How long does it take?

The three validation steps run for as long as your market takes to reach — some buyers are a phone call away, some are not. The acceleration program that follows is a 16-week sequence.

Do you work with start-ups, or only established companies?

Both. Our consulting clients typically turn over US$10M–$500M, and we also take on selected innovative start-ups and non-profits where we think the idea can be commercialized.

Do you invest in the ventures you validate?

No. This is an advisory engagement, not an investment. If the outcome supports raising money, our Capital Advisory division advises on debt and equity capital raising — as an advisor, not as a funder.

What happens if the answer is no?

You stop, and you stop having spent a fraction of what building it would have cost. A validated no is a result, and it is the cheapest one we produce.

Consulting · Innovation validation

Prove the market before you build the business

Innovation Validation is the bridge between an idea you believe in and a business with customers who will pay for it. Before you build it, fund it or hire for it, we go to the market you intend to serve and find out whether that market is there.

A founder showing a working prototype to a sceptical potential customer at the customer's premises

The case

Most new products fail for a reason that has nothing to do with the product.

0%of new products fail
0-weekprogram from first assumption to a case a funder can read

More than 65% of new products fail. Rarely because the engineering was wrong — usually because nobody established, before the money was committed, that a market existed at a price the business could live on. Creative ideas generate excitement, and excitement clouds judgment. It produces a dive-in mentality. Those who dive into the deep end without the skills or the safety aids tread water for a while; only for a while.

What it is

What innovation validation is

The fastest way to advance a business idea is to actively listen to the market you intend to serve, understand it, and respond to it while the product and the business model are still being formed. That is the whole method.

We help innovators build products and business models on market intelligence rather than conviction. The work is deliberately unglamorous: structured contact with real potential buyers, a written record of what they said, and a revision of the concept when the evidence calls for one. We report what we find, including when what we find is that the market is not there.

“If businesses fail from a lack of customers and not product development failure, then why do we have processes to manage product development and no processes to manage customer development?”
Steve Blank

The method

Three steps, in order

Our innovation validation services have three major steps. They run in sequence because each one is only worth doing if the one before it came back positive.

01Market identification
Who specifically has the problem, how many of them are there, and what do they do about it today?
1. Define the customer and the problem
2. Size the reachable market
3. Map the alternatives in use today
02Market & concept validation
The concept goes to that market and is tested against buyers rather than against our assumptions.
1. Structured interviews with potential buyers
2. Concept and price testing
3. Business model revised where the evidence demands it
03Market confirmation
Evidence that the demand is real, repeatable and large enough to build on — or evidence that it is not.
1. Demand confirmed at a workable price
2. A route to market that can be resourced
3. A documented case a funder can read

Two REGAL 3 advisors interviewing a potential customer on the customer's premises

The program

The 16-week acceleration program

Validation tells you whether to proceed. The acceleration program is what gets you ready.

We built it for our own ventures, it works for any type of business, and it forms part of Innovation Validation. Eight modules, in sequence, each ending in assessment criteria you have to clear before the next one starts. That gate is the point: it is built to stop a venture that should be stopped, early and cheaply.

Business Model Canvasthe theory, then out of the building to test it
Product/market fitcustomer discovery, validated against real buyers
Markets and getting to themroute to market, and the assumptions behind it
Product and technology validationcan it be built, at what cost
Finances and fundingprojected financials, and what they require
Legalstructure, ownership and the agreements that matter
Management teamwho runs it, and what is missing
Sustainabilitywhat keeps it alive after launch

The result

What you have at the end

One evidenced answer to one question: is there a proven market for this product, at a price that supports a business? If there is, you have the documentation to act on it, and most ventures at that point are either raising capital or bringing in the management to execute. If there is not, you found out for the cost of a validation program instead of the cost of a company.

If the business is already trading and in trouble, this is the wrong tool. Start with a business turnaround.

Questions

Common questions

Start a conversation.

Tell us the idea and the market you think it serves. We will tell you what it would take to find out.

Raise capital for a validated venture Talk to us