prodmgmt/startups
The founders of Pilot have started three times over, starting with Ksplice (sold to Oracle in 2011) and then Zulip (acquired by Dropbox in 2014).
Methodologies for understanding and measuring marketplace liquidity
This article was initially published on Lago's blog, an open-source billing API, and was ranked #1 on...
A curated and opinionated list of resources for Chief Technology Officers, with the emphasis on startups - kuchin/awesome-cto
Few things are more liberating or intoxicating than controlling your own fate.
Two months after the startup went bankrupt, administrators have summarized the $80M+ debt the company has accumulated, most of which will not be paid. The highest offer to buy Pollen’s business assets - but without its liabilities - currently stands at only $250K. Details.
Why does strategy tend to stall when the rubber hits the road? Nate Stewart, Chief Product Officer of Cockroach Labs, shares an essential guide for creating a resilient strategy that’s still standing next year.
Plus! Watercooler Shows; Smart Thermostats; Substitutes and Complements; Monetization; Apple Ads; Diff Jobs
We work with our NFX Guild on this mental model for greatness from day 1. Now, we are sharing it with the rest of the startup community.
The most significant bottleneck in the adoption of healthcare technology to date has been distribution. Over the last decade, generations of digital health companies have struggled to reach escape velocity—not because their products and services weren’t transformative, but because they failed to find an executable path for sustainable distribution and value capture. Some of that...
Though the industry is called venture capital, the goal of a VC isn’t to maximize every risk. Instead, we try to understand all the risks a business might face and weigh those risks with the reward - the exit. Here are the major risks that I typically review when a startup pitches. Market timing risk - Is now the right time for the business? It’s often hard to evaluate this risk, but nevertheless, it’s an important consideration.
Many startups scramble to create a "minimum viable product," or MVP, to get a version of their product to market quickly for testing. It’s a great way to cost-effectively test a website or app with real users. But be careful, if your MVP is too minimalist, it could torpedo your company's future.
Hubstaff founder Dave Nevogt shares how to test your startup idea by analyzing model, market and concept.
Building a two-sided market is probably the hardest thing you can build as an entrepreneur. It's so hard that a few weeks ago, I organized a Marketplace
Molly Graham helped forge a work culture at Facebook that's withstood huge amounts of growth. Today, she's something of a rapid scaling expert. Here's the key to doing it right, she says.
There are already very good lists of startup lessons written by really talented, experienced people (here and here). I’d like to add another one. I learned these lessons the hard way in the past four years. If you’re starting a company, I hope you have an easier path.
Goods versus Services: The next trillion dollar opportunity Marketplace startups have done incredibly well over the first few decades of the internet, reinventing the way we shop for goods, but less so for services. In this essay, we argue that a breakthrough is on its way: The first phase of the internet has been...
I’m a startup product growth guy with a social gaming background. I currently work as VP of Growth at Relcy, a mobile search engine. A few companies I’ve worked with on growth in the past (HIRED $702…
There's lots written about how you should build software, but few concrete examples of the messy reality as implemented by startups. Here's our process.
The “unreasonable effectiveness” of data for machine-learning applications has been widely debated over the years (see here, here and…
Apologies in advance: If you’re fluent in the language of accounting, please skip to the bonus Verizon iPhone feature at the end. What I’m about to describe will strike you as oversimplified and…
What happens on the other side of the acquisition doesn't get much startup press
I just spent a day working with Bob, the Chief Innovation Officer of a very smart large company I’ll call Acme Widgets. Bob summarized Acme’s impediments to innovation. “At our company we have a cu…
In the Creative Founder, students are paired semi-randomly, and then spend a semester trying to get to product-market fit. I always start them with market selection. A market has three key elements…
Dyson almost launched a robot vacuum. Back in 2001, after three years in development. Its first effort, shown to the British public in London looked nothing (and we mean nothing) like the eventual 360 Eye unveiled today. Sixteen years is a long time in tech. The DC06, as it was called, never made it past home-trial stages in 2012 -- apparently too pricey and heavy. Between then and now, technology got better. A lot better. At the Tokyo launch of its new robot vacuum, Sir James Dyson himself, told us how it all came together, and why it's not his native UK, but Japan, that'll get to buy it first.
Startup Metrics for Pirates - Download as a PDF or view online for free
Zapier has 3M+ users and generates $125M in ARR. At a $5B valuation, its fast-growing horizontal platform is unable to meet the demands of all of its customers. The increase of underserved Zapier customers presents an opportunity.
Before joining Wave four years ago, I spoke to a former employee about his experience. He said something that has stayed in my memory ever since: “Wave is really good at execution, so by working at Wave, you’ll learn how to execute very well.” Now that I’ve been here a while, I thought it would be good to write down what really good execution actually looks like in practice and the counterintuitive lessons I’ve learned along the way.
From Stripe to Notion, Cristina Cordova has worked on some of the biggest products in tech. She shares tactical tidbits on what she’s learned about about scaling companies and shaping your career.
How data businesses start, and how they keep going, and growing, and growing.
I used to be very anti-advertising. Fast forward two years and several pivots, and my slightly-less-early-stage business is doing $900 per month in revenue... from ads.
Every company makes decisions based on the highest paid person's opinion. It turns out it's just a hypothesis. Here's how to tame it.
How I Built This with Guy Raz · Episode
I first wrote this essay a few years ago. A founder mentioned it to me over the weekend, and so I decided to re-publish it here. One thing that's bothered me in the time since I wrote it is the way...
Check the requirements, book the viewing, let yourself in, and submit your application, all without emails or phone tag.
An open letter from a former Facebook and VMware engineering executive on how startups can best structure their release processes.
The marketplace revolution is still just beginning and the enterprise gateway is the newest type of marketplace.
One of social media's oldest companies is also its most undervalued.
The most popular products don’t become mass popular overnight. It’s a process. Usually they popularity is uneven, they are unknown in some niches, but very popular in another niches.
I learned from bosses & peers, including some famous peeps like Reed Hastings, Patty McCord, and Dan Rosensweig. But mainly I learned by doing, supercharged by feedback from many "Friends of Gib."
Apoorva Mehta’s grocery delivery app is now an essential—and booming—business. Now the 34-year-old billionaire has to show he can outfox Bezos, dodge an avalanche of new competitors and calm his rebellious workers and restless partners.
Some careers can be made on the back of a single, wonderful idea. We take a look at what that looks like, through Bill Gurley's VC career.
The pandemic has boosted interest in vending machine ownership. We surveyed 20+ operators to find out how much they make.
Even before the pandemic, it had started to unravel. What happens now that no one has a reason to dress up?
@mmcgrana: Patio11’s Law: The software economy is bigger than you think, even when you take into account Patio11’s Law.1 A few years ago, I woke up in Sunriver, OR, and went to make coffee. The house had one of those bed-and-breakfast-type coffee trays. Drip machine. A stack
It's been said that ideas don't matter, and that only execution does. I wholeheartedly disagree. You need both to succeed, but you can only get so good...
You probably think startups have nothing in common with a classical Chinese dance performance. You’re wrong.
Matt Meyers spent two decades at Weyerhaeuser dealing with product engineering, manufacturing, software engineering, product development, sales and
Canva are one of Australia's most successfull startups. In this case study we analyse how they use digital channels to attract and acquire new users
Most of the times, startup don't work. At some point it may make sense to either (1) give up on your original product and to sell the company, (2) shut down what you are doing and return money to investors, or (3) to pivot. You can read more on making the decision to give up in a future article. This post focuses on pivoting for small, early stage companies (e.g. 10 or fewer people).
I joked the other day that some of the best fairytales are written in Excel. While there isn’t a single magic number or set formula, understanding industry benchmarks can be really helpful to…
An MIT Sloan Ph.D. candidate discovered what turned skilled hobbyists into entrepreneurs.
The “traditional” user onboarding flows and walkthroughs are dead. Learn about the next era of user onboarding and how to adapt to the changes in your org.
This was first published on my mailing list The Looking Glass. Every week, I answer a reader’s question.
“We believe true equality is when spending more can’t buy you a better education.” – Duolingo founders When the language learning software company Rosetta Stone went public in 2009, they… Keep reading
Robert R. Taylor is a name you’ve probably never heard before. But this serial entrepreneur made his mark on the world of business by coming up with several products you are almost certainly very familiar with. Today we’re going to talk about, on the surface, the most boring of those- liquid hand soap. Something you can thank Mr. Taylor and [...]
Your phone increasingly knows what you’re taking a picture of. And which apps you have installed. So…
Create strong culture, stay laser-focused on problems, and set wildly ambitious goals
There is a story arc of the electric scooter market that took the world by storm in 2018, was second-guessed late in the year and has…
A discussion of the 9 core operating principles that world class companies tend to embrace, by NFX Managing Partner James Currier.
Recently, a founder asked to chat with me about SEO. During our call, the founder - whose startup is backed by a top-tier VC - said to me “I assume that you acquired your first users through paid marketing.” Really? Is this an assumption nowadays? Since we’ve raised money
PopSockets opted not to be a direct vendor to Amazon. Instead, it chose one major reseller to represent it on the marketplace. But, Amazon would not allow it. So, PopSockets walked away.
All things being equal, speed will determine whether your company succeeds or not. Here's how to make it core to your culture.
Accounting, bookkeeping, and tax tips to help you understand your small business finances.