1. Lean Startup: Lessons from the field of 300 Innovation-Corps
(Lean LaunchPad)
Teams
Errol Arkilic
M34 Capital
Founding and Former Lead I-Corps Program Director

2. How to make your startup not suck
I don’t know…
How to make your startup not suck
Errol Arkilic
M34 Capital
Founding and Former Lead I-Corps Program Director

3. I don’t know how to make your startup not suck
Errol Arkilic
M34 Capital
Founding and Former Lead I-Corps Program Director

4. How to make your startup not suck
Lean LaunchPad:
How to make your startup not suck
Errol Arkilic
M34 Capital
Founding and Former Lead I-Corps Program Director

5. This talk borrows heavily from:

6. Technology Innovation Spectrum
II-R----
------II-B
Supplements
NSF
STTR
SBIR
GOALI
I/UCRC
PFI
ERC
Resources Available ($)
Discovery
Development
Commercialization
Level of Development
From
Angus Kingon
Industry
I-Corps
ENG
NSF
Investors
Academia
Valley of Death
Unbridgable
Gulf of Death
Small Business

7. Innovation*
The design, invention, development and/or implementation of new or altered products, services, processes, systems, organizational structures, or business models for the purpose of creating new value for customers and financial returns for the firm
*Innovation Measurement
A Report to the Secretary of Commerce
January 2008

8. Why most products/companies fail
YOU’RE BUILDING SOMETHING NOBODY CARES ABOUT

9. Why most products/companies fail
YOU’RE BUILDING SOMETHING ABOUT WHICH NOBODY CARES

10. What can you do? Admit there are unknowns
Develop hypothesis to probe unknowns
Use appropriate metrics to validate
Close the hypothesis-testing loop
Rinse-and-repeat

11. Startups Fail because they Confuse Search with Execution -Steve Blank

12. Where are You in the Life Cycle
Execution
Search

13. Execution: Repeatable Internal Processes Knowns: Management:
Customers, Features, Channels, Pricing
Management:
Formal / The Suits
Characterized by “Only the Paranoid Survive”
Customer Creation + Company Building
Goals are set quarterly

14. Search: What Process? Knowns: Management:
Runway
Management:
No management, but founders with leadership/vision
Characterized by “Stark Raving Terror”
Collecting and analyzing: Search and Pivot
Customer Discovery + Customer Validation
Goal: To get to a sustainable business model

15. What happens when you confuse Execution with Search
YOU BUILD SOMETHING NOBODY CARES ABOUT

16. Data-Centric Approach Applying the Scientific Method
Hypothesis:
Here’s What We Thought
Experiments:
Here’s What We Did
Results & Insights:
Here’s What We Learned
Action:
Here’s What We Are Going to Do Next

17. Business Model Canvas ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
----- Meeting Notes (10/31/13 14:01) -----
Identifying partners and buyers -- what's the taxonomy of all I-Corps teams to date by industry/technology/sector -- what's the clustering look like for the most populous w/greatest potential ...
e.g., avoid CONSUMER WEB (very efficient eco-system with no competitive advantage for M34)
More than 3 and less that 8 categories -- mine the verticals deeply and run the table (materials?)
HOW DO NSF GRANTS CLUSTER ?? how does that align with I-Corps
impact investments and transactions ...
Atrium Capital inside out (not from Corporates to tech, but from Tech to Corporates) ... (talk with Russell?)
"facilitated tech transfer from Academia to Corporates ... "
We support certain kinds of things because someone at P&G has said green daipers matter, and they are high-tech from a materials point of view, and here's why (...)
building the network of buyers and funders is the key thing to realize liquidity for M34 investments ... get ahead of that curve early ...
ESPECIALLY IN EUROPE (like SAP and other international tech partners) ? ?

18. Technology Innovation Spectrum
Resources Available ($)
Discovery
Development
Commercialization
Level of Development
From
Angus Kingon
Industry
Investors
Academia
Valley of Death
Small Business

19. Building the Nation’s I-Corps “Fabric” -
How I-Corps evolved?
I-Corps Nodes #2
I-Corps Sites
October 2012
I-Corps Nodes
I-Corps Mentors #3
January 2013
I-Corps Sites
I-Corps Teams
This network model was developed by a very small band of instigators at NSF and it was my privalige to be able to lead the team from its inception until the July of 2013. #1
July 2011
I-Corps Teams

20. Credit: © 2011 JupiterImages Corp.
I-Corps Team
Entrepreneurial Lead
Post-doc or Student to move it forward
I-Corps Mentor
Volunteer
Domain-relevant volunteer guide
Proximity is better PI
Researcher with current or previous award
Credit: © 2011 JupiterImages Corp.

21. I-Corps Infrastructure
Nodes:
Ga Tech
U. Michigan
Bay Area: Berkeley, Stanford, UCSF
DMV: UMD, Va Tech, GWU
NYCRIN: CUNY, Columbia, NYU
Sites:
U Akron
UCSD
UIUC

22. NSF I-Corps Flow Diagram
Pool of eligible PIs & projects: ~50,000 projects (NSF)
“Go” Decision
(Teams)
Strategic Partnership
Customer Discovery
(Teams/Nodes)
Recruiting processes
(NSF)
Private Capitalization
Team
Selection
(NSF)
Node Assignment
(NSF)
Pool of
eligible
Teams
(NSF)
Public Funding
(e.g., SBIR, STIR, …. )
Curriculum Delivery & Refinement
(Nodes)
Business Model Canvasses
(Teams)
Awarded I-Corps Teams
(NSF)
“No-Go” Decision
(Teams)
Pool of
eligible
Teams
(I-Corps Sites)
Resource Infusion
Private Sector

23. I-Corps Curriculum Based on hypothesis-driven business-model discovery
Pioneered by Stanford and Steve Blank
Focuses on addressing market risk
Requires getting out of the lab
AT LEAST 15 hours of prep per week
Mandatory for all I-Corps participants
First 3 Days (at one of the five nodes)
5 follow-on webinars with team presentations
2 Days (lessoned learned )

24. Lean Approach to Product/Company Building
New way of looking at Startups and Product Launch
It is trendy now, but there is real analysis behind the hype
Don’t let cynicism blind you to the value
I’ve scratched the surface
Study the tool set
Become a student

25. When NOT to use a Lean Launch
When it doesn’t matter if your product/company fails
When your Technology Risk REALLY is the biggest risk element
When doing so causes you to miss the wave (bubble)

26. Five Takeaways Recognize the Valley of Death
Embrace the Scientific Method to probe unkowns
Don’t Confuse Search with Execution
Use the Business Model Canvas
This isn’t going away

27. Thank You Questions?