
How Google Ventures instills design into the heart of its portfolio companies - shakes
http://thenextweb.com/google/2013/03/15/how-google-ventures-instills-design-into-the-heart-of-its-portfolio-companies/?utm_source=HackerNews&utm_medium=share%2Bbutton&utm_content=How%20Google%20Ventures%20instills%20design%20into%20the%20heart%20of%20its%20portfolio%20companies&utm_campaign=social%2Bmedia
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dpritchett
Memphis has a pretty cool "design and marketing help" VC-alike called A>M
Ventures. They're the newish investment arm of a local advertising firm and
they provide major help to early-stage companies that would otherwise be
relying on their own amateur Photoshop skills.

Some of my favorites from their portfolio (n.b. - I know the founders and have
worked with some of them):

\- <http://kufikia.com> \- Cohort-based dev skills courses with job placements

\- <http://paytopia.com> \- Cardless online payments

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cliftonmckinney
The am>ventures site is here: <http://amventures.co/>

We're really happy with the work they've done for us. For early stage
startups, they're a great option.

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mkoble11
"While this approach may not sound appealing to every startup out there, the
design team is clearly a selling point for Google’s VC arm, making it more
attractive to promising early-stage startups."

Sure sounds appealing to me. :) This is a big differentiator for GV.

BTW great to see a feature on Ordr.in, I love that startup.

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harrisonweber
Would be interesting to see what companies (if any) wouldn't want this sort of
service. Guessing later stage startups could push back.

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benologist
Probably startups that don't want to outsource their design and user
experience to a giant corporation that genuinely does not care about their
users on an individual basis.

The idea-refining sounds invaluable, it really seems unfair to burden that
with outsourced ui/ux.

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harrisonweber
Want to be clear, though, that Google Ventures tries to keep pretty separate
from Google. Also, the better GV's portfolio companies do, the better GV does.
My impression is that the design team actually cares.

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danshapiro
I think the wording of the title is unfortunate, because "instill" sounds sort
of pushy and directive. GV makes services like this are available (which is
pretty awesome!).

Note: work for google - not GV - and speaking for myself.

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harrisonweber
Didn't mean that to be negative.

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awkward
"Huh. Hmm. Put a horizontal bar across the top. That's ok - maybe another one.
That feature sounds great - it's horizontal bar can go right under the Google
plus's."

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dreamdu5t
I don't see how that process instills design in the company at all. It's just
like hiring a design firm to redesign or evaluate the product.

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harrisonweber
Did you read it? The results = an unfinished mockup. A majority of this
process is used to help teach design thinking, so companies can make the right
design/usability decisions on their own.

