Startup City Canada

An essential guide to building supportive entrepreneurial communities "Startup communities" are popping up everywhere, from cities like Boulder to Boston and even in countries such as Iceland. These types of entrepreneurial ecosystems are driving innovation and small business energy. Startup Communities documents the buzz, strategy, long-term perspective, and dynamics of building communities of entrepreneurs who can feed off of each other's talent, creativity, and support. Based on more than twenty years of Boulder-based entrepreneur turned-venture capitalist Brad Feld's experience in the field?as well as contributions from other innovative startup communities?this reliable resource skillfully explores what it takes to create an entrepreneurial community in any city, at any time. Along the way, it offers valuable insights into increasing the breadth and depth of the entrepreneurial ecosystem by multiplying connections among entrepreneurs and mentors, improving access to entrepreneurial education, and much more. Details the four critical principles needed to form a sustainable startup community Perfect for entrepreneurs and venture capitalists seeking fresh ideas and new opportunities Written by Brad Feld, a thought-leader in this field who has been an early-stage investor and successful entrepreneur for more than twenty years Engaging and informative, this practical guide not only shows you how startup communities work, but it also shows you how to make them work anywhere in the world.

Entrepreneur and bestselling author of The Lean Startup, Eric Ries reveals how entrepreneurial principles can be used by businesses of all kinds, ranging from established companies to early-stage startups, to grow revenues, drive innovation, and transform themselves into truly modern organizations, poised to take advantage of the enormous opportunities of the twenty-first century. In The Lean Startup, Eric Ries laid out the practices of successful startups – building a minimal viable product, customer-focused and scientific testing based on a build-measure-learn method of continuous innovation, and deciding whether to persevere or pivot. In The Startup Way, he turns his attention to an entirely new group of organizations: established enterprises like iconic multinationals GE and Toyota, tech titans like Amazon and Facebook, and the next generation of Silicon Valley upstarts like Airbnb and Twilio. Drawing on his experiences over the past five years working with these organizations, as well as nonprofits, NGOs, and governments, Ries lays out a system of entrepreneurial management that leads organizations of all sizes and from every industry to sustainable growth and long-term impact. Filled with in-the-field stories, insights, and tools, The Startup Way is an essential road map for any organization navigating the uncertain waters of the century ahead.

“There are at least two kinds of games,” states James Carse as he begins this extraordinary book. “One could be called finite; the other infinite.” Finite games are the familiar contests of everyday life; they are played in order to be won, which is when they end. But infinite games are more mysterious. Their object is not winning, but ensuring the continuation of play. The rules may change, the boundaries may change, even the participants may change—as long as the game is never allowed to come to an end. What are infinite games? How do they affect the ways we play our finite games? What are we doing when we play—finitely or infinitely? And how can infinite games affect the ways in which we live our lives? Carse explores these questions with stunning elegance, teasing out of his distinctions a universe of observation and insight, noting where and why and how we play, finitely and infinitely. He surveys our world—from the finite games of the playing field and playing board to the infinite games found in culture and religion—leaving all we think we know illuminated and transformed. Along the way, Carse finds new ways of understanding everything from how an actress portrays a role, to how we engage in sex, from the nature of evil, to the nature of science. Finite games, he shows, may offer wealth and status, power and glory. But infinite games offer something far more subtle and far grander. Carse has written a book rich in insight and aphorism. Already an international literary event, Finite and Infinite Games is certain to be argued about and celebrated for years to come. Reading it is the first step in learning to play the infinite game.

Most startups fail. But many of those failures are preventable. The Lean Startup is a new approach being adopted across the globe, changing the way companies are built and new products are launched. Eric Ries defines a startup as an organization dedicated to creating something new under conditions of extreme uncertainty. This is just as true for one person in a garage or a group of seasoned professionals in a Fortune 500 boardroom. What they have in common is a mission to penetrate that fog of uncertainty to discover a successful path to a sustainable business. The Lean Startup approach fosters companies that are both more capital efficient and that leverage human creativity more effectively. Inspired by lessons from lean manufacturing, it relies on “validated learning,” rapid scientific experimentation, as well as a number of counter-intuitive practices that shorten product development cycles, measure actual progress without resorting to vanity metrics, and learn what customers really want. It enables a company to shift directions with agility, altering plans inch by inch, minute by minute. Rather than wasting time creating elaborate business plans, The Lean Startup offers entrepreneurs—in companies of all sizes—a way to test their vision continuously, to adapt and adjust before it’s too late. Ries provides a scientific approach to creating and managing successful startups in a age when companies need to innovate more than ever.

This book offers a comprehensive model for explaining the success and failure of cities in nurturing startups, presents detailed case studies of how participants in that model help or hinder startup activity, and shows how to apply these lessons to boost local startup activity. Startup Cities explains the factors that determine local startup success based on a detailed comparison of regional startup cities—pairing the most successful and less successful cities within regions along with insights and implications from case studies of each of the model’s elements. The book compares local city pairs, highlighting factors that distinguish successful from less successful cities and presents implications for stakeholders that arise from these principles. Peter Cohan is a lecturer of Strategy at Babson College and one of the world’s leading authorities on regional startup ecosystems. Starting in 2012, he created and led Startup Strategy courses that explore four regional startup ecosystems—Hong Kong/Singapore, Israel, Paris, and Spain/Portugal. These courses are based on an original framework for evaluating why a few cities host most startup creation and the rest fail to do so. In running these courses, Peter has built a network of local policymakers, investors, entrepreneurs, and professors from which he draws practical insights for what distinguishes successful Startup Commons from their peers. The book provides vital benefits to these stakeholders. What You’ll Learn Local policymakers will know how to build a local team to set objectives for their local Startup Commons and develop a comprehensive strategy to realize those goals Entrepreneurs will know how to choose where to locate their startups based on factors such as the supply and quality of talent—from chief marketing and technology officers to coders and sales people; quality of life, access to capital, customers, and mentors; and costs such as salary and real estate expense University administrators and faculty will know how to take research out of their labs and house it in companies that can commercialize that research, create academic programs that will encourage more entrepreneurship among their students, and connect with local policymakers and capital providers to spur local startup activity Capital providers will know how to scout out emerging startup cities where they can get access to the best investment opportunities at more favorable valuations and have greater influence on how the local startup scene evolves Who This Book Is For All key startup stakeholders, including local policymakers (mayors, directors of economic development, treasurers, controllers, presidents of regional chamber of commerce), entrepreneurs (CEOs, chief marketing officers, chief financial officers, chief HR officers, chief technology officers), universities (presidents; deans of faculty; provosts; professors of finance, management, and entrepreneurship; directors of international education), and capital providers (venture capital partners and associates, angel investors, bank loan officers, managers of accelerator operations)

The publishing industry has responded to the emergence of digital technologies with many useful and innovative products, but the business of publishing has not yet reinvented itself for this new era—old, outdated models prevail, limiting both vision and opportunity. Every Book Is a Startup provides a roadmap for publishing professionals interested in bringing a fresh, entrepreneurial approach to the business of book publishing, based on techniques proven effective in the world of tech startups. This book shows you how to apply tech industry concepts such as customer development, validated learning, and pivots to create publishing business practices that are agile, flexible, and highly profitable. Here at O'Reilly Media, we've incorporated many of these techniques into our own publishing business, including "release early, release often." With that in mind, the initial release of this project discusses two core ideas for how this new way of thinking can be applied to book publishing, and solicits your ideas about what we might include in future releases of this book. What do you want to know more about? Would a variety of case studies be helpful? Let us know! The current ebook release of Every Book Is a Startup is priced at $7.99; subsequent releases will be priced higher. Buy the current release now and you'll receive all updates at no additional cost. A print edition will be available for purchase when the book is complete.