During the Cold War U.S. diplomatic and military alliances existed to defend freedom around the world. Today, these alliances are being reshaped to respond to Russian threats to the Baltics and Eastern Europe and to China’s economic, military, and technological influence worldwide.

Hacking for Allies

Steve Blank is the originator of customer development  godfather of the #leanstartup; this is his podcast.

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The connections between the world of national security and commercial companies still has surprises.

The Secret History of Polaroid CEO Edwin Land

One of the most exciting things a startup CEO in a business-to-business market can hear from a potential customer is, “We’re excited. When can you come back and show us a prototype?”

This can be the beginning of a profitable customer relationship or a disappointing sinkhole of wasted time, money, resources, and a demoralized engineering team.

It all depends on one question every startup CEO needs to ask.

Founders Need to Be Ruthless When Chasing Deals

Capitalism has been good to me. After serving in the military during Vietnam, I came home and had a career in eight startups. I got to retire when I was 45. Over the last quarter century, in my third career, I helped create the methods entrepreneurs use to build new startups, while teaching 1,000’s of students how to start new ventures.

Is a $100 Million Enough?

If you haven’t been paying attention Apple has started shipping its Apple Vision Pro, its take on a headset that combines Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR). The product is an amazing technical tour de force. But the product/market fit of this first iteration is a swing and a miss.

Apple Vision Pro – Tech in the Search of a Market

We just wrapped up the third year of our Technology, Innovation, and Great Power Competition class –part of Stanford’s Gordian Knot Center for National Security Innovation.
Joe Felter, Mike Brown and I teach the class to:
Give our students an appreciation of the challenges and opportunities for the United States in its enduring strategic competition with the People’s Republic of China, Russia and other rivals.
Offer insights on how commercial technology (AI, autonomy, cyber, quantum, semiconductors, access to space, biotech, hypersonics, and others) are radically changing how we will compete across all the elements of national power e.g. diplomatic, informational, military, economic, financial, intelligence and law enforcement (our influence and footprint on the world stage).
Expose students to experiential learning on policy questions. Students formed teams, got out of the classroom and talked to the stakeholders and developed policy recommendations.

Hacking for Allies

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