Especially in this economic environment, companies have to be alert to changing markets and opportunities for creating competitive advantage.  Entrepreneurs who focus on their internally-created idea, who are removed from prospective customers' unmet needs, run the risk of burning through all their investment dollars and becoming irrelevant.

For our clients, we forge partnerships with knowledgeable key executives to build solutions where there are none, building on our clients' existing products and core strengths.  This is enhanced product development which, incidentally, lines up first adopter customers to test, refine and become references for new solutions.

A recent case -

PROBLEM:  A software-as-a-service company resisted building solutions that moved ahead of the market, opting to build custom solutions for signed customers.  In 2009, not only do executives want to commit only to solutions they can see and test (not "vaporware"), but the company kept losing deals because the big competitors were willing to build out their solutions prior to capturing committed customers.

SOLUTION: Enlisting the experts from six large target companies, we approached executives who "owned the business problem" that needed to be solved.  From the EVP level down to operations, the experts looked at our client's core solution, identified advantages and shortfalls against competitors, and contributed over thirty enhancements and their priorities to build out a solution. Four of the participating companies were also potential customers for the enhanced solution with over $7 million in annual revenue potential.

Typical Terms of Engagement: Retainer, incentives, consulting fees and stock options