Four to eight weeks. That is the window between idea and launched product when you work with an AI-native development team. It sounds aggressive, but it is not a marketing claim — it is a repeatable process that we execute on every MVP engagement at Meld.
The secret is not working longer hours or cutting quality. It is eliminating the waste that traditional development processes have normalized:
- Weeks of discovery documents that no one reads
- Boilerplate code that has been written a thousand times
- Communication overhead between siloed teams
Here is the exact process we follow to take your startup from idea to live product in 4-8 weeks.
Week 1: Discovery and Scoping
The first week is the most important. This is where we understand your vision, define what the MVP actually is, and map the fastest path to market. The goal is not to document everything you will ever build — it is to identify the smallest possible product that proves your hypothesis.
The five-day sprint
| Day | Focus | Output |
|---|---|---|
| Day 1-2 | Vision alignment | Business model clarity, user personas, competitive landscape |
| Day 3-4 | Scope definition | Prioritized feature list with clear MVP boundary |
| Day 5 | Technical architecture | Roadmap with weekly milestones, architecture document |
Scope discipline
Every feature must answer one question:
"Does this need to exist for the first 100 users to get value?"
If the answer is not a clear yes, it goes to the backlog. This discipline is what separates a 4-week launch from a 4-month launch.
The output of Week 1 is not a 50-page specification — it is a shared understanding of what we are building and a plan to build it.
Weeks 2-3: Foundation and Core Features
This is where AI-native development shows its power. While a traditional agency would spend weeks setting up authentication, building admin panels, and configuring CI/CD pipelines, we start with a production-grade foundation that already includes all of this.
What ships on day one of development
On day one of development, your product already has:
- User authentication with social login and email/password
- Multi-tenant database architecture
- Admin dashboard for managing users and data
- Email notification system
- Payment integration with Stripe
- CI/CD pipeline with automated testing
- Monitoring and error tracking
This foundation alone eliminates 60-80 hours of boilerplate on every project. Your engineers focus exclusively on what makes your product unique.
AI-augmented velocity
With the foundation in place, AI-augmented coding accelerates feature development by 2-3x:
| Activity | Traditional | AI-Augmented |
|---|---|---|
| Code generation | Manual typing | AI-generated, engineer-directed |
| Test writing | After development | Written alongside features |
| Documentation | End of project | Continuous, automated |
| Refactoring | Periodic sprints | Real-time optimization |
Weekly demos keep you in the loop. Every Friday, you see a live demo of what was built that week. No surprises, no status reports that obscure reality — just working software.
Weeks 4-6: Feature Completion and Polish
By week 4, the core features are functional. Weeks 4-6 are about completing the feature set, polishing the user experience, and hardening the product for production traffic.
User experience refinement
We review every user flow end-to-end, looking for:
- Friction points — where users hesitate or get confused
- Missing feedback — actions that do not confirm success or failure
- Confusing interactions — flows that require explanation instead of being intuitive
The difference between a product that feels professional and one that feels like a prototype is in these details.
Edge case handling
What happens when things go wrong? We systematically identify and handle edge cases:
- What happens when a user submits an empty form?
- What happens when the payment fails?
- What happens when two users edit the same record simultaneously?
- What happens when the network drops mid-transaction?
Each of these becomes a handled scenario rather than a support ticket.
Performance optimization
| Optimization | Target | Why It Matters |
|---|---|---|
| Database queries | Sub-100ms response | Users feel instant feedback |
| Image compression | 80%+ size reduction | Faster page loads, lower bandwidth |
| API caching | Hot data served from Redis | Sub-millisecond response times |
| Lazy loading | Below-fold content deferred | Faster initial render |
The goal is a product that feels fast from the first interaction.
Weeks 6-8: Testing, Deployment, and Handover
The final phase ensures everything works reliably in production and transfers full ownership to you.
Testing strategy
Every critical user path is covered by automated tests:
- Unit tests for business logic — individual functions verified in isolation
- Integration tests for API endpoints — request/response contracts validated
- End-to-end tests for complete user flows — browser-automated path verification
- Manual QA across browsers and devices — human validation of the experience
Production deployment
We deploy to production infrastructure with:
- Environment configuration — production secrets, API keys, feature flags
- SSL certificates — end-to-end encryption for all traffic
- Domain setup — custom domain with proper DNS configuration
- CDN configuration — global content delivery for maximum performance
- Database backups — automated daily backups with point-in-time recovery
This is not a staging environment — it is ready for real users from day one.
Documentation and knowledge transfer
| Deliverable | What You Get |
|---|---|
| Technical documentation | Architecture, deployment process, codebase conventions |
| Training sessions | Hands-on walkthroughs for your engineering team |
| Full source code | Complete ownership, no vendor lock-in |
| Infrastructure access | All accounts, credentials, and configurations |
What Makes This Possible
Three things make 4-8 week MVPs possible:
1. Production-grade foundation
Starting from zero is the number one reason MVPs take months. Our foundation eliminates 60-80 hours of boilerplate work on every project. Authentication, billing, admin panels, CI/CD — all done before your project starts.
2. AI-augmented development
Our engineers work 2-3x faster than traditional developers by leveraging AI for code generation, testing, and documentation. The time savings compound across every feature.
3. Senior engineers only
Junior developers need mentoring, make more mistakes, and work slower on complex problems. Every Meld engineer has Fortune 10 experience and can work autonomously on production systems.
No juniors learning on your dime. No communication overhead between teams. Just senior engineers building your product at AI-augmented speed.
Is Your Idea Ready for an MVP?
The best MVP candidates have three characteristics:
- A clear target user — you know exactly who will use this
- A specific problem to solve — not a vague improvement, a concrete pain point
- A value hypothesis — a testable belief about how the product creates value
You do not need a perfect business plan or a detailed specification — you need clarity on who cares and why.
If you have that clarity, Meld can have your product in front of real users in 4-8 weeks. MVPs start at $15K, and every project includes full source code ownership, documentation, and 90 days of post-launch support.
The best time to launch was yesterday. The second best time is in 4-8 weeks.