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 are a practitioner of Customer Development, ESL was doing it before most us were born. Fred Terman Sent Us In 1953 the U.S.

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Silicon Valley Stealth RSS California 194

Steve Blank

JUNE 25, 2009

Computer hardware companies were faced with their customers asking for low-cost (relatively) desktop computers they had no experience in building. The answer depends on your answer to two questions: which step in the Customer Development process are you on? Find out Memorex’s position in Silicon Valley.

Technology 143

Technology Silicon Valley Fractional VPE Part-Time VPE 143

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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Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 253

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 27, 2012

customer development. agile engineering. Some general customer development slides click here. Called “ How to Build a Startup: The Lean LaunchPad ,” it walks you through the Business Model Canvas and an overview of the customer development process. Visitors Guide to Silicon Valley.

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Open Source Silicon Valley Lean Customer Development 335

Steve Blank

AUGUST 29, 2016

A team from their Enterprise Innovation Office has joined us at NYU as observers at our 5-day Lean LaunchPad class, while another team is in Silicon Valley with the Hacking for Defense team learning how to turn their hard problems into partnerships with commercial companies that lead to deployed solutions. The Innovation Insurgency.

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Lean Silicon Valley Government Acquisition 182

Steve Blank

AUGUST 29, 2016

A team from their Enterprise Innovation Office has joined us at NYU as observers at our 5-day Lean LaunchPad class, while another team is in Silicon Valley with the Hacking for Defense team learning how to turn their hard problems into partnerships with commercial companies that lead to deployed solutions. The Innovation Insurgency.

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Lean Silicon Valley Government Acquisition 182

Steve Blank

APRIL 9, 2009

But what I wanted was an agile marketing team capable of operating independently without day-to-day direction. It will cost you your job.” Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. The first reaction from my CEO was, “that’s why you’re running the department.” That kind of accountable. Order Here.

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Silicon Valley Technical Review RSS PR 269

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 10, 2009

In future posts I’ll describe 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. While that’s not true, it is a fact that entrepreneurs only have one word for “startup.” .

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Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 220

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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Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 4, 2008

Boyd emphasized the importance of agility in combat: "the key to victory is to be able to create situations wherein one can make appropriate decisions more quickly than ones opponent." Lean startups have the ability to use this commodity stack to lower costs and, more importantly, reduce time to market. Agile software development.

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Lean San Francisco Agile Continuous Deployment 102

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 7, 2008

We had endless arguments internally about what features it should include, how the avatars should look, and how much it should cost. Finally the day came, we unleashed the landing page, emailed our existing customers, and started advertising online. Just load them all in and choose a low cost-per-click. I used to use $.05,

Demand 167

Demand San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment 167

Steve Blank

JANUARY 26, 2016

Introducing Hacking for Defense – Connecting Silicon Valley Innovation Culture and Mindset to the Department of Defense and the Intelligence Community. They don’t need an office in Silicon Valley to figure out what’s out there. DF-21 and Islands in the South China Sea. They are experts in leveraging Web 2.0

Silicon Valley 120

Silicon Valley North Korea Agile Lean 120

Steve Blank

AUGUST 5, 2010

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. VC’s invested in things that ran on electrons: hardware, software and silicon. Quickly iterate the product in front of customers.

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Lean Internet Silicon Valley Venture Capital 263

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 2, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Saturday, August 2, 2008 Paul Graham on fundraising I have found no better primer on the current realities of starting a new technology company in a startup hub like Silicon Valley than Paul Grahams essays. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

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San Francisco Software Review Technical Review Continuous Deployment 125

Steve Blank

JANUARY 25, 2010

A business model diagram also shows how the product gets distributed to your customers and how money flows back into your company. And it shows your company’s cost structures, how each department interacts with the others and where your company fits with other companies or partners to implement your business.

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Agile Startup Silicon Valley Business Model 335

Steve Blank

MARCH 18, 2011

The signals are loud and clear : seed and late stage valuations are getting frothy and wacky, and hiring talent in Silicon Valley is the toughest it has been since the dot.com bubble. Customer Development , Agile Engineering and the Lean methodology enforced a process of incremental and iterative development.

Internet 335

Internet IPO Silicon Valley Agile 335

Steve Blank

JULY 25, 2011

Scientists and engineers as founders and startup CEOs is one of the least celebrated contributions of Silicon Valley. ESL, the first company I worked for in Silicon Valley , was founded by a PhD in Math and six other scientists and engineers. Why It’s “Silicon” Valley. It might be its most important.

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Engineer Silicon Valley United States Venture Capital 311

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 15, 2011

Our Lean LaunchPad class teaches scientists and engineers that starting a company is another research project that can be solved by an iterative process of hypotheses testing and experimentation built around the business model / customer development / agile development solution stack. And I am definitely enjoying it.”.

Silicon Valley 245

Silicon Valley Lean Customer Development Business Model 245

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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Vertical Silicon Valley RSS Marketing 125

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 24, 2009

As the costs of production fall, it’s getting easier and easier to send in a proposal or even a complete work. Most publishers are still caught up in an outdated “vision vs. metrics&# argument, which is already obsolete here in Silicon Valley. I’ve met a lot of gatekeepers in the past few months. ideas (e.g.

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San Francisco Lean Technical Review Distribution 113

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. The Customer Development process (and the Lean Startup) is one way to do that.

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Lean Silicon Valley Startup RSS 260

Steve Blank

APRIL 2, 2009

As a private company you can decide that winning at all costs is your culture. You can decide that coming in first at all costs is your culture. Think through if you want to win at any cost. (I It’s the decisions that you make that might cost you an order, a sale or a higher stock price. And we decided not to.

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Silicon Valley RSS Startup California 127

Steve Blank

MAY 15, 2009

However, I’ve seen this story repeated time and again, and not just in Silicon Valley. The Curse of a New Building At some point in my career as I began to ponder how/why startups morph from agile, “can do&# companies to [.] [.] Stay hungry, stay lean. Lessons Learned N ew buildings are a distraction.

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Silicon Valley RSS Lean Agile 230

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 12, 2009

After these slides, these VC’s recognized that this company had dramatically reduced risk and built a startup that was agile, resilient and customer-centric. The presentation didn’t have a single word about Lean Startups or Customer Development. Your “Customer Development Process&# has really resonated for me.

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Venture Capital Silicon Valley RSS Hockey Stick 239

Steve Blank

MAY 18, 2009

We agreed that all her founding CEOs seemed to have the same set of personality traits – tenacious, passionate, relentless, resilient, agile, and comfortable operating in chaos. He welcomed us by screaming, “Do you know how much it costs every minute this line is down.&# the manager followed us still yelling.

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Founder Silicon Valley RSS China 310

SoCal CTO

DECEMBER 1, 2010

The Ultimate Combination of Startup Business Development Methods - ArcticStartup , November 16, 2010 I've been a huge fan of Steven Blank's Customer Development methodology for a long time. D&O insurance is a “cost of respect” for board members. Build Your Own Silicon Valley? What went wrong?

Technical Review 175

Technical Review Technology Product CTO Hire 175

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 11, 2013

As Eric puts it in the webcast, “I’ve met now the CEOs of some of the biggest companies in the world, and I still spend time with the CEOs of high-growth Silicon Valley companies from the garage on up, and what all those people have in common is that they are seeking out sources of sustainable growth…. So that doesn’t harm the brand.

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Lean Silicon Valley Agile Cofounder 167

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 13, 2008

This approach is a the heart of breaking down the "time/quality/cost pick two" paradox , because these small investments cause the team to go faster over time. Wed never heard of five whys, and we had plenty of "agile skeptics" on the team. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup?

Software Review 167

Software Review Technical Review San Francisco Continuous Deployment 167

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 8, 2009

Much of what makes the USA, and Silicon Valley in particular, such a great place to start a company is the result of good government policy. I started my last company with 100% off-shore resources because I could never have completed Customer Development at a reasonable cost of money or regulatory burden had I employed US Citizens.

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DC Washington San Francisco SBIR 90

Startup Lessons Learned

MARCH 13, 2009

Do some Customer Development instead. IMVU was a top-1000 website in the world, with millions of customers and making millions of dollars without getting any significant press coverage. In fact, we often felt frustrated when new startups with a fraction of our success got terrific write-ups in Silicon Valley-centric venues.

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San Francisco PR Lean Early Stage 168

Startup Lessons Learned

DECEMBER 7, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Sunday, December 7, 2008 The hackers lament One of the thrilling parts of working and writing in Silicon Valley is the incredible variety of people Ive had the chance to meet. In school I was being pounded day and night with anything that has to do with agile software development.

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Software Review Technical Review Part-Time VPE San Francisco 94

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. The Alchemist Series: Customer Development and Metrics. Tweet By Elizabeth Knopf (Co-Founder & CEO, Sorced). However, I needed to actually build it!

Cofounder 47

Cofounder Technical Review San Francisco Founder 47

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 11, 2009

Its one of the easiest ways to get leverage in your development process, amplifying the power of your team by letting you take advantage of code written by thousands of others. Its obvious that can lower your development costs, but I think its even more important that it can reduce your time to market. Expo SF (May.

Software Review 68

Software Review Software Hiring San Francisco 68

Up and Running

MAY 23, 2016

The software was sold based on installation cost running on local servers for enterprises—which was very, very expensive. It’s a particularly popular strategy in the world of product development and is used to quickly and quantitatively test a product or a product feature. Estimating Realistic Startup Costs.

Software Review 74

Software Review Software Delaware Forecast 74

Steve Blank

MAY 4, 2009

In an early stage startup, instead of sales being up front, the point departments are likely to be product development and customer development. Later on in this same company’s life, sales will become the pointy end and product development moves to a supporting role. No one was confused after that.

Silicon Valley 132

Silicon Valley RSS Non-Compete California 132

usersknow.blogspot.com

APRIL 30, 2010

The basic version of this feature will be available to everybody, but an upgraded version will cost money. An Agile Alternative: Embedded Design A Depressing Example of Non-Agile Design Why Your Customer Feedback is Useless Seven More Ways People Suck at Customer Developmen. My God, How Long Will This Take?

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Software Review Agile San Francisco Advisory Board 40

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 22, 2008

It took us months to realize what we had done, and to eventually apologize and win back the trust of those customers wed alienated. The whole episode cost us hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost revenue. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? Expo SF (May.

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.Net Operations San Francisco Lean 158