Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 7, 2009

This post describes how following the traditional product development can lead to a “startup death spiral.&# In the next posts that follow, I’ll describe how this model’s failures led to the Customer Development Model – offering a new way to approach startup sales and marketing activities.

Customer Development 232

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 232

VC Cafe

MAY 21, 2024

Although GenAI is a revolutionary technology, incumbents in the infrastructure domain are aggressively investing. Their scale and resources enable them to innovate rapidly, making it challenging for startups to compete directly in this space. Additionally, startups in this space face significant platform risk.

Generative AI 97

Generative AI ChatGPT Vertical B2B 97

Steve Blank

APRIL 10, 2009

And he recognized it was making his startup feel and act like a big ponderous company. Most decisions in a startup must be made in the face of uncertainty. One of the things he mentioned was that when it came to decision-making he still tended to think and act like an engineer. The same is true in your company.

Silicon Valley 307

Silicon Valley RSS Startup Agile 307

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 7, 2009

Posted on December 7, 2009 by steveblank In my 21 years of startups, I had my ideas “stolen” twice. In a startup success isn’t about just execution, it’s how well we could take our original hypothesis and learn, discover , iterate and execute. See part one for the first time it happened. This time it was serious.

Silicon Valley 253

Silicon Valley Non-disclosure Agreement NDA Startup 253

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 16, 2009

However the Customer Development Model and the Lean Startup work equally well for startups on the web. I realized the Customer Development model needs to be clearer in what exactly a startup is supposed to do, regardless of the business model.

Customer Development 228

Customer Development Web Developer Customer 228

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 19, 2009

Other advisors provided marketing with industry-specific advice in our initial vertical markets (computational fluid dynamics, computational chemistry, finite element analysis, and petroleum engineering). Some of these advisors from the academic community would work with our of VP of Engineering and help us solve specific technical problems.

Engineer 221

Engineer Silicon Valley Part-Time VPE Advisory Board 221

VC Cafe

JANUARY 17, 2024

Both startups and large tech companies leaned in hard, incorporating automation tools and generative AI applications across verticals. Meta’s Make-A-Video builds on the recent progress made in text-to-image generation technology built to enable text-to-video generation. Visual generative AI made strides as well.

Generative AI 139

Generative AI Video Intellectual Property Artificial Inteligence 139

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. So what does an early-stage company do to avoid the doom and gloom plaguing the world of startups?

Early Stage 135

Early Stage Los Angeles Silicon Valley Cofounder 135

Steve Blank

AUGUST 31, 2009

After 20 years of working in startups, I decided to take a step back and look at the product development model I had been following and see why it usually failed to provide useful guidance in activities outside the building – sales, marketing and business development.

Customer Development 244

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 244

Steve Blank

JUNE 3, 2009

Reducing Risk – Simulation versus Customer Development If you remember the first part of this discussion, startups face two types of risk; invention risk and/or customer/market risk. In either type of startup you want to put in place processes in place to reduce risk.

Vertical 137

Vertical Silicon Valley Marketing RSS 137

Steve Blank

AUGUST 13, 2009

It took me 8 startups and 21 years to get it right, (and one can argue success was due to the Internet bubble rather then any brilliance.) No internet, no blogs, no books on startups, no entrepreneurship departments in universities, etc. It took lots of trial and error, learning by experience and resilience through multiple failures.

Silicon Valley 204

Silicon Valley RSS Technical Review Lean 204

Steve Blank

MARCH 19, 2009

Filed under: SuperMac | Tagged: Early Stage Startup , Steve Blank « There’s a Pattern Here SuperMac War Story 2: Facts Exist Outside the Building, Opinions Reside Within – So Get the Hell Outside the Building » Leave a Reply Click here to cancel reply. Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice.

Silicon Valley 165

Silicon Valley Software Review Technical Review RSS 165

YoungUpstarts

OCTOBER 19, 2017

The lean start-up movement has been based on a single insight – which the purpose of a start-up is to discover a business model that works. In this article we explore the unique challenges of a lean start-up and how Outsourced Product Development (OPD) can be used to overcome them. The Lean Start-Up Environment.

Product Development 153

Product Development Lean Developer Product 153

VC Cafe

SEPTEMBER 8, 2023

Consider what followed since November: New foundational models, more efficient ways of training models etc An explosion of open source models, the rise of HuggingFace Breakthrough research across voice, video, text, multi modality, etc Billions of dollars invested in thousands of startups at the application layer of generative AI.

Generative AI 78

Generative AI ChatGPT Artificial Inteligence Cofounder 78

Steve Blank

JUNE 11, 2009

Posted on June 11, 2009 by steveblank When my students ask me about whether they should be a founder or cofounder of a startup I ask them to take a walk around the block and ask themselves: Are you comfortable with: Chaos – startups are disorganized Uncertainty – startups never go per plan Are you: Resilient – at times you will fail – badly.

Cofounder 229

Cofounder Founder Silicon Valley Technical Cofounder 229

Steve Blank

JULY 7, 2009

Steve Blanks 30 years of Silicon Valley startup advice. luck… and as one of Steve Blank’s posts today mentioned, you can’t test hypotheses from within your building. Now In Print!

Customer Development 128

Customer Development Developer Silicon Valley Customer 128

Mucker Lab

OCTOBER 12, 2016

Just six months ago, VCs were publishing white papers extolling the virtue of non-bank lending startups, but now no one will touch them with a 10-foot pole. Vertical integration of different funding risks. Whatever happened to IoT after Nest? We make investments in years 1–3, we hope to make money back in years 7–10.

Harvest 60

Harvest Vertical IPO Early Stage 60

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. For example, How does sales differ from one market to another?

Vertical 125

Vertical Silicon Valley RSS Marketing 125

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. Lets see why.

Lean 260

Lean Silicon Valley Startup RSS 260

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 5, 2009

I had last been in Chapel Hill on a winter’s day in 1986, traveling with the VP of Sales of our new supercomputer startup, Ardent. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times Ardent would be my third technology company as a VP of Marketing (Convergent Technologies and MIPS Computers were the other two.)

North Carolina 131

North Carolina Silicon Valley Fractional VPE Part-Time VPE 131

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 14, 2009

Posted on September 14, 2009 by steveblank Over the last 30 years Wall Street’s appetite for technology stocks have changed radically – swinging between unbridled enthusiasm to believing they’re all toxic. Each VC firm/partner has a different spin on what to weigh more.) 3) invest in and take equity stakes in exchange for capital.

Silicon Valley 235

Silicon Valley IPO Technical Review Venture Capital 235

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 26, 2009

So no post today on entrepreneurship, Secret History of Silicon Valley, Customer Development, Lean Startups, etc. This post was mentioned on Twitter by Brendan McManus, [Startup Digest]. Startup Digest] said: Thanksgiving Day [link] [via @sgblank] [.] Just a reflection on my family and hopes for our children.

Silicon Valley 152

Silicon Valley Turkey United States RSS 152

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 24, 2009

In other words, they are facing conditions of extreme uncertainty, just like startups. The other revels in the world as we all know it will be someday: limitless distribution enabled by new technologies, the importance of collaborative filters, and on-demand availability of all content for end-users.

San Francisco 113

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Distribution 113

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 23, 2009

I was between my 7th and 8th and final startup; licking my wounds from Rocket Science, the company I had cratered as my first and last attempt as a startup CEO. I was consulting for the two venture capital firms who between them put $12 million into my last failed startup. (My It was a long way from Ellis Island.)

Silicon Valley 131

Silicon Valley RSS Venture Capital Customer Development 131

Austin Startup

OCTOBER 22, 2017

You’ve decided to undertake a startup, now how exactly are you going to go about that? Allow me to emphasize that native talent and temperament have a lot to do with how you determine your goal, whether it’s golf or creating a startup. They learn how to talk with potential customers and de-risk their plans from the start.

Technical Review 48

Technical Review Incubator Software Review Vertical 48

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 24, 2009

This tendency is a two edged sword: by iterating strategy a startup can dramatically improve the size and trajectory of the company, but at times this process can be the bane of venture investors (and why they have prematurely grey hair.)

Customer 216

Customer Silicon Valley RSS California 216

Steve Blank

JULY 30, 2009

That is until I saw that in startup after startup customers come from places you don’t plan on. He’s Only in Field Service When I was at Zilog, the Z8000 peripheral chips included the new “ Serial Communications Controller &# ( SCC ).

Silicon Valley 143

Silicon Valley RSS California Customer Development 143

Where to Play

MARCH 14, 2018

The post Success story: how startup Augury determined its market opportunities appeared first on Where to Play. The tale of an Industrial IoT startup discovering a new strategic business tool. Augury is bringing predictive maintenance technology to new markets. At times, it seemed like the possibilities were endless.

Artificial Inteligence 91

Artificial Inteligence Marketing Vertical Startup 91

VC Cafe

DECEMBER 1, 2022

Like any new and emerging technology, the Metaverse has faced its share of challenges and criticisms. Layoffs, technology difficulties and expensive hardware didn’t massively help build a positive story. Like any new and emerging technology, the Metaverse has faced its share of challenges and criticisms.

Generative AI 88

Generative AI Vertical Early Stage PR 88

Steve Blank

APRIL 2, 2009

We had thought really hard about “ market type ” and decided to reposition the company from a technology provider to a solutions provider. Well yes, I understand that, but this is a startup, what else do you want to do? “I Now we needed to put the tactical programs in place to make this repositioning strategy happen.

Silicon Valley 127

Silicon Valley Technical Review RSS Software Review 127

Steve Blank

MAY 11, 2009

I didn’t recognize the behavior at the time, but anyone who loves technology and gadgets has at one time or another has bought a technology toy – USB memory sticks, iPod Shuffles, umbrellas with LED lights, alarm clocks that talked, Flip Video Cameras, etc. We accidently had a product with the Novelty Effect.

Video 184

Video Silicon Valley RSS California 184

cdixon.org

SEPTEMBER 17, 2011

Why you shouldn’t keep your startup idea secret. I have a personal diligence rule that when speaking to people at large companies, the facts that they tell you are very useful but their opinions about startup ideas no more valuable than any other smart person’s opinions). Peter Coles. Jon Russell. Jonah Peretti. Lauren Leto.

Stealth 68

Stealth Startup NDA Cofounder 68

Steve Blank

APRIL 9, 2009

If these sound like reasonable answers to you, and you are in a startup/small company, update your resume. Most startups put together a corporate mission statement because the CEO remembered seeing one at their last job, or the investors said they needed one. What I was actually hearing was a failure of management.

Silicon Valley 269

Silicon Valley Technical Review RSS PR 269

Steve Blank

MARCH 20, 2009

Facts are the rock on which you build your strategy and tactics In a startup second-hand facts are almost as useless as opinions. It reminded me of “earlier days&# , when I was just starting out in running business operations for startups. Now what was the strategy? What did I learn so far?

Silicon Valley 147

Silicon Valley Customer RSS Philippines 147

Steve Blank

MARCH 25, 2009

We had been attempting to compete by their rules with the same types of technology messages. Up until now all the graphics board companies supplied “technology”, and it was up to the customers to figure out which of these arcane specs was best for their business.

Silicon Valley 157

Silicon Valley Marketing RSS California 157

Steve Blank

MAY 22, 2009

Everyone should have a chance to walk the floor looking for deals, technology, distribution, customers, etc. Partnership Opportunities At any show you are attending there has to be tons of opportunity for business to business relationships you hadn’t thought about. These two posts were amazing.

Silicon Valley 136

Silicon Valley RSS California Customer Development 136

Steve Blank

APRIL 6, 2009

And in the tradition of great startups, on the way out Perry took 6 of his best managers with him. In building ESL Perry made a conscious choice to emulate Hewlett Packard (then considered the “gold standard” of a great technology company.)

Silicon Valley 194

Silicon Valley Stealth RSS California 194