Yottaa Gets $9M for "Anti-Lean" Startup Approach

I recall reading in someone's book - maybe Blank's - that Lean Startups can help when there is market risk, but not "innovation risk" - will the team actually be able to create the thing they have in mind? Something like a new cancer drug was the example - the market is not a problem, the problem is whether you'll be able to create it.

The normal usage of the term "Lean" (ie from Toyota) actually has little to do with validated learning and more to do with the elimination of wasteful aspects of production that don't directly lead to customer value. Usually that means "pulling" work out of a team based on need rather than trying to anticipate need that might never materialize (like the need to scale workforce and infrastructure, which is the case here). FTA: "The idea, he says, is to be “global from day one and have scalability built in.”". Of course in any pull system, validated learning is built-in, because new customer demand is new information, but the focus of Lean is actually the reduction of wasteful production. He'll have wasted a lot of time/money if demand doesn't match the infrastructure he's built.

I use Yottaa as a band-aid for inherited websites at my agency. When a client comes to us, asks us to rebuild their site and take over their old site in the mean time, we use Yottaa to speed the heck out of their poorly-hosted, poorly written previous site.

Also, don't be confused when the sales guys call and say they're from "Yoda". The space muppet is the correct way to pronounce yotta, the SI prefix.