May 31, 2010 at 20:27How to win the heart of Yandex?
You can often hear complaints that major players in the Internet market are not interested in startups, that getting through to them and telling your idea is almost impossible, that there aren’t enough tools even to quickly create a prototype product that can be convincingly presented and understood by them whether he is interesting to them.
Startup Point decided to help developers by opening new ideas for a direct path to the doors of Yandex. At the 19th Startup Point meeting in Moscow, Yandex representatives Grigory Bakunov and Anton Zabannykh described how Yandex tools can be used to create their projects.
How to do it and what is needed for this?
The idea should be fast fresh and original. Approximate areas of activity that Yandex may be interested in may include, for example:
- analysis, structuring of the personal (mail, subscriptions, etc.) and general information flow (news, blogs, etc.), for example, using data extraction technology;
- New interface solutions for web services and applications;
- processing and presentation of personal data in various fields (finance, medicine, documents, etc.);
- Methods of studying user behavior on the Internet, advertising technology.
A more detailed and official list of areas of their interests will be published by Yandex in the near future. It is not necessary to be limited to this list, the main thing is that the idea be really interesting.
In order for you to quickly build a prototype of your product, Yandex offers to use its tools: API for a number of its projects.
The API of some Yandex products (such as Blogs, Photos or Maps) is already open and documented, a full list can be found at api.yandex.ru
In addition, in the framework of cooperation with Startup Point, Yandex is ready to provide access to the internal API of other projects: At the moment, it is the Yandex.Mail and RSS subscription API.
Conventional APIs simply extend the functionality of the product for which they are intended - for example, using such APIs you can write your own plugins for Mail, which will show additional information about the sender of the letter, thumbnails of documents in unusual formats, etc.
Yandex's top-secret internal APIs are the tools on which the product is completely built: for example, Yandex Mobile Mail is entirely made using the Mail API. These are powerful tools for developing full-fledged new products in which all the functionality of the original product can be involved.
In early July, we plan to hold a special Startup Weekend - an event where a program participant has a chance to build a prototype of his product in 54 hours, using the advice of Yandex technologists if necessary.
In addition, program participants can ask questions about the functionality of the APIs provided and, in some cases, request and receive the opportunity to expand the capabilities of the API with the functionality necessary for product development.
At the end of summer, we will hold the final event - the presentation of prototypes and finished projects for Yandex. The meeting will be attended by Yandex management, including the leaders of the main areas of the company. Only the most interesting projects will be presented: prepared during the program, or found by us in the community.
Yandex will talk with the project participants most of all liked by Yandex :)
How to participate in the program:
Write us an email at yandex@startuppoint.ru, in which you state:
- the main idea of the product is not very long, please.
- the degree of readiness of the product ¬– idea, prototype, finished project.
- Do you need access to the internal API of products (Mail and RSS-subscriptions) - we will contact Yandex with a request to open access for you.
- Do you need people to implement a product prototype - we will try to help you by posting an ad on finding the right people on the site www.StartupPoint.ru and on other friendly sites.
Startup Point decided to help developers by opening new ideas for a direct path to the doors of Yandex. At the 19th Startup Point meeting in Moscow, Yandex representatives Grigory Bakunov and Anton Zabannykh described how Yandex tools can be used to create their projects.
How to do it and what is needed for this?
1. Come up with an idea
The idea should be fast fresh and original. Approximate areas of activity that Yandex may be interested in may include, for example:
- analysis, structuring of the personal (mail, subscriptions, etc.) and general information flow (news, blogs, etc.), for example, using data extraction technology;
- New interface solutions for web services and applications;
- processing and presentation of personal data in various fields (finance, medicine, documents, etc.);
- Methods of studying user behavior on the Internet, advertising technology.
A more detailed and official list of areas of their interests will be published by Yandex in the near future. It is not necessary to be limited to this list, the main thing is that the idea be really interesting.
2. Use Yandex tools
In order for you to quickly build a prototype of your product, Yandex offers to use its tools: API for a number of its projects.
The API of some Yandex products (such as Blogs, Photos or Maps) is already open and documented, a full list can be found at api.yandex.ru
In addition, in the framework of cooperation with Startup Point, Yandex is ready to provide access to the internal API of other projects: At the moment, it is the Yandex.Mail and RSS subscription API.
Conventional APIs simply extend the functionality of the product for which they are intended - for example, using such APIs you can write your own plugins for Mail, which will show additional information about the sender of the letter, thumbnails of documents in unusual formats, etc.
Yandex's top-secret internal APIs are the tools on which the product is completely built: for example, Yandex Mobile Mail is entirely made using the Mail API. These are powerful tools for developing full-fledged new products in which all the functionality of the original product can be involved.
3. Ask Yandex for advice
In early July, we plan to hold a special Startup Weekend - an event where a program participant has a chance to build a prototype of his product in 54 hours, using the advice of Yandex technologists if necessary.
In addition, program participants can ask questions about the functionality of the APIs provided and, in some cases, request and receive the opportunity to expand the capabilities of the API with the functionality necessary for product development.
4. Show Yandex your product
At the end of summer, we will hold the final event - the presentation of prototypes and finished projects for Yandex. The meeting will be attended by Yandex management, including the leaders of the main areas of the company. Only the most interesting projects will be presented: prepared during the program, or found by us in the community.
Yandex will talk with the project participants most of all liked by Yandex :)
How to participate in the program:
Write us an email at yandex@startuppoint.ru, in which you state:
- the main idea of the product is not very long, please.
- the degree of readiness of the product ¬– idea, prototype, finished project.
- Do you need access to the internal API of products (Mail and RSS-subscriptions) - we will contact Yandex with a request to open access for you.
- Do you need people to implement a product prototype - we will try to help you by posting an ad on finding the right people on the site www.StartupPoint.ru and on other friendly sites.