Startups & Ventures

Watch a movie online with friends Even with different audio tracks and subtitles. Yes, we have glitchy apps to let you watch a movie with friends, but this one should let you choose the audio track, so you can watch one movie, and each of you can select an audio stream.

Hey guys! Hope you are all great 🙌 ProductStar Global holds free weekly online meetup this Sunday (10/05) for anyone who is interested in product management! 👌 Manasa GN, Product Manager at Shell will talk about "Feature table building which helps understand different types of Product Managers in the industry".😎 They say ideas are 'a dime a dozen' but where do good ideas come from? Do they come from observation, personal experience, or research? Manasa will explore these questions in this discussion. 🚀 Key points: 🔸 Understand the different types of Product Managers in the industry 🔸 How to use the EMUC model to look for good ideas. 🔸 Learn how to build Feature tables for Product Managers Join the webinar by the following link https://productstar.org/productwebinar_startupsi 🗓 May 10th (Sunday) ⏰ 13.00 GMT, 18.30 IST, 20.00 Jakarta It’s going to be really interesting, so Invite your friends and share the information with your colleagues 🙌

​​Found a great list of newsletters you can subscribe to in the categories such as tech, finance, business, productivity. Available as a Notion page - https://www.notion.so/090c527e386d4cef9ad6ad12b6248b4a?v=c7912c2a61304991aedbd0ecaac1d798

​​Trend: Drip Drop DripDrop is a souped up version of Pedialyte for adults. The company claims that its oral rehydration therapy products have a multitude of benefits for healthy people, including hangover relief and faster exercise recovery. DripDrop has grown largely thanks to its portable “Powder Sticks” that can be mixed with water. A host of unique flavors (like “spiced apple cider”) has also helped the brand achieve rapid growth. What's next: DripDrop is part of the meta trend of turning medical products into consumer-facing categories. Other recent examples include retinol serum and red light therapy devices.

Coffee as Wine Coffee has become a product for the masses, but there is an untapped market of luxury coffee enthusiasts and sommeliers. While testifying to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 2017, Kelly Goodejohn of Starbucks described how, “coffee is the second most traded commodity after oil and 25 million farmers around the world rely on income generated from growing coffee.” While many sources have come out to dispute this claim (some arguing that it is only the 15th most traded commodity globally), there is no escaping coffee’s influence in the world. In his most recent book, “Caffeine: How Caffeine Created the Modern World,” Michael Pollan describes how for many caffeine is not consumed because of its life-enhancing and surprisingly medicinal effects, but purely because it is a wonder energy drug that allows us to work more — like cocaine for the masses. What if a company reframed coffee from a mass-drug with purely practical uses to a luxury good designed to be consumed in small doses (like wine)? Whether designed as a subscription service or a high-end coffee shop, the business would be a coffee dealer designed to expose people to a new brand of luxury coffee beans. What would it take to elevate coffee culture to the same level as wine culture? This business would work to answer this question and push the world to the “fourth wave” of coffee consumption (1st wave was instant coffee, 2nd wave was commoditized coffee a la Starbucks, 3rd wave was specialty coffees a la Blue Bottle, and this proposed 4th wave is luxury coffee designed to create coffee sommeliers). Monetization: selling coffee beans as a subscription; hosting conferences and events for luxury coffee enthusiasts; providing coffee sommelier certifications at a price; and more.

Cloud Factories One of the largest “taxes” on goods that are purchased in person is the cost of shipping that product to its retail location. Replacing “dead space” or “dying spaces” in malls with smaller, robotic factories that can decrease shipping costs for end-consumers; thus, decreasing the average price of goods or allowing merchants to sell less while still maintaining revenues. This business would be like Travis Kalanick’s CloudKitchen business (which has already raised over $400M dollars). Cloud Kitchens are commercial facilities purpose-built to produce food specifically for delivery. This business would do the same thing with factories to either be delivered to end users or picked up “in-store” (really, just a store-front with a few items of clothing that you can try on for sizing, not for style). The thesis of this business would be that bringing the production closer to the end-consumer could actually reduce pricing. Monetization: Subscription fee to be able to use these cloud factories. Perhaps a % per good sold.

At-home Sleep Lab Everyone sleeps differently, but it’s hard to figure out what conditions create the “best sleep” for you. An integrated system of sleep devices that can turn your room into a “sleep-lab” or “legendary sleep location.” The company would sell watches that can track your sleep, blankets that can adjust in temperature throughout the night, lightbulbs that can turn on and off with different waking hues, meditative speakers to play music or sounds, sleep mattresses, and more. All of these devices would have live-sensors that work together every night to try and optimize your sleep cycle for the better. It would use machine learning to create the best tailored sleep environment for you. Casper (currently with a market cap of $250M, CSPR on the stock market) has dabbled in this quite a bit. One example way that this could work is by having 2-weeks of “testing sleep” to adjust a variety of factors to see how individuals respond best, then a platform tailored to you based on these results. To sell the product, it could be a “sleep subscriptions service” that is free for the first 4 weeks (the first 2 weeks would be “sleep tests” and the next 2 weeks would be actual sleep use). Imagine the 1999 movie Smart House, but as a Smart Sleep suite of integrated sleep systems. Eventually, with data at scale, these metrics could be used to create a large sleep database that could be used for research.

Today’s business problem and the idea: Sponsor app for J1 visa applicants For cultural exchange students looking to get a J1 visa and work temporarily in the United States, it is difficult to find a job. Currently, specialized agencies (known as Visa Sponsors) charge cultural exchange students anywhere from $1,500 - $10,000 for “program fees” which include, finding a job placement for the student, providing insurance for the student, and other support for the student before, during, and after their placement in the United States. However, these agencies are essentially middle-men in a system where the students and employers could talk directly if they just knew how to find each other. Generally, in this business their are so many points of contacts that students end up paying so many more fees than they need. Thus, this business would be an app (perhaps like Tinder) where students can upload resumes, complete a job profiles, and search for jobs while employers can post job descriptions, conduct interviews remotely, and find the best students for temporary work. We would cut out one (of the many) middle-men. Our role would be to provide a stable platform for these connections to take place. Think of it like an Indeed (which sold in 2012 for $1b), ZipRecruiter, or LinkedIn for international students who want to come to the US temporarily.

Finding a problem or How to find business problems and the ones you have You're going to have to brainstorm. Some people recommend that you just sit around waiting for inspiration to strike. I don't. That might take years, if not forever. Be proactive. It's hard to say where the best place to start brainstorming is, not because there are so few, but because there are so many. There are thousands of good problems out there, and practically anything can trigger you to stumble across one. What's more important is that you recognize a good problem when you see one, and vice versa. If a problem scores poorly on the guidelines above, don't waste your time. Keep brainstorming. For that reason, it makes sense to start with one of these guidelines in mind, and let that be your trigger. For example, since it's helpful to solve a problem that you have yourself, why not take a look at your own life and see if you can spot any problems. What worries you, exasperates you, or annoys you? The other guidelines also work well as brainstorming triggers. Who do you like spending time with? What groups are you a part of? What are some problems you notice people solving frequently? What's something that seems to be growing into a bigger trend? My personal favorite is to start by looking at where people are already spending lots of time and money and go from there. Money changing hands is almost always a sign that there's a valuable problem being solved. Avoid Fatal Mistakes Founders typically have already made one or two huge mistakes by this point. If you can avoid these, you'll be way ahead before you've even started. Starting with a solution in mind. I've mentioned this already, but it's worth repeating. You need to be honest with yourself here, because this is sometimes subtle. If you're already attached to a particular idea for a product, technology, or set of features that you want to build, that's going to ruin your ability to find a solid problem and analyze it objectively. You've put the solution first, and it's blinding you to opportunities. Ruling out already-solved problems. Nothing in the guidelines above says that a good problem is one that nobody is solving. In fact, the opposite is usually true. Almost all successful businesses start by tackling problems that have popular, pre-existing, alternative solutions. Way too many founders attempt to solve unsolved problems, then get stuck. These problems are often unsolved because they're unimportant and people don't care. Being afraid to solve high-value problems. Indie hackers in particular are notorious for only tackling cheap, low-value problems. You don't have to sell something for cheap to have a chance at success. That's backwards. It's actually harder to sell cheap things, because people care less. I've bought more cars than back scratchers in my life. It doesn't matter that you're a small, scrappy startup. I've met 2-person teams selling their software for $10,000 per year per customer. Pick a high-value problem and charge a high price. Not having a specific customer in mind. If you can't articulate whose problem you're solving, how is your website going to articulate it? If you want to wait and see who the best customer turns out to be, that sounds a lot like a key looking for a lock. If you think your product is for everyone, it's probably for nobody. If you describe your target customer by combining a bunch of attributes (e.g. "iOS users who need to get tasks done but prefer modern, clean UIs"), that's not an actual group of people. You're just describing the features of a product you're already biased toward building. Some of these points are a bit counterintuitive. That's why so many generations of smart-but-uninformed indie hackers are repeating the mistakes of their predecessors. But it's simple to avoid these kinds of mistakes once you know them. It's more a more a matter of knowledge and discipline, rather than genius or hard work.

​​Current trend: Oximeter Pulse oximeters are small devices that use light to measure blood O2 saturation. Like face masks and hand sanitizer, Oximeter sales have surged due to the current crisis. Quartz reports that Oximeter sales have increased more than 5x since January. The spike is so sudden that many Amazon sellers and brick and mortar stores have run out of inventory. Why the bump? Despite statements from the American Lung Association that Oximeters are only helpful for people with certain health conditions, people are using them as a way to self-diagnose. Or, for those that have the disease, as a way to measure lung function at home. Oximeters are just one of many devices that people are using for the “self-care” movement, a group that monitors their health without interfacing with a health care pro.

Some news: Oil is almost down to $1/barrel So, startupers, prepare your ideas to explode the market with innovative energy resources. Why this is happening: The May contract expires tomorrow. Oil traders that still have contracts are selling at whatever price they can get because they do not (all) have the ability to take physical delivery. Storage and refiners are not buying. The $1/barrel is a trading dynamic when there are many sellers and limited buyers.

Today’s project idea: Random knowledge chats It’s hard to learn cool topics directly from experts (unless you listen to a podcast, which is not very interactive). My favorite feature on Wikipedia is the “random article” button, which sends you to a random Wikipedia page. This company would take this same idea and similar to Omegle places you in a random 1:1 video conversation for 15 minute conversations for $5 each. The platform would allow you to learn random things from random people who are an expert in their subject and all you would have to do is pay them with coffee/tea/pastries. Perhaps it could be called, "Teach for a Coffee". Get rated after the end of each interaction and become more of an expert. Perhaps, eventually, the platform would create partnerships with media companies to give people a foot-in-the-door to become talking heads on programs like CNN, Fox, MSNBC, and more.

How to brainstorm great business ideas, part 2 If you find yourself trying to think up product ideas, then you're putting the solution first. Not only is that backwards, but it's harder! How exactly are you supposed to think up good product ideas out of thin air? It's impossible to design a great tool for a job before you even know what the job is. You'll make your life easier and your business ideas better if you put the solution last and the problem first. What makes for a good problem? The first step is to recognize a good problem when you see one. A good problem is one that many thousands of people have. Otherwise you won't have enough customers. For indie hackers, this number doesn't need to be too big. Usually a few hundred thousand is enough. In some cases, much less. You want these to be people you genuinely like talking to, because they'll be your customers for years. And ideally you have the same problem as them, too, so you can empathize with what they're going through. It's best if the people who have this problem hang out together and identify as a named group. For example, "developers" or "teachers" or "NBA fans" or "YouTubers." That means they're likely to make all sorts of recommendations to each other, including product recommendations, which makes word-of-mouth growth possible for your business. It also gives you juicy channels to target, which will come into play later. It helps if the problem is a growing one, meaning more and more people have it every year. This sets the stage for your business to grow. And you want it to be a problem that people encounter frequently, so they'll seek the solution on a regular basis. Finally, and arguably most importantly, you want it to be a valuable problem. In other words, you want it to be a problem that people pay money to solve. Preferably lots of money.

How to brainstorm great business ideas Part 1 It's been said that ideas don't matter, execution does. I wholeheartedly disagree. You need both to succeed, but you can only get so good at execution. A great idea gives you much more leverage. Most people equate product ideas with business ideas. That's wrong. Your product is only one part of your business. There are at least four parts in total: - the problem you're solving (aka the market) - the distribution channel to reach customers - the monetization model you use to make money - the solution to the problem (aka your product or service) Great business ideas are strong in all of these areas. Problem First, Solution Last The #1 rule is to put the problem first and the solution last. Your product/service should be the last thing you think about. Why? Because it's the most flexible. You can build anything. But the other three aspects are constrained. You have to choose from a limited set of viable problems, channels, and models. Always start with the constraints.

Today’s app idea: Is it worth to read an article? A browser extension that shows the amount of words in an article, so you know whether it’s worth your time to read.

Drone Dog-Walker Not a side project, but a whole startup idea. To walk my dog, I have to go outside. A drone or robot that can automatically walk my dog. This concept would be similar to Wag (which raised $361M, was valued at $1B+, and was backed by Softbank; however, Softbank eventually parted ways in late 2019). However, instead of paying humans to walk people’s dogs, this company would use drones.

Museum virtual tours A website gathers as many virtual museum tours as possible to watch all of them online.

​​Trend: Posca This brand of paint marker pens was already gaining momentum before coronavirus. But demand has exploded now that millions of parents are homeschooling their children every day. Posca pens are great for kid's painting. As a bonus, they can be used on windows. And they easily wipe off of any glass surface. Perfect for the new parent turned teacher who lacks a whiteboard.

An app to report large social gatherings.

Auto suggested hashtags Twitter should auto-suggest hashtags based on what you’re tweeting about. It can be a browser extension.