Building Tech Products & Scaling Startups: Launchbase

When it comes to scaling a business from the ground up, you want to build a category-defining company that owns the entire space and adds value for your users. This week, John dives in with Dr Charles Armitage, Co-Founder and CEO of Florence, an online marketplace that connects independent nurses and carers for freelance shifts.

Re-inventing your startup at every opportunity is key whilst scaling to pivot your business with your user’s changing needs. We discuss building products that are user-centric and defining your product-market fit on the roadblocks that may appear along the way and learn from the mistakes because that is what an MVP is for.

Passion, Resilience, Coachable, Curiosity.

These are the qualities that seed/pre-seed investment firms like TIA Ventures look for in entrepreneurs and bringing 'Thought Into Action'. This week, John grabs a virtual coffee with Wills Hapworth, Managing General Partner at TIA Ventures, a seed-stage venture capital fund that partners with companies building emotional and visceral connections with their consumers.

We discuss identifying your “North Star” as an entrepreneur and recognising your visceral product-market fit. We touch base on questions like: “Are MVP’s still relevant?”, "How do you get your product to market?”, "Are your credentials as an entrepreneur important to investors?” and unpacking the success stories by learning from the failures.

Sources:

“Superhuman” Article: https://firstround.com/review/how-superhuman-built-an-engine-to-find-product-market-fit/

Execution is everything. When launching your digital product, you should always have the “why” and the “how” and sell your product in just one sentence. This week, we sit down with Nick Miller, UK Country Manager for Payfit on launching your product lean and focusing on the “less is more” mantra. Understanding your user and what problem you are solving for them through your MVP will save you money in the long-run.

We dive into pinpointing what is essential when it comes to launching an agile product: “What is your selling point?”, "What objectives are you trying to achieve?”, and “How do you allocate your resources to create a product with a high level of excellence?”

For those of us starting the journey towards launching our own business or startup, taking those first steps may seem daunting. This week, we have a chat with Lex Deak, Founder of Basket, on delving into the vast and multi-faceted world of entrepreneurship and starting a business from the ground up: the good, the bad and the funny.

To say that 2020 was a rollercoaster ride is the understatement of the century. In times of chaos, however, comes opportunity. This week, we sit down with Molly Johnson-Jones, Co-Founder of flexa, to discuss launching your product during a pandemic and the challenges and opportunities that come with keeping your product and startup thriving in the chaos.

We're in a business climate transformed by a global pandemic and tech founders need help figuring out how to navigate the seed round and impress investors and stand out from the crowd. This week, we sit down with Robert Walsh, the Managing Partner at Q Ventures. Robert answers our burning questions: What key qualities do investors look for in your business? What is your idea disrupting? Is it necessary to have a working MVP when approaching an investment company?