Hear Linden speak about IFTTT:

A Columbia, Missouri startup Zapier by Wade Foster, took the IFTTT concept a step further and applied it towards business. This is a brilliant use of the concept that IFTTT conceived because it provides a clear business model and solves many intricate pain points for users of disparate services across the web. Instead of having a programmer to automate certain scenarios, a subscription to Zapier could save time and money.

Zapier was inspired by a chat that Wade had with a co-founder months before they solidified the concept amidst a startup weekend.
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Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do. – Apple Inc.

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Outlined below are common components of an online venture and a recommended product to fulfill those needs quickly, reliably, and inexpensively.

Content Management
WordPress - WordPress is an open source blog tool and publishing platform powered by PHP and MySQL. It’s often customized into a Content Management System (CMS). It has many features including a plug-in architecture and a template system.

Analytics
Google Analytics – Google Analytics is a free service offered by Google that generates detailed statistics about the visitors to a website. The product is aimed at marketers as opposed to webmasters and technologists from which the industry of web analytics originally grew. It is the most widely used website statistics service, currently in use at around 57% of the 10,000 most popular websites. Another market share analysis claims that Google Analytics is used at around 49.95% of the top 1,000,000 websites

Testing
Google Website Optimizer – Google Website Optimizer is a free website optimization tool that helps online marketers and webmasters increase visitor conversion rates and overall visitor satisfaction by continually testing different combinations of website content. Google Website Optimizer can test any element that exists as HTML code on a page including calls to action, fonts, headlines, point of action assurances, product copy, product images, product reviews, and forms. It can be used at multiple stage in the conversion funnel. Google Website Optimizer allows webmasters to test entire pages, known as A/B testing or page elements, known as Multivariate testing such as Headings, images or body copy. This tool is part of Google Analytics, though accessed through a different user interface.

Prototyping
Google Docs – Google Docs is a free, Web-based word processor, spreadsheet, slide show, form, and data storage service offered by Google. It allows users to create and edit documents online while collaborating in real-time with other users. Google Docs combines the features of Writely and Spreadsheets with a presentation program incorporating technology designed by Tonic Systems.

Email
Mailchimp - MailChimp is an email marketing service with over 500,000 users. They provide an easy way for users to send email newsletters, manage subscriber lists, and track campaign performance. MailChimp takes a variety of basic and advanced features (like templates, list segmentation, a/b testing, geo-targeting and ROI tracking) and makes them accessible to the everyday user through automation and a competitive price point.

CRM
Sugarcrm - SugarCRM is a software company based in Cupertino, California. They produce the web application Sugar, also known as SugarCRM, which is a customer relationship management (CRM) system that is available in both open source and proprietary, non-free versions. Sugar’s functionality includes sales-force automation, marketing campaigns, customer support, collaboration and reporting. The company operates a number of websites, including its commercial website SugarCRM.com, a development website (SugarForge.org), Sugar Exchange (for third-party extensions), and user forums.

Ecommerce
Amazon and Paypal both offer simple and more advanced integration of ecommerce capabilities via an API. Additionally, both of these companies offer a form of subscription ecommerce which in increasingly popular.

Please provide your feedback and insight into your own lean startup stack in the comments below.
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After conducting in depth ethnographic research, Tesco realized that Koreans are one of the hardest working people in the World. Time is precious and after the work day is over, shopping is not something people want to do. Typically people would have to go to the store to purchase the groceries.

Tesco brought the store to the people by installing virtual stores amidst the subway stations throughout the country effectively turning their waiting time into shopping time. These virtual stores are backlit posters of products just as if they were in the store; each product has a QR code that people can scan and add to a shopping cart on their mobile phone. Once the purchase is completed, those groceries are automatically delivered to their residence after work hours.

This initiative increased new customers by 76%, online sales by 130%, and elevated Tesco to the #1 online grocer in Korea and improved their offline rank to a close 2nd. This is a very innovative use of QR codes to solve a major pain point for Korean consumers. I think that this can also apply to the US market in major cities as time is a resource that is becoming increasingly scarce.
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When Malloy’s craft tests out safely, he’ll be asking $40K a piece for them. Malloy is hopeful the Hoverbike will be in limited production inside of a year, with full production in two years

“Our goal is to produce an extremely reliable helicopter, designed with rugged simplicity at its heart and true pilot safety built into the design and operation of the aircraft,” Malloy’s states on his web site.

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Features That Work Well

• The CR-48 stores almost everything in the cloud so that if your device is lost or stolen; someone else winds up with the device rather than all of your files and personal information.
• The focus on data and applications that can be used via a browser is another advantage because Google in addition to other companies offer products that rival, if not surpass the functionality, cost, and usability of typical installed software.
• Compared to smartphones and Ipads, the CR-48 has a near full size keyboard that cannot be matched via on screen touch keyboards.
• Connectivity is solely via wifi which has become nearly omnipresent in home, work, and retail environments that it adds convenience and utility.
• Support for Flash, sorry Steve Jobs you can’t always be right Exclusion of a prominent and widely accepted component of the web is not acceptable.

Challenges to Google’s CR-48

• Android and the future of the Chrome OS may be competing against one another and the future of multiple Google powered operating systems may cannibalize one another in addition to confusing the developer community.
• Tablets that run other operating systems such as Windows or iOS will always provide any competing platform a run for its collective money.
• Pricing will also play a factor as Apple typically covers the higher end while other manufacturers cover the mid to lower end. Personally, I would rather have a cost effective, yet functional device that meets my needs such as the CR-48.

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Pioneering new technologies to tip the scale from risk to benefit are starting to take shape. Medical Device companies are already harnessing emerging technology that will potentially either shorten the duration of medicinal therapy , provide a possible bridge to necessary surgery, lessen the risk and recovery of surgery, or eliminate the need altogether.. One such company is San Diego’s Aethlon Medical, Inc. They have designed a selective filtration device in the form of a single use cartridge called Hemopurifier, that can readily be used with existing dialysis machines in hospitals and clinics. The cartridge contains affinity agents that tightly bind to structures unique to exosomes produced by cancer and glycoproteins that reside on the envelopes of viruses.

In effect, the Hemopurifier selectively separates both exosomes and viral targets away from the blood cells and removes them from the circulatory system. The company claims that the treatment benefit is immediate and the entire circulatory system can pass through the device in as little as 15 minutes. The potential result is the preservation of immune cells needed to combat cancer and viral infections with the hope of attaining improved results to the traditional treatment of cancer and Hepatitis C. In addition, the Hemopurifier can potentially offer at least partial immune reconstitution for patients with HIV/AIDS, and is being considered as a treatment candidate for patients with drug resistant HIV. The device is also being studied as a broad-spectrum countermeasure against pandemics and bioterrorism. Aethlon is conducting trials and a commercialization strategy in India and has filed an Investigational Device Exemption with the FDA.

Another compelling medical device targeting an unmet need is Vital Therapies’ ELAD, a bedside cartridge device that mimics the functions of the liver for patients with acute liver failure. Currently, transplantation is the only therapy shown to improve survival in liver failure. The problem is there is just not enough livers to go around. With an estimated 17,000 patients on the liver transplant waiting list and an average waiting time of one year, coupled with 30,000 patients not eligible for transplant or any other therapeutic options, many patients are at direct risk for liver failure. Vital Therapies is hoping to provide a bridge to transplant or liver recovery with ELAD.

The device is comprised of four cartridges, each containing immortalized human liver cells. The patient’s plasma flows between cells through 32,000 hollow fibers in the cartridges, allowing two-way transfer of metabolites with the liver cells. During ELAD therapy, the cells metabolize toxins and synthesize proteins and other liver specific products essential for life. So far the company has completed six clinical trials in the USA, UK and China with 150 receiving treatment and currently has a pivotal trial underway at over 20 sites in the US, Europe and Saudi Arabia. Vital Therapies hopes to complete BLA and MAA submissions in 2011.

These devices and others being developed provide newfound hope for patients in the future by minimizing exposure to toxic medications, avoiding or at least minimizing traumatizing surgery or providing a ‘bridge of life’ until necessary surgery can be considered. Their potential impact has major ramifications in terms of the future of patient care and patient quality of life, and hopefully a positive effect on outcomes and cost of treatment. The future can’t get here fast enough.

Chris Barnes is a 18 year veteran of the Medical Affairs and Commercial functions of the Biopharmaceutical Industry. His interests include emerging medical and CRO technology, HIV & Hepatitis virology and marketplace as well as trends and advances in Ecommerce. He can be contacted viaemail or via LinkedIn.Tweet