Lean Startup
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This article relies on references to primary sources or sources affiliated with the subject, rather than references from independent authors and third-party publications. Please add citations from reliable sources. (June 2011) |
"Lean startup" is a term coined by Eric Ries. His method advocates the creation of rapid prototypes designed to test market assumptions, and uses customer feedback to evolve them much faster than via more traditional product development practices, such as the Waterfall model. It is not uncommon to see Lean Startups release new code to production multiple times a day,[1] often using a practice known as Continuous Deployment.[2]
According to the New York Times, "The term 'lean start-up' was coined by Mr. Ries, 31, an engineer, entrepreneur and blogger. His inspiration, he says, was the lean manufacturing process, fine-tuned in Japanese factories decades ago and focused on eliminating any work or investment that doesn’t produce value for customers." [3]
Lean startup is sometimes described as Lean Thinking applied to the entrepreneurial process.[4] A central tenet of Lean Thinking is to reduce waste. Lean startup processes reduce waste by increasing the frequency of contact with real customers, therefore testing and avoiding incorrect market assumptions as early as possible.[5] This approach attempts to improve on historical entrepreneurial tactics by reducing the work required to assess assumptions about the market, and to decrease the time it takes a business to find market traction. This is referred to as Minimum Viable Product.
In The Entrepreneur's Guide to Customer Development, Brant Cooper and Patrick Vlaskovits add a fourth element, and that is the use of powerful, low-cost and easy-to-use analytics. While some characteristics of lean startups have been practiced for years, the confluence of these trends is a recent[when?] phenomenon that increases the speed of iteration or "number of learning cycles per dollar", as a business homes in on a product-market fit.[6]
[edit] References
- ^ "The Promise of the Lean Startup". http://gigaom.com/2009/08/11/the-promise-of-the-lean-startup/. Retrieved 2009-08-11.
- ^ "Continuous Deployment at IMVU: Doing the impossible fifty times a day". http://timothyfitz.wordpress.com/2009/02/10/continuous-deployment-at-imvu-doing-the-impossible-fifty-times-a-day/. Retrieved 2009-02-10.
- ^ Lohr, Steve (2010-04-24). "Lean Start-Ups Aim to Find Customers Quickly". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/25/business/25unboxed.html. Retrieved 2011-06-10.
- ^ "What is Lean about the Lean Startup?". http://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2009/12/what-is-lean-about-lean-startup.html. Retrieved 2009-12-16.
- ^ "Achieving Flow in a Lean Startup". http://www.ashmaurya.com/2009/12/achieving-flow-in-a-lean-startup/. Retrieved 2009-12-08.
- ^ The Entrepreneur's Guide to Customer Development. http://books.google.com/books?id=NxHfuayI8-IC&printsec=frontcover&dq=The+Entrepreneur's+Guide+to+Customer+Development. Retrieved 2010-04-02.
[edit] External links
- The Lean Startup Wiki
- TechCrunch TCTV coverage of The Lean Startup
- Interview w/ Eric Ries of Startup Lessons Learned on The Web 2.0 Show. Eric talks about the "Lean Startup" methodology and entrepreneurship
- The Lean Startup - First Blog Post Eric Ries introduces the term "Lean Startup" in this post on his blog, Startup Lessons Learned.
- Philosophy Helps Start-Ups Move Faster coverage in the Wall Street Journal.
- BusinessWeek - Embrace the Lean Startup Model
