Please see below the journey of my Venture Building Activity. All of this was done without raising any capital. All of this was done with a very limited budget that I managed to gather from almost a decade of savings from various employments.
Research Phase 1
March 2020
Lockdown began and I suddenly found myself with a lot of extra time. There were no more gym sessions, no more after work socials, life was very Hobbsian. So with all this time, I started to do research on what extra jobs I could do during this spare time. I initially thought I should buy and sell sunflower oil.
Operations Phase 1
October 2020
Due to operational issues, I decided not to pursue sunflower trading opting instead for building an MVP with a friend I met at Google Campus.
Opened Zeraf Technologies
March 2021
My friend and Co founder had a child and drops out. At this point, our MVP wasn't great and so I decided to open a small office with 3 Software Engineers in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Venture Builder
July 2020
Without realizing, I had created a Venture Builder. I had created 3 prototypes and started to gather feedback from potential customers. At this point, I narrowed down the list to 3 prototypes. Medusa, GiraffeNotes and GreenCheddar
MVP Generation 1
January 2022
Released the first version of GreenCheddar and GiraffeNotes and collected feedback from all walks of life. There was a clear signal. We should pursue GreenCheddar despite it's many flaws.
MVP Generation 2
May 2022
Released Medusa and Third Version of GreenCheddar. Collected feedback. It seemed that achieving sales was difficult. We didn't manage to hit product market fit. However there was a stronger signal for GreenCheddar. So we dropped Medusa and went full steam on GreenCheddar.
The Pivot
September 2022
Released the 4th version of GreenCheddar. The feedback was much better, however the legacy was clunky and therefore we decided to build a smaller mobile version taking lessons from the past iterations.
MVP Generation 3
April 2023
Released 5th MVP of GreenCheddar. We believe this is the final stage and are in the process of onboarding clients.