First, what’s a startup?

What first comes to your mind when you think of the word “startup’’? Entrepreneurship, small teams, funding, creative disruption, the k-drama… The list probably goes on and on.

According to Wikipedia (yeah, I know. I’m actually quoting Wikipedia, but I think the definition does the term justice), a startup refers to “a company… undertaken by entrepreneur[s] to seek, develop, and validate a scalable business model.”

buzzvil

So according to the definition, buzzvil is definitely a startup. It was founded by entrepreneurs who disrupted the Ad-tech industry through original and innovative products. The business model has continuously evolved and grown ever since, through the efforts of some 120 employees. But as the company grew in size and business became more mature, there came the need for more swift innovation. Such needs called for the creation of the Business Incubation Center(BIC), meant to act like a startup inside a startup.

Introducing the BIC

The BIC is a small team with 3 members so far. Max is the lead and PM of the BIC team. He has been with buzzvil ever since he moved from France to Korea 8 years ago 🇫🇷🇰🇷. He is also the Head of Design at the company. Mason, who is the author of this article, is the team’s market researcher. He lived in the US for 11 years 🇺🇸🇰🇷. Aspiring to learn more about Product Management, he joined buzzvil in July 2022 and is thoroughly satisfied with the company, team, and environment of continuous growth. Jia, the product designer and the newest member of the team, is Hungarian-born Chinese who speaks 4 languages 🇭🇺🇨🇳🇬🇧🇰🇷 (she can communicate with more than a third of the world’s population!) Before joining buzzvil, she worked at a Korean B2B startup as a product designer. As you can see, the team is very dynamic and global, and collaboration happens in English.

What makes the BIC more startup-like?

So what makes the BIC a startup inside a startup? Part of this could be answered by this question: What’s the most important aspect of a startup?

The business model? The funding amount? Its culture?

These are indeed all very indispensable factors of a startup but none of these is possible without the people who started the startup. These people are entrepreneurs, who are adventurous and take ownership of the business and its products. And the members of the BIC team do just this– they develop new products and take ownership and responsibility for their success and failure. Along the way, the team continuously ideates, researches, develops, validates, and iterates for the success of that new product.

As such, the BIC team is, by nature, meant to be adventurous. Because it’s small, it makes decisions more autonomously and quickly. Communication is direct and seamless, without unnecessary paperwork or pretenses. While being autonomous, the team keeps in check through daily scrums and what’s called the weekly PPP’s, which are dedicated to sharing the week’s Progress, Problems, and the coming week’s Plans. Through such exercises, everyone stays on the same page and focuses on one common objective, generating higher focus and delivering results more quickly.

So what is the BIC’s goal?

The team’s objective is to create new products that will increase the company’s customer reach by 2-3 times. Yes, it’s a bold goal as buzzvil already has many clients. But the team receives a lot of support within the company and it has firm belief in achieving this goal through the best practices mentioned above. Despite knowing it’s going to be challenging, being a part of creating an entirely new product and watching it succeed will be a feeling like no others.