How to think like a

startup
Loic Le Meur
How do startup
entrepreneurs
find ideas?
In the beginners mind there are
many possibilities, but in the
experts mind there are few

- Shunryu Suzuki
Meditation and mindfulness is popular
in Silicon Valley and now in Davos
Provide benefit to the customer - anything else
is a waste

Learning to see waste and then systematically

eliminate it
I am still learning.

- Michelangelo, at age 87
Airbnb started because of a shortage of hotel rooms in San Francisco
Uber started because of a shortage of cabs in Paris
Ryan Hoover,
Product Hunt
Started just from an email list

Gathered a small community

of people addicted to new
products
Naval Ravikant,
Angel List
Weekly email of curated angel
investors
Craig Newmark,
Craigslist
Request and Gives from
Craigs friends
Jamie Siminoff,
Ring
Tried 3 different ideas in his
garage

Struggled to find initial funding

Now approaching 1,000

employees
The Ring founding story
Create an environment for creativity - Further future
Create an environment for creativity
Create an environment for creativity
Create an environment for creativity
Create an environment for creativity
Millennials
dont want to
own anything
and care about
improving the
world
Improve the world

I just wanted
more electric
cars on the
road
- Elon Musk
Make the world better

All business
should make
the world
better
- Leila Janah
LXMI
They dont care about copying
...and making it better
Instagram
stories and
Snapchat
stories
Snap's Spectacles are the beginning of
camera-first future
SV entrepreneurs surround themselves
with investors who provide more than
$
 Teams are remote, own the business
and dont feel like employees
Mix of highly experimented professionals and very creative millennials

Matthew Dami Kevin Jean-Jacques

Mansfield Dina Wolf Borie

Were too slow and too old in this company

SV
entrepreneurs
launch their
product really
fast
"If you're not
embarrassed
by the first
version of your
product, youve
launched too
late"
- Reid Hoffman
Entrepreneurs iterate quickly
Entrepreneurs
break the rules
Travis Kalanick and Uber got
sued non stop but kept
going

Uber and Airbnb were illegal

from day one in many
places but kept operating
Entrepreneurs make everything
transparent
Even your own company is rated
Entrepreneurs acknowledge issues and respond quickly
Elon Musk turns a tweet into a company wide change in 6 days
Elon Musk turns a tweet into a company wide change in 6 days
#1
Advantage of
a start up...
Speed
Were going in
full throttle.
That ought to
keep those
fighters off our
back.
- Luke Skywalker
Speed is the #1 competitive weapon

Rapid product beats competition

Rapid results builds team morale which leads to more success

Rapid results generate more interest

Rapid results increases valuation

(NFX Guild)
Always keep
momentum.
The competitor to
be feared is one
who never bothers
about you at all,
but goes on
making his own
business better all
the time.
- Henry Ford
Set the time, not the output

What product can I build in:

3 months? (Directhit, Xfire)

8 days? (Hot or Not)

30 days? (Jiff)

1 month? (Meerkat)

(NFX
Guild)
Twitters MVP
Linkedins MVP
Facebooks MVP
Googles MVP
How startups win

No QA No Board of Directors

No Usability Studies No Bus Dev Deals

No Focus Groups No PR

No Politics No Marketing Spend

No Endless Debates No Budgeting Process

(NFX Guild)
At Google X,
we embrace
failure.
- Astro Teller
Most Startups Fail
Entrepreneurs fail fast
And pivot
Startups ranked by number of years from founding to $1 billion valuation
Flickr should have built Instagram but
they did not move fast enough
Entrepreneurs work with an ecosystem
of developers
Twitter decided developers werent so
important anymore
Entrepreneurs
Embrace
wikipedia style
volunteer
collaboration

Slush and their 2,200 volunteers

Entrepreneurs
challenge the
current players
by re-inventing
the model
Metromile charges insurance
protection per mile
Entrepreneurs
constantly
reinvent their
business
Uber selling data

Tesla next?
Thanks!
Loic Le Meur

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