Kickstart by Nomu Labs: product validation before building an MVP

In a recent article, we explained what Nomu Labs looks like today and why, in 2026, our focus is on product strategy, decision-making, and validation before investing in development. That approach is reflected in a structured service model built around three stages: initiation, growth, and maintenance. Each service has a clearly defined scope, purpose, and pricing, designed to be coherent, sustainable, and aligned with real product needs.

In this article, we focus on the initiation service: Kickstart. Kickstart is designed for teams that are about to build an MVP and need to reduce risk before committing time, capital, and resources. The goal is to make decisions before building and avoid investing in a digital product without real market validation.

What Kickstart is and why product validation comes first

Kickstart is a structured product validation process. It is not a traditional development project, and it is not an MVP designed to scale from day one. It is a Product 0.0, built to learn fast and decide with clarity whether a digital product is worth pursuing.

The process is time-boxed to six to eight weeks, with a clearly defined scope from the start. This structure forces prioritization, prevents unnecessary feature accumulation, and keeps the work focused on what actually matters: validating product and business hypotheses with real data before building more.

How the product validation process works

Kickstart starts by defining the product problem and the core hypotheses that must be true for the digital product to make sense. Clear KPIs and success criteria are set before any development begins, so validation is never left open to interpretation.

From there, a minimal MVP is built with one purpose only: validation. This MVP is instrumented from day one to capture meaningful market signals. Throughout the Kickstart, market analysis, user testing, and key metrics tracking are combined to generate real learning. All insights are documented to support informed decision-making before adding new features.

The main deliverable: decisions before building more

The outcome of a Kickstart is not just a functional MVP. It is a clear decision about the future of the digital product.

At the end of the process, the result is a concrete recommendation: continue, pivot, or stop. Each option is backed by data, metrics, and validated learning gathered during the product validation phase. This closure prevents emotional decisions, unnecessary development, and months of work spent on an MVP with no traction.

Who Kickstart is for

Kickstart is designed for early-stage startups, corporate teams exploring new digital products, and founders who need to validate an idea before raising investment or scaling an MVP. It also acts as a natural filter: it only works for teams willing to base their product strategy on evidence and make hard decisions when the data does not support the initial idea.

Kickstart within Nomu Labs’ product strategy

Nomu Labs sells clarity to decide which digital products are worth building. Kickstart is the entry point to that product strategy and the most direct way to validate before building.

If validation is positive, the product can evolve on solid foundations. If it is not, the value lies in discovering that early. In both cases, the outcome is the same: lower risk, better capital allocation, and stronger product decisions from the very beginning.

See Nomu Lab´s services