Hardware founders: budget for testing before you spend everything building the prototype. Components and fabrication are only part of the cost. You may also need calibrated instruments, lab access, field trials and time to understand why something failed. Plan for those costs early. Before funding another redesign, ask whether testing the current version would tell you more about what to build next. 3f.vc/article/building-a-pro…

Budget for testing before you build the next version. A working prototype still needs time, equipment and money to prove it’s reliable. 3f.vc/article/building-a-pro…

How do you go from building a product to closing your first B2B contract? We've compiled a few lessons from our conversations with founders on working closely with customers, managing changing requirements and getting paid. Read: 3f.vc/article/co-building-yo…

Your first B2B customer will teach you more about your product than months of internal planning. We've put together lessons from founders who've recently closed their first contracts, covering co-building, pricing and earning customer trust. Read: 3f.vc/article/co-building-yo…

Your first B2B contract often changes the product you thought you were building. At 3F VC, we've spoken to founders who've recently closed their first contracts. A few recurring lessons: Co-build with 2–3 customers to identify shared needs. Define pilot scope and pricing early. Earn trust by delivering and responding quickly. Understand what your work is worth to the customer. We've put together some learnings from these conversations. Read: 3f.vc/article/co-building-yo…

Building in public is useful even when nobody is following you. Documenting what you tried, what went wrong and what comes next creates a record that others can learn from. We put together a simple guide to writing better public updates. 3f.vc/article/how-to-write-a…

Most early founders don't have impressive numbers to share. That's fine. A failed experiment, a wrong assumption or an unexpected learning can make for a useful public update. Here's how to write one that people can actually learn from. 3f.vc/article/how-to-write-a…

You don't need users or impressive numbers to write a public update worth reading. Your mistakes, failed experiments and what you learnt from them can be useful to another founder. We wrote a short guide on how to make your public updates worth reading. 3f.vc/article/how-to-write-a…