Today we’d like to introduce you to Anton Yakushin.
Anton, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
VentureBlocks began as a conversation between myself and Heidi Neck, who was my professor when I was an undergraduate student at Babson College studying business. Heidi is an expert in entrepreneurship education, and is a big supporter of game-based learning, which involves using game mechanics (for example, creating an environment where failure is encouraged in order to learn and progress).
Over the next few years, we conducted many customer interviews (in-person or phone conversations with the goal of truly understanding a potential customer and their needs) to understand the needs and problems of entrepreneurship educators around the country. We also spoke to over 200 undergraduate and graduate students studying entrepreneurship.
It was quickly apparent that it’s difficult to teach customer interviews to students who don’t have entrepreneurship experience, but it’s increasingly a core component of entrepreneurship courses. Students felt uncomfortable with the process, and although many students were reading about the process in class, it was like driving a car: it requires experiential learning with guidance and feedback to be effective. Unfortunately, professors simply don’t have the bandwidth to individually give each student such an experience. That’s why we created VentureBlocks!
VentureBlocks is a 3D simulation that teaches students to understand the needs of potential customers by having students practice talking to them and gaining insights in a virtual world. VentureBlocks gives players the challenge of learning about a new market that they know nothing about–small pet bears called “nanus”.
The realism of the simulation prepares students for what customer interviewing is really like, and we use game-based learning (missions, points, leaderboards) to provide guidance and make the experience fun. VentureBlocks allows students to make the most common mistakes in a comfortable, virtual setting, and provides instant feedback on each mistake made and action taken. With VentureBlocks, students are ready for customer interviews in the real world.
On top of that, instructors receive insights about their students, including their strengths, weaknesses, and lessons learned. Professors are able to tailor a follow-up lecture on areas where students struggled the most before sending them out into the real world.
Today, we are in over 50 colleges and universities around the United States and the world and growing. We are still talking to customers, iterating on feedback, and making sure our simulation is as current and useful as possible.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Speaking to entrepreneurship professors and students before creating our product was a huge help. We aimed to get the most learning done up-front, so that by the time we were building VentureBlocks, it was something our potential customers actually wanted.
In fact, we started by prototyping using a paper-based game using index cards with writing on them and poker chips to track points and progress. I played the role of the computer, setting everything up, responding to “player” actions, and enforcing the rules. By the time we started creating a computer simulation, we already knew what we needed to build.
It was definitely not easy, though. Research and prototyping took almost a year, and our very first computerized version had a number of issues because it needed to be downloaded for students to use it. This resulted in setup and performance issues, and we spent a lot of time rebuilding the simulation to get it to run from the cloud in users’ web browsers.
We also tested using the simulation in many different courses to see where it was most effective and where it was a natural fit. This even allowed us to develop follow-up activities to bundle with the simulation.
VentureBlocks – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
I’m a “jack-of-all-trades” software engineer and my co-founder, Heidi, is a well-known and experienced leader in the field of entrepreneurship education. I think this was a great combination of skills to have in our founding team.
We’re most proud that we created a tool and experience that aligns with the needs of entrepreneurship educators, and everything from the flow, the website experience, to the analytics were created with our customers in mind. We engaged entrepreneurship professors and students every step of the way.
What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
Most definitely VentureBlocks! We continue to engage our customers for feedback, and it’s so wonderful to hear from users that we created something that really helped them.
Pricing:
- VentureBlocks licenses cost $14.95 per student, with a bulk pricing options available
Contact Info:
- Website: www.ventureblocks.com
- Phone: (617) 383-7467
- Email: info@ventureblocks.com
Image Credit:
VentureBlocks LLC
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