NORCAT Entrepreneurship 101 - "Product Development" featuring Dave Peres & Rob Patterson, Co-founders, Minalytix

ENT101Session #6 - Product Development

Presented On: Nov 5, 2014

Presented By: Dave Peres & Rob Patterson

Agenda

• Our background

• What is product development?

• The typical product development process• What am I building?

• What and who are involved?

• How do I do it?

• What development model options are there?

• Our product development experiences – for better or for worse…

Our Background

• Dave Peres – Co-Founder of Minalytix• Former VP at Century Systems Software and Manager of PMO & IT/IS at

BESTECH

• 15 years of experience in Mining Engineering and Software Product Development

• Rob Patterson – Co-Founder of Minalytix• Software product developer and implementation specialist at Century

Systems, Business Analyst and Project Manager at BESTECH

• 13 years of experience in developing and implementing software solutions

Our Company

• Minalytix Inc.

• Founded in 2013• Privately owned.• Located in Sudbury, Ontario, Canada• Software development and consulting focused on the Mining & Exploration

Industries

• Offering consulting services to help fund product development.

• Developing commercial products for clients and partners.

• All team members have experience in commercial software product development.

Product Development

The process of taking an IDEA and turning it into a viable PRODUCT and making sure that PRODUCT aligns with that original IDEA.

Typical Product Development Process

Idea Generation Business Strategy

Idea Screening&

Market Research

Feature Specification& Product Design

Product & ProcessDevelopment

Testing&

VerificationProductionLaunch

Support & Maintenance

Typical Product Team Roles

• Visionary

• Product Manager

• Analyst

• Designer

• Programmer / Engineer

• Quality Assurance

• Sales and Marketing

• Support and Maintenance

Idea Generation

Who?

• Visionary• This could be anyone in or outside of

an organization that sees an opportunity to create or improve something

• Customers, market, product manager, employee, suppliers, business partners, etc.

What / How?

• Write out customer needs

• Brainstorm product issues

• Use R&D

• Review customer complaints

• Research your competition

• Know what`s out there

• Don’t limit possibilities at this point

• Continues through product development process

Idea Screening & Market Research

Who?

• Visionary

• Customers

• Analyst

What / How?

• Talk to your customers and truly understand their needs

• Develop & evaluate screening criteria• Market factors

• Production factors

• Development factors

• Financial factors

• Risk & Cost/Benefit Analysis

Who?

• Visionary

• Analyst

• Product Manager• Understands the market

• Creates relevant documents

• Bridge between all team roles

What / How?

• Write a business plan

• Profitability and market potential

• Resources required for development

• Competitor analysis

• Fit with your business profile

Business Strategy

Feature Specification & Product Design

Who?

• Visionary

• Customer

• Product Manager

• Designer

• Programmer / Engineer

What / How?

• Customer and market requirements

• Functional requirements

• Technical designs and specifications

• Testing and verification specification

A Note on Simplicity

Product & Process Development

Who?

• Product Manager

• Programmer / Engineer

What / How?

• Build the product to the specifications defined

• Adjust as necessary to meet reality!

• Develop and document processes and procedures that produce the best product

Testing & Verification

Who?

• Product Manager

• Quality Assurance

What / How?

• Confirm that product meets all requirements in testing and verification specification

• Work with development team to address defects/issues

Production

Who?

• Product Manager

• Analyst

What / How?

• Establish a production facility / line

• Create manuals and other documentation

• Determining logistics• Shipping

• Storage

• Sales & Distribution

Launch

Who?

• Product Manager

• Customers

• Sales and Marketing

What / How?

• Advertising

• Marketing

• Elevator pitch and sales collateral

• Re-sellers, distribution channels

• Get it into your customers’ hands

Support & Maintenance

Who?

• Customers

• Product Manager

• Quality Assurance

• Analyst

• Engineer / Programmer

What / How?

• Provide avenues for customer feedback

• Address customer issues

• Inform customers of those issues

• Identify opportunities for product improvement

Popular Product Development Models

Our Experience

• All of our experience in product development has been with software

• At Century Systems, we assisted in the development and implementation of GeoData Management products for the mining and exploration industries

Our Experience with Ideas

• When we started• The product had been developed specifically for one

customer’s needs• It cost time and money to re-design the product to meet

the needs of the overall industry

• Lessons learned• Do your research up front• Talk to your customers; make sure that you understand your

market

• What we did to get better• Improved communication and collaboration with customers

through user reviews and conferences

Our Experience with Design & Development

• When we started• Lacked formal requirements and design specifications

• This resulted in the wrong things being built with no way to determine where things went South

• Lessons learned• Documentation is key. If it’s not in writing it doesn’t exist

• It takes time to prepare it correctly but IT MUST BE DONE

• What we did to get better• Introduced formal requirements and technical

specifications templates and enforced their use

Our Experience with Testing

• When we started• We did not have structured test plans

• Introducing new features caused old ones to break

• Lessons learned• Testing specifications are a must

• Regression testing must be incorporated

• What we did to get better• Developed a bug and enhancement tracking system

• Introduced test plans to track the issues

Our Experience with Support & Maintenance

• When we started• There were no standard releases – each

customer got the latest set of features• SUPPORT NIGHTMARE!!!

• Lessons learned• Product improvements need to be

organized and planned• Future feature roadmap is important

• What we did to get better• Established standard releases and service

packs which greatly reduced support overhead

Our Experience – Conclusion

• Despite some hiccups along the way, hard work and perseverance paid off! The effort was successful and the product was sold in over 45 countries.

• Do your research and planning up front, take the time to write things down properly, and stick to the plan!

Thank You!!