Steve Blank

MARCH 5, 2012

One of the confusing things to entrepreneurs, investors and educators is the relationship between customer development and business model design and business planning and execution. When does a new venture focus on customer development and business models ? Search Versus Execution.

Search 326

Search Business Model Customer Development Agile 326

Steve Blank

MAY 23, 2016

In every startup I did, every new course I created, and everything I’ve taught, the phrase “make every day count” took on new meaning when I knew how many were left. When I retired after 21 years working in 8 startups, I was invited to be a guest lecturer at the business school at the University of California Berkeley.

Lean 224

Lean Technical Review Vietnam Engineer 224

Steve Blank

JUNE 18, 2013

Ten years ago I started thinking about why startups are different from existing companies. I wondered if business plans and 5-year forecasts were the right way to plan a startup. So what would a search process for a business model look like? In 2004 I funded IMVU, a startup by Will Harvey and Eric Ries.

Lean 295

Lean Agile Customer Development Business Model 295

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 30, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Tuesday, September 30, 2008 What does a startup CTO actually do? When Ive asked mentors of mine who have worked in big companies about the role of the CTO, they usually talk about the importance of being the external face of the companys technology platform; an evangelist to developers, customers, and employees.

CTO 168

CTO Fractional CTO CTO Hire Technical Review 168

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 3, 2012

I offered what I just learned from spending a day at the ranch with the R&D group of a $100 billion corporation along with the insights my Startup Owners Manual co-author Bob Dorf who has several Fortune 100 clients. Enter the Business Model Canvas. Operating divisions execute the known business model.

Business Model 334

Business Model Customer Development United States Operations 334

Steve Blank

MAY 14, 2012

magazine is publishing a 12-part series of excerpts from The Startup Owner’s Manual , the new step-by-step “how to” guide for startups. The excerpts, which appeared first at Inc.com , highlight the Customer Development process, best practices, tips and instructions contained in our book.

Balance Sheet 335

Balance Sheet Business Model Customer Development Metrics 335

Steve Blank

JUNE 18, 2013

Ten years ago I started thinking about why startups are different from existing companies. I wondered if business plans and 5-year forecasts were the right way to plan a startup. So what would a search process for a business model look like? In 2004 I funded IMVU, a startup by Will Harvey and Eric Ries.

Lean 187

Lean Agile Customer Development Business Model 187

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 5, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Friday, June 5, 2009 It’s a startup, not a spreadsheet Some people, when they start to realize the power of using data to inform their decisions, become obsessed with optimization. Unfortunately, most decisions that confront startups lack a definitive right answer. But this is wrong, too.

San Francisco 102

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Startup 102

Steve Blank

DECEMBER 7, 2010

I’ve introduced a new class at Stanford to teach engineers, scientists and other professionals how startups really get built. Business schools teach aspiring executives a variety of courses around the execution of known business models, (accounting, organizational behavior, managerial skills, marketing, operations, etc.).

Wiki 318

Wiki Lean Management Business Model 318

Up and Running

NOVEMBER 10, 2015

” As the managing editor of Bplans, I’ve had the good fortune to learn about business via the content we share; through interviews with LivePlan customers and other business owners; and thanks to brilliant, informal coaching from people like Tim Berry, Noah Parsons, and the rest of the executive leadership team at Palo Alto Software.

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Curation Lean Software Review Finder 60

Steve Blank

JULY 28, 2011

This approach would shape Silicon Valley’s entrepreneurial ethos: In startups, failure was treated as experience (until you ran out of money). The combination of Venture Capital and technology entrepreneurship is one of the great business inventions of the last 50 years. And it will lead to more startups and job creation.

Engineer 287

Engineer Silicon Valley United States Intellectual Property 287

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 7, 2013

Last May, I shared the news that long-time Lean Startup advocates Brant Cooper and Patrick Vlaskovits were working on a new book called The Lean Entrepreneur featuring illustrations by FAKEGRIMLOCK. LitMotors approach to using Lean Startup to create a new vehicle category. Startup blogging was hardly "cool" back then.

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Lean Entrepreneur Agile San Francisco 167

Up and Running

DECEMBER 6, 2012

Lean Planning is a set of tools for discovering a business model that works, building an action plan to test your assumptions, creating financial models and a plan for a viable business, and tracking your performance so you can adjust your plan on the fly, quickly and easily. Do startups have a manual?

Lean 147

Lean Silicon Valley Forecast Technical Review 147

Up and Running

MAY 23, 2016

To give you a better idea of what entrepreneurs in this industry are thinking about during each phase of the startup process, I interviewed SaaS entrepreneurs from all over the world, including our own COO Noah Parsons. The one-page pitch format is also more suitable for SaaS businesses that are constantly testing new ideas.

Software Review 74

Software Review Software Delaware Forecast 74

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 1, 2010

billion Iridium was one of the largest, boldest and audacious startup bets ever made. It crashed back down to earth as one of the largest startup failures on record. They made other assumptions about the type of sales channel, partnerships and revenue model they would need. The result was a classic startup failure writ large.

Business Plan 335

Business Plan Customer Business Model Customer Development 335

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 9, 2009

In the summer of 1999, I started working on a startup from my college dorm. And the great ideas that became todays successful tech startups dwarf anything that had been done to that point. Nonetheless, my first startup was a tool for college students from elite colleges to create resumes and help them find jobs. And Google?

San Francisco 94

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 94

Steve Blank

MAY 7, 2009

Almost every university, region and car wash now has a business plan competition; the rules, who can participate, how large the prizes and who are the judges vary by school. Over scrambled eggs and diet coke, I listened to this seasoned startup veteran describe the excitement of his students who came to the U.S. to compete.

Business Plan 160

Business Plan Silicon Valley RSS Venture Capital 160

Steve Blank

JANUARY 21, 2010

The startup founder who gets fired just as his/her company is growing into large company could be a cliché – if it wasn’t so true – and painful. Scalable Startups at Adolescence. In our previous post we posited that Scalable Startups are designed to become large companies. Let’s take a look at why.

Agile 120

Agile Development Team Review Leadership Merger 120

Up and Running

DECEMBER 5, 2016

Determine your target market: You need to know and understand your customers. Develop a forecast: Basic forecasts and budgets are critical; tracking them is even more so. The idea here was that business plan should no longer be just a single event. Can the Business Model Canvas replace the business plan?

Lean 60

Lean Silicon Valley Business Model Forecast 60

Up and Running

JULY 14, 2015

Peter and Jonathan discuss startup incubators, and our guest Caroline talks to us about the “F” word and 10 reasons why startups fail. Startup Incubators – (2:13). Read also: Q&A with Business Incubator Co-founder Joe Maruschak. Learn more about Techstars , a startup accelerator program.

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Incubator Email Startup Oregon 60

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 6, 2012

Ten years ago I started thinking about why startups are different from existing companies. I wondered if business plans and 5-year forecasts were the right way to plan a startup. Experienced entrepreneurs kept finding that no business plan survived first contact with customers. Sign up here.

Lean 324

Lean Georgia Michigan Business Model 324