Stages of The Startup Life Cycle

The notion «startup life cycle» denotes a set of stages that are typical for growing and developing startups. Knowledge and ability to differentiate startup stages are strategically vital for the Project Manager: it enables to evaluate possible risks and obstacles, to find solutions for overcoming them.

What should a founder remember?  Attempts to speed up the processes at any of the stages of a startup (for example, premature launch of a product), which frequently happens, if one is mistakenly focused on competitors’ projects, - leads to serious issues, or even to product failure. 
Below stages of the startup life cycle, suggested by Max Mramer, are viewed.His classification has been actively used by global investment funds Startup Genome and Kauffman Foundation.

Startup life cycle

Opening

• Market and competitors, potential customers are being investigated;
• The first iteration of the user’s experience is being designed;
• Relevance of problem and solution is being worked out, the market is checked;
• MVP is created.

Testing

• Correspondence of the solution to its problem while market is being examined is argued;
• MVP is launched;
• Product validation is taking place;
• Users’ experience is reviewed and improved, based on the validation tests results;
• The product is being improved on the stages of version update;
• Actions, regarding correspondence of the product to the market are being performed.

Efficiency

• Correspondence of the product to the market is reached;
• Preparatory work before scaling is done;
• User experience is optimized to prevent rapid growth of the number of users;
• Productivity is optimized (with the same aim);
• Operational workflows, while preparing for scaling, are reviewed and streamlined;
• Strategies’ validation tests are carried out.

Scaling

• Scaling strategies testing is completed;
• Optimization of operating systems reaches the desired level;
• Aggressive growth is accompanied by active promotion of the product;
• Validation tests are carried out to achieve the level of reproducible sales process at scale.

Profit maximization

• Successful scaling of business allows to speak about the status of an estblished company;
• Manufacturing, and revenue-generating operations are expanding;
• The system is being optimized in order to maximize profits.

Update

• The company’s profits peak;
• Project system optimization is at its highest point;
• There are trends to create new companies and products that will become innovative in the market;
• Active searching for other companies and technologies is taking place in order to expand own market share and to keep the offer relevant;
• Vertical and horizontal expansion is being examined to stem the decline of the company.

Read also: Startup Funding Rounds: Seed Series A, B, C

Stages of startup maturity have been also proposed in the framework of other classifications that exclude some of the stages described above. When working with the product, the founder should rely on various classifications in orfer to find convenient solutions.

The company Software Development Hub cooperates with  product teams and startups, providing IT outsourcing services. The SDH team implements ideas for the software development, web technologies, mobile devices in the field of digital health, education, e-accountancy, home automation, and security. Software Development Services for Startups will assist in evaluating the viability of an idea, launching a product to gain the maximum benefit, and scaling the solution.

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