making their annual trek to Silicon Valley. It’s a common refrain around Silicon Valley to disparage the role of MBA’s in entrepreneurship. One tweet read, “well, if HBS is investing in the lean startup we know it has jumped the shark.”

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Silicon Valley San Francisco Lean Investment Bankers 167

Steve Blank

MAY 26, 2009

The guidelines I had originally proposed to my students worked for enterprise software or Web 2.0 You kids have to learn to do it the old fashioned way they did it before they new economy and Silicon Valley. Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. What is it that’s unique about the market I’m in?

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Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 14, 2009

Filed under: Customer Development , Venture Capital | Tagged: Entrepreneurs « Customer Development Manifesto: Market Type (part 4) Customer Development Manifesto: The Path of Warriors and Winners (part 5) » 16 Responses Jon Ziskind , on September 14, 2009 at 9:19 am Said: Steve – Great post and really great advice.

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Silicon Valley IPO Technical Review Venture Capital 217

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 26, 2009

Its easy to take Silicon Valley for granted. Ive written a little bit about the origins of Silicon Valley because I think its important for us to understand how we got here in order to make sure we preserve what is best about our community. And do your customer development.

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San Francisco Silicon Valley Startup Continuous Deployment 113

Steve Blank

JANUARY 21, 2016

Instead, I went the Software as a Service route and tried to charge for what was a commodity product. We could have let you have the software for free, basically. … Because Lean Startup methods, Crowdfunding, Amazon Web Services and the Internet that connects us all, is bringing the cost of failure to zero. . Clay : Yeah.

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Detroit Baltimore Entrepreneur Cofounder 120

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 17, 2009

This post describes a solution – the Customer Development Model. In future posts I’ll describe how Eric Ries and the Lean Startup concept provide the equivalent model for product development activities inside the building and neatly integrates customer and agile development.

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