There are several great examples of successful lean start-ups that have disrupted the market and achieved great success through the lean start-up methodology.
Slack: Founded in 2009, Slack is a workplace messaging company that disrupted the traditional corporate communication channels using a lean start-up approach and quickly grew to a multibillion-dollar enterprise. They focused on customer centricity and continuous learning to listen to what customers wanted and iterated quickly to serve those needs. Slack leveraged a simple, easy-to-use product at the right time to gain market traction and quickly grew into the leading workplace communication platform.
Airbnb: Founded in 2008, Airbnb has revolutionized the hospitality and travel industry by utilizing a lean start-up approach and focusing on customer satisfaction. They leveraged online networks, geographical information and user-generated content to create a unique user experience that dramatically lowered the cost of accommodation. Airbnb employed a continuous testing, learning, and iteration process to fine-tune its product and ultimately grew to be a multi-billion dollar company.
Dropbox: Founded in 2007, Dropbox is a file sharing and storage service that revolutionized the data storage and collaboration space. They used a lean approach to test the market and quickly iterated on the product. Dropbox's team focused on user experience, ease of use and convenience, which helped them become the dominant file storage and collaboration solution.
These are just a few examples, but there are many more out there. Aspiring entrepreneurs should be encouraged to take a page out of these successful lean start-ups’ books and adopt similar approaches to better serve their customers, iterate quickly and grow their business.