Startup Lessons Learned
OCTOBER 20, 2008
Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, October 20, 2008 The engineering managers lament I was inspired to write The product managers lament while meeting with a startup struggling to figure out what had gone wrong with their product development process. When a process is not working, theres usually somebody who feels the pain most acutely, and in that company it was the product manager.
Cracking the Code
OCTOBER 27, 2008
Cracking The Code. Thoughts from a Venture Capitalist on Software, Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), Cloud Computing, Internet and more. Monday, October 27, 2008. Hard times. Lehman Bank employees stage a protest by blockading the entrance to the Banks Headquarters. Posted by Philippe Botteri. at 9:32 AM. Labels: anecdotes. No comments: Post a Comment. Newer Post.
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Tim Keane
OCTOBER 8, 2008
'Startups and angels: Along the way to success. By Tim Keane, Angel Investor, Golden Angels Investors, LLC. Home. Archives. Profile. Subscribe. « The Whitehorse Daily Star - good advice for entrepreneurs | Main. | Forward to the past: The (re) rise of direct marketing » October 08, 2008. Being The Best You Can Be. Last week, our angel group reviewed a business with an online lie detector technology. We've all seen The Sharper Image catalog voice stress analyzers and i supp
Software By Rob
OCTOBER 11, 2008
Software by Rob Passionate about Startups and MicroISVs Lessons Learned by a Serial Entrepreneur home about press micropreneurs archives ← Should You Build or Buy Your Micro-ISV? I’m in a Book! Blog Blazers: 40 Top Bloggers Share Their Secrets → Book Review: Finding a New Career that Values Your IT Knowledge Software Development If youre trying grow your startup youve come to the right place.
Speaker: Nick Noreña, Innovation Coach and Advisor, Kromatic
Every startup and innovation project exists within an ecosystem that either helps or hurts that project. As innovation managers, we need to keep a pulse of that ecosystem and make sure we're helping those innovation projects we're managing every step of the way. In this webinar, Nick Noreña will walk through an Innovation Ecosystem Model that he and his team at Kromatic have developed to help investors, heads of product, teachers, and executives understand how they can best support innovation in
SoCal CTO
OCTOBER 1, 2008
I went to a meetup yesterday that was on the topic of Internet Marketing / SEO / SEM. The meeting had a decent case study and some pretty good discussion around the room of different tools that you might consider using. Then the organizer went into a 20 minute sales pitch around his new training/coaching offering. It felt like a bad time share presentation.
Seeing Both Sides
OCTOBER 19, 2008
Earlier this year, I wrote a blog about how to prepare for the financing process , focusing in particular on follow-on financings. Some readers have pointed out to me that I left out a very key element of the due diligence process: what the process itself reveals about the nature of the entrepreneur to the VC. Many entrepreneurs I know underestimate the importance of their small and large actions during due diligence and the signals their behavior send to the VCs.
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BeyondVC
OCTOBER 22, 2008
Despite these tough times, there are still some bullheaded companies who think they can grow their way out of this mess or find the right M&A partner to bail them out. I can guarantee you that this is a recipe for disaster. I was on the phone today with the CEO of one our portfolio companies, and we were joking that we were in unprecedented times since we have been approached by a number of bankers about buying companies that are much larger than us. So if these bigger p
Eric Friedman
OCTOBER 8, 2008
Want to see 12 guys who took home over $1 Billion since 2003? The NYTimes has a great chart showing the breakdown of compensation. (Source: NYTimes ). I was linked to this article from my friend Fazal (he should be blogging!) that points out the detail of a compensation package in the hundreds of millions over just a few years. I point this out as the attention funnel is moving from many regular topics to the economy for most people.
SoCal CTO
OCTOBER 1, 2008
As a follow-up to my last post on Meetups SEO / SEM , I was just booted from the group and any of my comments about issues I had with the way the group was handled along with my negative vote about the event were deleted from the group. It makes me wonder if Meetup is actually encouraging this kind of thing.
Andrew Payne
OCTOBER 29, 2008
I frequently get asked: what should my investor presentation look like? There’s no unilateral answer, because every situation is different. In his recent blog post, “ A hierarchy of pitches “, Eric Ries points out each situation warrants a different presentation emphasis, and he neatly categorizes the different types. For example, a company that’s “printing money” needs to show the growth will continue, the market is big enough, and the numbers are real.
Startup Lessons Learned
OCTOBER 4, 2008
Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Saturday, October 4, 2008 About the author ( Update January, 2010: This post originally dates from October, 2008 back when I first started writing this blog. Ive updated the "official" conference bio below but otherwise the text remains unchanged from that original essay.) The most common feedback Ive heard from readers has been that I should provide details on my background.
Jason Ball
OCTOBER 30, 2008
I was lucky enough to unbox a G1 yesterday. Pretty neat phone, it doesn't outshine the iPhone in my opinion, but it's a great device. Definitely 100x better than any other phone out there (minus the iPhone). But what makes the G1 great is the apps that take full advantage of *everything* the handset has to offer. Wikitude (worst name ever for the coolest app I've seen to date).
BeyondVC
OCTOBER 15, 2008
I did an interview with Rich Maguire of Datamation last week which he just posted yesterday. While the markets seemed to get excited for a day about the bank bailout, attention is turning toward an even bigger problem for startups, a potential recession. The consumer no longer has that ATM called their house and confidence and spending to boot are down. So what's an entrepreneur to do these days and are there any pockets of opportunity?
Eric Friedman
OCTOBER 6, 2008
I recently participated in a feedback session with Joffrey’s coffee to come up with a new coffee specifically for bloggers. My suggestion to call the new blend “Coffee 2.0″ seemed to resonate and they have launched the new coffee. My career in naming products is clearly growing. Coffee 2.0 is the perfect fuel for blogging, coding and gaming and is a great gift for the Web lover in your life.
Pascal's View
OCTOBER 21, 2008
I just found an interesting blog, Customer Experience Matters , written by Bruce Temkin of Forrester Research. Temkin focuses in his business practice on customer experience, and his blog covers topics including management best practices. He recently identified Six New Management Imperatives , and he just posted a great piece on the importance of creating a strong and positive corporate culture. Having witnessed the destructive impact that dysfunctional corporate cultures ca
Andrew Payne
OCTOBER 2, 2008
Over creamed chipped beef this morning, I subjected my friend Antonio to my latest rants on challenges and opportunities in the software business. He helped me crisp up a major theme: being smart is no longer a barrier to entry. Software used to be really really hard: there weren’t a lot of developers (and few that were superstars), languages were primitive, tools were primitive (and expensive), the stack was expensive and buggy, and servers cost real money.
Startup Lessons Learned
OCTOBER 28, 2008
Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Tuesday, October 28, 2008 A hierarchy of pitches Every company will need to pitch itself from time to time. Usually we think of pitches in the context of raising money, but that is only one of many pitch situations. We pitch to potential partners, vendors, publishers, conferences, employees, and even lawyers. Its different from selling a product, because it is not part of our regular business practice, is not something that relates to our core competence, and tends n
Jason Ball
OCTOBER 21, 2008
Yes, it's another bike post on my blog. I'm turning into a regular gear-head. The WSJ has a feature on cycling in London- approximately 500,000 trips are made via bicycle every day in London.
BeyondVC
OCTOBER 9, 2008
The alarm bells are ringing in Silicon Valley and start-up land today with Sequoia Capital and Ron Conway telling companies to prepare for the economic meltdown and to raise cash by cutting their burn. This is not new news as being in New York we started to feel the real economic impact in mid-September as Lehman melted down and as Merrill Lynch was bailed out by Bank of America.
Eric Friedman
OCTOBER 7, 2008
Gmail came out with an interesting feature today called Mail Goggles which forces you to solve simple math problems before an email is sent out to delay sending email you would later regret. My favorite part about this feature is when it is actually active by default: …Mail Goggles is only active late night on the weekend as that is the time you’re most likely to need it.
Pascal's View
OCTOBER 18, 2008
How many venture-backed CEO's have reported that they have received multiple copies of the Sequoia PowerPoint , first from all of their VC directors, then their VC friends, and finally from random people who know they are working in a venture-backed company? Well, the 'don't-tell-anyone-it's-confidential-but here you-go' guerilla dissemination tactics have worked very well for the PR people at Sequoia. But is the 'be afraid' message that most people are highlig
Startup Lessons Learned
OCTOBER 21, 2008
Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Tuesday, October 21, 2008 Lean startups vs lean companies Venture Hacks has a great article today on lean startups. They quote extensively from two of our most important thinkers: Taiichi Ohno , creator of the Toyota Production System, and Kent Beck , creator of extreme programming. If youre not familiar with their work, and how it relates to startups, this is a great place to start.
Jason Ball
OCTOBER 7, 2008
Congratulations to the Spotify team- they’ve launched their public beta today allowing anyone to listen to music over the web, in what I think could be the next great music app. I’ve been lucky enough (thanks Daniel!) to be one of the beta testers over the past several months- today’s the first time I’ve seen (and heard) ads on Spotify- and they’ve come up with a great advertising supported music model that’s legal.
BeyondVC
OCTOBER 1, 2008
I received some incredible news last night from two portfolio company CEOs updating me on our Q3 numbers. They not only hit their respective forecasts set early in the year, but they beat them. Normally I expect our portfolio companies to hit their numbers, but I am ecstatic because we delivered in the midst of the largest financial crisis we have ever seen.
www.vcconfidential.com
OCTOBER 21, 2008
Pascal's View
OCTOBER 12, 2008
The Levensohn Go Solar project continues! According to our installation project manager from Solar City , Jeremy, PG&E will take another three to four weeks to turn the system on, but the panels are functional. I will be posting “BEFORE” and “AFTER” comparable electric bills once we are live. Solar City also has an information monitoring function that I look forward to understanding and blogging about once the system is fully operational.
Startup Lessons Learned
OCTOBER 30, 2008
Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Thursday, October 30, 2008 John Doerrs 10 lean startup tips I just saw video of John Doerrs talk yesterday at VentureBeat’s “How to manage your start-up in the downturn&# roundtable event. The tips are based on advice JD solicited from great KPCB entrepreneurs. I was impressed enough to transcribe (and paraphrase) the list.
aweissman.com
OCTOBER 12, 2008
skip to main | skip to sidebar. aweissman.com. Maximizing the serendipity around you. Oct 12, 2008. Wwoof (ebay for farming) and others. Latest things I am tracking: WWOOF - world wide opportunities on organic farms - ebay for farming - " WWOOF is an exchange - In return for volunteer help, WWOOF hosts offer food, accommodation and opportunities to learn about organic lifestyles.
Seeing Both Sides
OCTOBER 9, 2008
Every start-up board is having the same conversation these last few weeks: how will this economic crisis affect us and what should we do in our own business? We had our annual investor meeting this week and warned our investors that it was going to get ugly over the next year or two (surprisingly, they indicated that some of their other VC investors had sounded positively pollyanna during this annual season).
Cracking the Code
OCTOBER 10, 2008
Cracking The Code. Thoughts from a Venture Capitalist on Software, Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), Cloud Computing, Internet and more. Friday, October 10, 2008. The Bessemer 10 laws of SaaS - Fall 2008 Release. When we first published Bessemer’s Top 10 Laws for Being "SaaS-y" in early 2008 in conjunction with our annual invitation-only SaaS CEO Summit, we were overwhelmed with the positive response and feedback we received.
Pascal's View
OCTOBER 2, 2008
“ The things that will destroy America are prosperity at any price, peace at any price, safety first instead of duty first, and love of soft living and the get-rich-quick way of life.” Theodore Roosevelt, 1917. Would he say, “I told you so…?
Startup Lessons Learned
OCTOBER 7, 2008
Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Tuesday, October 7, 2008 The App Store after the gold rush I wrote earlier about the issue of distribution advantage on the iPhone. As the gold rush drives thousands of apps onto the platform, its getting harder and harder for new entrants to get oxygen. Take a look at The App Store after the gold rush - FierceDeveloper : According to a recent BusinessWeek feature , the flood of new games, productivity tools and related iPhone software is making it difficult for the
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