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Customer Development in Japan: a History Lesson

Steve Blank

The book has been shepherded and edited by a great Japanese VC at Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Venture Capital, Takashi Tsutsumi, with help from Masato Iino. I asked Tsutsumi-san to write a guest post for my blog to describe his experience with Customer Development in Japan. Evangelizing Customer Development in Japan.

Japan 305
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Customer Development is Not a Focus Group

Steve Blank

Customer Development is all about gathering a list of what features customers want by talking to them, surveying them, or running “focus groups.” Gathering feature requests from customers is not what marketing should be doing in a startup. And it’s certainly not Customer Development.

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This Week in Venture Capital – Episode 2

Both Sides of the Table

I was on This Week in Venture Capital (TWiVC) again this week with Jason Calacanis. My take was that this follows three trends: a) customer involvement in product design, b) mass customization [e.g. On the first point – think of Steven Blank’s customer development but for physical products.

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Moneyball and the Investment Readiness Level-video

Steve Blank

Startup Tools here Filed under: Customer Development , Lean LaunchPad , Teaching , Venture Capital. Customer Development Lean LaunchPad Teaching Venture Capital' You can follow the talk along using the slides below. If you can’t see the slides above, click here. Additional videos here.

Video 288
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Early-stage Regional Venture Funds–part 2 of 3 of Bigger in Bend

Steve Blank

This means that those winning deals have to make a ~30x return to provide the venture capital fund that 20% compound return (the 6x). Focus on capital efficient, scalable startups and founders. Filed under: Customer Development , Lean LaunchPad , Science and Industrial Policy , Venture Capital.

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When Hell Froze Over – in the Harvard Business Review

Steve Blank

There was nothing suggesting that startups and new ventures needed their own tools and techniques, different from those written about in HBR or taught in business schools. To fill this gap I wrote The Four Steps to the Epiphany , a book about the Customer Development process and how it changes the way startups are built.

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China’s Torch Program – the glow that can light the world (Part 2 of 5)

Steve Blank

Part 3, the next post describes the rise of Chinese venture capital. Torch has four major parts: Clusters, Business Incubators, Seed Funding, and Funds to support Venture Capital firms. Filed under: China , Customer Development , Technology , Venture Capital. Lessons Learned.