SBIR Topical Class: “Positioning Yourself for NSF SBIR/STTR”

Most technology startups fail. Why? They start executing before they have a sound business model. What about you? Have you discovered a scalable and profitable business model yet?

Customer Discovery Lab is a Customer Discovery Bootcamp designed for entrepreneurs. Customer Discovery Lab uses a combination of teaching methodologies from Customer Discovery (get out of the building), Lean Startup (iterative loop of experimentation), Startup Engineering (disprove your assumptions) and the Business Model Canvas to uncover your compelling business model.

After this program, you will have identified the core of your business model - your customer segment and value proposition. Or you may discover there isn't one. And that's OK too. It's better to find out now than after spending years and a fortune only to find out you were wrong.

How does it work?

1. Multi-week intensive program. You should commit to attend every week.
2. Each week, make assumptions about what needs to be true about your business model to succeed.
3. Design tests to disprove each assumptions.
4. Collect data and interpret the results.
5. Update your business model canvas based on what you have learned.
6. Present your findings to the teaching team and get thoroughly thrashed.
7. Repeat.

You will be expected to talk to at least 10 potential customers each week.

REGISTRATION LINKS

Both Customer Discovery Theory and Customer Discovery Tools are prerequisites to Customer Discovery Lab. Please take Customer Discovery Theory first which is offered the second and fourth Tuesday of every month. Once you begin Customer Discovery Lab, you are then expected to attend every subsequent Thursday until you graduate.

• Click here to register.

About the Class

Protecting Intellectual Property (IP) is certainly important, but where does fit in the many priorities of any Startup business? We will address this important question in a round table fashion where attendees are encouraged to share their IP journey.  At the roundtable we will have a successful startup CEO and attorneys/advisors who have shepherded many Startups in the past with IP. This class is for any Startup aiming for long term success and wishing to learn from and network with IP experts.

What you will learn:

• What aspects of IP are most important to address and how should a young business address them?
• How does IP and employment intersect?
• What are best practices for IP security that don’t include filing for a patent or copyright?
• What are the dangers and pitfalls of ignoring IP questions (or spending too much time focused on them)?

The following subjects will be addressed over the course of the four-part series:

1.       What Startups Need to Know About IP

2.       Finding Value for Your Startup TODAY Using IP

3.       How Does the World View You Differently Before/After IP?

4.       IP in Action: How will you most likely use IP assets over time?

About Georgia Intellectual Property Alliance 

The Georgia Intellectual Property Alliance® (GIPA #gaipalliance) is empowering Georgia IP to advance society.™ Our mission is to provide the leadership, resources and advocacy to make Georgia a global model for the most efficient and effective ecosystem to facilitate creation, protection, and enablement of intellectual property for the economic and social well-being of our citizens. (https://www.gaipalliance.org/about)

Registration

• Click here to register.