The preliminaries are now out of the way.
For the last six months, my partners and I (Joe Pryor and Adrian Zehnder), have been trying to do everything in our power to dissuade ourselves from starting b2b2dot0 ("be two be two dot oh").
We prototyped the service with a new (to us) technology (Ruby on Rails). We subjected ourselves to audits by technology experts. We put together a business plan. We ran a virtual focus group with prospective clients. We physically visited prospective clients. We spoke with past colleagues. We met with lawyers and accountants. We spoke with our own financial consultants, and of course, we had many discussions with our friends and family.
The conclusion? There are no guarantees in life. But we believe that there is a real business opportunity here and we are uniquely qualified to make good on it. So...in January, the three of us are writing checks to give birth to b2b2dot0 and are committed to raising the child together into adulthood.
This blog is my attempt to catalogue our experiences. I'm taking the time to do so for three reasons:
- It's personal. I know that building a company can be a crazy experience. I've done it several times before. Keeping this blog, aside from my bicycle riding, should help to keep me grounded.
- It's communal. We're going to be growing a community around b2b2dot0. Our customers, our employees, our service providers, all have a right to know who we really are, where we're at and how we're doing. Our success will be determined by how much value we bring to the market, not how secretive we can be. This blog will be one vehicle to provide transparency to our community.
- It's Agile. Everything about us is Agile. Our attitude, our processes, our architecture and design, our business model...everything! I want b2b2dot0 to be THE poster child for agility and this blog to be our living window into TheAgileStartup.
Sam Bayer
CEO
b2b2dot0
