Steve Blank

DECEMBER 7, 2009

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. I remember presenting our ideas for Marketing Automation to one VP of Marketing in a large Silicon Valley company. It’s just a story about what happened to me.

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Steve Blank

AUGUST 31, 2009

Finally, I’ll write about how Eric Ries and the Lean Startup concept provided the equivalent model for product development activities inside the building and neatly integrates customer and agile development. Look at the early Silicon Valley companies – Homebrew Club =>PCs. Product Development Diagram 1.

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Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 7, 2009

Finally, I’ll write about how Eric Ries and the Lean Startup concept provided the equivalent model for product development activities inside the building and neatly integrates customer and agile development. Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. To Order Outside of the U.S. Now In Print!

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Steve Blank

MARCH 19, 2009

Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. To Order Outside of the U.S. Now In Print! Blog at WordPress.com.

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Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 16, 2009

However the Customer Development Model and the Lean Startup work equally well for startups on the web. The first question to ask is: “Does your startup have market risk or is it dominated by technical risk?” Lean Startup /Customer Development is used to find answers to the unknowns about customers and markets.

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Steve Blank

JUNE 11, 2009

Other Roles in a Startup Generic advice given to entrepreneurs assumes that everyone is going to be the founder/co-founder. Reply steveblank , on June 14, 2009 at 2:22 pm Said: Actually this is the mistake most startup entrepreneurs make – particularly in tough economic times. This is the minimum feature set for founders.

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Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 26, 2009

So no post today on entrepreneurship, Secret History of Silicon Valley, Customer Development, Lean Startups, etc. Reply steveblank , on November 26, 2009 at 10:29 am Said: Just the stories of the entrepreneurs are bigger than life. Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. Now In Print!

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Steve Blank

OCTOBER 5, 2009

The culture and work ethic of Convergent had earned it the title “the Marine Corps of Silicon Valley”. Reply Karma in the Lean Startup Era , on January 28, 2010 at 5:26 pm Said: [.] Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. Working with my old boss sounded like a great idea. Now In Print!

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Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 23, 2009

The same issues arose time and again: big company management styles versus entrepreneurs wanting to shoot from the hip, founders versus professional managers, engineering versus marketing, marketing versus sales, missed schedule issues, sales missing the plan, running out of money, raising new money. To Order Outside of the U.S. Now In Print!

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Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 24, 2009

Pattern Recognition One of the great things about being an entrepreneur is that you are constantly running a pattern recognition algorithm against a continual collection of customer and market data. But at times it’s why entrepreneurs can sink their own companies. Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice.

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Steve Blank

APRIL 6, 2009

Two years out of the Air Force, serendipity (which would be my lifelong form of career planning) found me in Silicon Valley working for my first company: ESL. If you’re an entrepreneur, ESL is the most important company you’ve never heard of. could design and produce, and a good part of it was coming from Silicon Valley.

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Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 14, 2009

One of the biggest mistakes entrepreneurs make is misunderstanding the role of venture capital investors. There’s lots of lore, emotion, and misconceptions of what VC’s do or don’t do for entrepreneurs. What this meant for entrepreneurs and VC’s was simple– the gold rush to liquidity was on. What Do VC’s Do?

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Steve Blank

JUNE 25, 2009

I’ve tried to read a lot of your History of Silicon Valley posts. Find out Memorex’s position in Silicon Valley. Some say we were the first PCM in the valley. Some say we were the first PCM in the valley. were the first computer entrepreneurs here. They are very interesting. Now In Print!

Technology 138

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The Startup Magazine

JUNE 1, 2023

By Daniel Sokolovksy, Co-Founder and CEO, WARP and Troy Lester, Co-Founder and CRO, WARP The dissolution of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) was more than just a bank collapse, it was a reality check for both startups and the VCs that fund them. Hire versatile players and lean into your team The SVB collapse reminded us that staffing matters.

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Steve Blank

JULY 9, 2009

There couldn’t have been a worse choice for CEO in Silicon Valley. Hollywood Meets Silicon Valley was an Oxymoron A key premise of our new company was that our video compression and authoring technology would revolutionize how games were made and played. This wasn’t just some random Silicon Valley fantasy.

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Steve Blank

JULY 30, 2009

Unfortunately most startups learn this by going through the “Fire the first Sales VP&# drill: You start your company with a list of potential customers reading like a “who’s who&# of whatever vertical market you’re in (or the Fortune 1000 list.) Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice.

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Steve Blank

AUGUST 3, 2009

If you read only one previous post, read this one (or this one.) ————- The Birth of Entrepreneurship in The Hot Cold War Silicon Valley entrepreneurship was born in the middle of a secret war with the Soviet Union. Microwave Valley was about to take off. military, the CIA and the National Security Agency.

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Steve Blank

APRIL 9, 2009

Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. on April 10, 2009 at 6:58 am Said: Amazing blog. To Order Outside of the U.S. Now In Print! Blog at WordPress.com.

Silicon Valley 259

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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. would look in each of the verticals. Waterfall, Agile, Lean? For example, How does sales differ from one market to another? Liquidity – How?

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Steve Blank

JULY 27, 2009

For entrepreneurs good things come to those who ask. Entreprenuers Know How to Ask Successful entrepreneurs have the ability to ask for things relentlessly. Entrepreneurs are fearless, persistent and uninhibited about asking – whether it’s asking to assemble a team, get financing, sell customers, etc.

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Steve Blank

JUNE 3, 2009

Simulation to Reduce Invention Risk If you’re in a vertical where “invention risk” is dominant, then you want to do everything you can to manage and reduce those risks. When I wrote the Four Steps to the Epiphany , the Customer Development text, I hadn’t yet thought about what vertical markets it might be appropriate for.)

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Steve Blank

MARCH 20, 2009

Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. To Order Outside of the U.S. Now In Print! Blog at WordPress.com.

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Steve Blank

MARCH 25, 2009

A key lesson is that as an entrepreneur, you get to choose your segment. Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. Getting B-52s through the Soviet Air Defense System » 20 Responses brantcooper , on March 26, 2009 at 3:52 pm Said: Great story, Steve. Glad to see you blogging! To Order Outside of the U.S.

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Steve Blank

MAY 22, 2009

Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. Go to trade shows like it matters. To Order Outside of the U.S. Now In Print! Blog at WordPress.com.

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Steve Blank

APRIL 2, 2009

Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. To Order Outside of the U.S. Now In Print! Blog at WordPress.com.

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Steve Blank

MAY 11, 2009

Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. To Order Outside of the U.S. Now In Print! Blog at WordPress.com.

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Steve Blank

APRIL 30, 2009

Luckily (or maybe because we were in Silicon Valley where there was a domain expert for everything) there was a very smart consultant in the retail computer space, Seymour Merrin, who preached about the importance of packaging. Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. To Order Outside of the U.S.

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Steve Blank

APRIL 20, 2009

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance I always had been curious about how Silicon Valley, a place I had lived and worked in, came to be. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance I always had been curious about how Silicon Valley, a place I had lived and worked in, came to be. How did Silicon Valley start?

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Steve Blank

OCTOBER 21, 2010

The Churchill Club , Silicon Valley’s largest public affairs organization, invited Carl Schramm , president and CEO of the Kauffman Foundation and I to talk about entrepreneurship. Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. Translation: They write checks for $100 Million dollars a year.) Now In Print!

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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. Over its lifetime a Lean Startup may spend less money than a traditional startup.

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Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 24, 2009

They can make smart investments even if the entrepreneurs are not well credentialed or have a product/idea that is outside the mainstream of what investors are expecting As this change has rippled up the venture industry, it has meant a lot more worthy companies are getting funded than just a few years ago. 12comments: Dougvs said.

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Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 23, 2009

sgblank Lean Startup Cirle 111909 This movie requires Adobe Flash for playback. Big thanks for the continued sharing, and certainly the link to Lean Startups. Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. They were kind enough to sponsor a meet-up in San Francisco. The slides below go with the video.

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Steve Blank

JUNE 5, 2009

This is incisive and powerful and I hope many entrepreneurs or would-be entrepreneurs “get&# this eloquently stated point. The last thing I want is for new entrepreneurs to read my comment and get dismayed about the importance of facts. You do different things as an entrepreneur when you are creating a new market.

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Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 23, 2009

Eighty some pages later I realized that a) I had some great war stories as a good marketeer and failed CEO, b) I’d have to pay my wife and kids to read them, c) the three of them were probably the entire total available market, and d) when I looked at what I had done and what other entrepreneurs had done at their startups, that there was a pattern.

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Steve Blank

MAY 1, 2009

If you’ve never seen Eric’s Lean Startup presentation, take a few minutes to at least watch his part. Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. Thanks to Dave McClure and Leonard Speiser for the opportunity to speak. The Customer Development talk can be seen here. To Order Outside of the U.S.

Customer Development 139

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Steve Blank

AUGUST 14, 2009

Filed under: California Coastal Commission « Touching the Hot Stove – Experiential versus Theoretical Learning The Secret History of Silicon Valley Part X: Stanford Crosses the Rubicon » Leave a Reply Click here to cancel reply. Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. Order Here.

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Steve Blank

AUGUST 7, 2009

Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. Order Here. To Order Outside of the U.S. Now In Print! Blog at WordPress.com.

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