Defensibilities

In the olden days their were lots of 'defensibilities' that a company could have (barriers to entry or ways to get a sustainable competitive advantage). You could have a port or iron mine in the right place. Software business are left with just 4 types of defensibility:

• Brand - awareness or recognition of your brand
• Scale - e.g. Amazon, they are so big they have lower prices, so it's hard to compete.
• Embedding - you embed your software in another organisation so that it's hard to take out.
• Network Effects - you have so many users it's hard to anyone else to 

James Currier of NFX Guild on A16Z podcast:

https://soundcloud.com/a16z/network-effects-taxonomy#t=4:08

Defensibilities

In the olden days their were lots of 'defensibilities' that a company could have (barriers to entry or ways to get a sustainable competitive advantage). You could have a port or iron mine in the right place. Software business are left with just 4 types of defensibility:

• Brand - awareness or recognition of your brand
• Scale - e.g. Amazon, they are so big they have lower prices, so it's hard to compete.
• Embedding - you embed your software in another organisation so that it's hard to take out.
• Network Effects - you have so many users it's hard to anyone else to 

James Currier of NFX Guild on A16Z podcast:

https://soundcloud.com/a16z/network-effects-taxonomy#t=4:08

A/B Testing vs Multi-Armed Bandit

Interesting article arguing that the Multi-Armed Bandit approach is better than A/B testing.

One of the comments suggests that A/B testing gets a faster result (for a given sample size), allowing you to turn off the weakest options sooner. So it could still be better for a quick experiment.

http://stevehanov.ca/blog/index.php?id=132

Nespresso - slow success

Nespresso's success was a long time in coming.

Nespresso was first patented as a system in 1976. Nespresso SA was formed as an wholly-owned but independent subsidiary of Nestle in 1986, and initially targeted offices but failed. It was only in 1988 that they were overhauled to target high income households, with direct sales of pods.

Glow First - pool costs in case you need infertility treatment

Use the Glow app and try to get pregnant for 10 months. Contribute $50/month. If it doesn't work you get infertility treatment paid for.

http://www.healthcareglobal.com/technology/1414/s-business-model-pays-off-in-its-app
https://glowing.com/glow_first

Business Metrics

Great article on business metrics to use in different circumstances:
http://a16z.com/2015/08/21/16-metrics/

Energiser: Emoji films

Like charades, but instead of mime express a film in emojis.
E.g. Silence of the Lambs is a speaker with a line through it and 2 sheep

X.ai

X.ai have an interesting proposition, using artificial intelligence to schedule meetings.

They also ask people to agree to a pledge before joining the team - Pledge.

And this is nicely executed, after you join the waiting list: