The product development lifecycle gives teams a clear path to turn ideas into market-ready products. This approach breaks down the journey into 7 key stages:

• Ideation: Teams generate creative solutions to problems they've identified
• Validation: Concepts are tested for market fit and technical feasibility
• Prototyping: Early versions are created to collect feedback before a major investment
• Development: The actual product is built based on validated prototypes
• Testing: Quality assurance ensures the product works properly and offers a good user experience
• Launch: The product reaches the market with coordinated cross-team efforts
• Improvement: Post-launch feedback is gathered to enhance the product over time

This lifecycle helps product managers see challenges coming, coordinate teams across different departments, and keep projects moving forward. Companies might adjust these stages to fit their needs, but the basic flow stays similar across industries. By following this structure, teams lower risks, use resources better, and are more likely to create products customers actually want.^[1]