berkeley, berkeley class, business model, business model canvas, customer development, engineering, lean launchpad, lean startup, startup, steve blank

1. Tiny Techie
Nate Nicole Stephanie Tony
108 Cumulative interviews to date
● 60 Moms/ 7 Dads
● 6 Pediatric Nurse /Doctors/Hospital
administrators
● 4 Baby Store Retailers
● 6 Lactation Consultants/Doulas
● 12 Sensor/Fluid
Engineers/Companies
● 5 Professors
● 4 Founders
● 2 Other
Week 0:
Building a smart nipple shield that helps
● moms struggling with breastfeeding
● moms curious about the data
Week 12:
Building a smart nipple shield that helps
● Type A moms with concerns about
underweight babies, in urban areas,
with household income >$100k and
<$500k
Andy Smith, Mentor Jude & Elijah, Advisors

2. Origin Story:
● 4 students - passionate about IOT and babies
● Other ideas we considered:
○ Smart car seat - lightweight, ergonomic child
placing and easier buckling
○ Baby car wash - automated washing of a baby’s
behind
○ Netflix for children’s books & educational
materials
Babies IOT

3. Day 1 beliefs
Customer Segments
● Mothers struggling with
breastfeeding
● Moms with high
severity/low duration of
bfing issues
● Moms that do not struggle
bfing, but just like the data
it provides
We thought Value
Propositions were
product features

4. Customer Segments
Weeks 1-2:
● Mothers struggling with
breastfeeding
● Moms with high
severity/low duration of
bfing issues
● Moms that do not struggle
bfing, but just like the data
it provides
● First time moms
Weeks 4-5:
● Type A moms who are
concerned about
underweight babies, urban
areas, >$100 household
income
● Type A moms with breast
pain
● Working moms
● Lactation consultants
Weeks 9-12:
● Type A moms who are
concerned about
underweight babies, in
urban areas, >$100k
household income
● working moms, in urban
areas, with household
income > $100k
● Dads who are data geeks
● Dads (w/ moms struggling
with breastfeeding)
● Google / Facebook HR
● By week 12, we can ask a mom 4 questions and predict with 80% confidence
whether they will show high interest in our product. Critical to honing in on a
specific customer segment inside the mom market
● Saboteurs - lactation consultants are mom influencers who do not like us
Validated In ProgressInvalidated

5. In ProgressInvalidatedInvalidatedValidated
Breastfeeding Mom Personas and
Interview Quotes
Data Nerd
“That data would be
interesting to have, I
might use once in
awhile”
10% of interviews
Lactivist
“Ugh, that’s horrible. I
would never use it”
20% of interviews
Easy going mom
“It sounds cool, but I
don’t I would buy it.”
25% of interviews
Struggling
Breastfeeders
“Love the product! I can
see the market for this”
45% of interviews

6. Value Proposition Dashboard
Gains
Pains
Customer
Jobs
Gain Creators
Pain Relievers
Products
& Services
Feed the baby
Nutritional mystery
Insecurity
Discomfort
Confidence that mom is “doing it right”
Babies are breastfed longer
Eliminates uncertainty in
babies feeding habits
Reduces discomfort
Breast is best
Mother-baby bonding
experience
Nipple shield monitor
App with real-time milk
consumption data
tracking
The problem we’re solving is relieving the anxiety and self-questioning
that mothers experience. “Am I bad mother?”

7. FormulaFeeding
Pumping &
Breastfeeding Support
Baby
Technology
Lactation
C
onsultants
Breastfeeding
m
onitoring
products
TinyTechie
Competitor Leaf Diagram
Our main competitor - hospital scale
Moms will do almost
anything to avoid
formula
Saboteurs

8. Market Size
SAM dropped as we
discovered that moms
needed to have
specific problems to
show interest
$15M
$2M
$309M
$20M
$400M
To improve our SAM, we looked at complementary mom products, including
breastfeeding survival kits, poop health identification apps, education
materials through the app, but these did not resonate in customer interviews.
SAM increased
slightly as we refined
our customer
segments
$500k

9. Channels
Week 1:
● Lactation consultants
● Mom and Pop Maternity
shops
● US association of lactation
consultants
Weeks 4-5:
● our own website
● amazon.com
● Mom and Pop shops make very little profit selling baby products and competing
against Amazon. They are pivoting towards baby classes for revenue
● Saboteurs - lactation consultants are mom influencers, typically very natural
focused, do not like technology
Validated In ProgressInvalidated

10. MVP Progression
Weeks 1-5
Proving Viability
Can moms picturing themselves using this?
Results:
Moms are familiar with nipple shields
Moms use iPhones while feeding, are not
concerned about wireless radiation when
their baby is underweight
Weeks 3-9
Proving Feasibility
Can we actually make this at a reasonable
cost?
Struggle:
Sensors were made for industries (too big),
or touches the fluid in smaller applications
(not food safe)
Technologies: Magnometer, Temp sensor,
OLED Sensor, in-pipe turbine

11. MVP Progression
Weeks 9-12
Feasibility Proved!
Results:
We flew to Las Vegas, found an excited
partner in IST (sensor company).
Validated that we can source tiny and
low cost flowmeters.
Specs:
Accuracy: +/- 5%
Size: 0.2-0.5 cm
Battery Life - 10 hours
Unit Cost - $3-$5
Next steps
Prove Usability
● 3D print the nipple shields and
embed the sensors
● Give it to moms to test

12. ARE GOING FOR IT!
Next Steps for the FlowMometer
Investment Readiness - Not yet, but could be a viable business
More validation needed:
● Are moms liars? They said they would buy it, but will they hand cash over?
(Lesson borrowed from other LLP team - Illuminate)
● Will moms actually enjoy using the product?
● Customer acquisition costs - is it low enough to be profitable?
Next steps:
● Build 20 FlowMOMeters
● Test payments and usability with moms
Stephanie Tony