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About TCGen

TCGen Inc. is a product management and product development consulting firm based in Menlo Park, California. TCGen advises companies on accelerating product innovation and reducing costs by working with teams and management to unlock the value they already have in engineering and marketing.

TCGen assists companies in the strategy and innovation processes through product definition, execution, and launch. TCGen has helped cut time to market, rapidly scale product programs, foster a product mindset and improve innovation.

History of TCGen

John Carter is the founder of TCGen Inc. Carter was chief engineer at BOSE Corporation, a consumer electronics company. Carter shares the patent for BOSE’s Noise Canceling headphones and the patents assigned to Livescribe for a design to reduce noise in smart pens.

Carter founded Product Development Consulting (PDC) in Cambridge and Boston, Massachusetts. Carter and his PDC colleagues wrote the Apple New Product Process (ANPP) for Apple Computer, a product development process used in all of the company’s divisions.

After serving as a CTO and on the Board of several organizations, including Cirrus Logic, a semiconductor supplier, Carter founded consulting firm TCGen in 2002.

Past Publications

• Measure the Steps to Success [Concurrent Engineering], Wayne Mackey, John Carter, IEEE Spectrum, Vol. 31, 6, 1994.
• Getting It Done: New Roles for Senior Executives, Tom Hout and John Carter, Harvard Business Review, November-December, 1995.
• Innovate Products Faster: Graphical Tools for Accelerating Product Development John Carter and Jeanne Bradford (CreateSpace: 2012).
• Strategic Agility – The Trinity of Governance, Process & Funding, John Carter, Business Agility, April 2, 2020.
• Can Agile and Waterfall Co-Exist?, John Carter, TrendiG, April 8, 2020.
• Predictive Metrics: Measuring the Key Drivers That Indicate Agile At Scale Success, John Carter, Atlassian, May 6, 2020.
• How to Manage an Innovation Portfolio, John Carter, Viima, May 8, 2020.
• Five Product Development Pitfalls — And How to Avoid Them, John Carter, Zoho, May 20, 2020.
• 15 Key Considerations Before Expanding Your Product Offering, John Carter, Forbes, January 20, 2021.
• Looking For Innovation In All The Wrong Places? Inventing Outside The Core, John Carter, Forbes, February 3, 2021.
• Avoid The Next Product Failure: Rethinking Your Product Strategy, John Carter, Forbes, May 27, 2021.

In The News

• Jesse Nieminen, Interview with John Carter, Founder, TCGen, The Innovation Room, May, 11, 2020.
• Yaniv Corem, School of Innovation – Episode 16, June 9, 2020.
• Jess Larsen, Innovation and Leadership – Episode 397, June 2020.
• Phil Mckinney, Innovation Lessons from Bose, Killer Innovations, July 7, 2020.
• Chris Kalaboukis, Corporate Innovation with John Carter of TCGen, think future, July 21, 2020.
• The Productivity Process, Agile Innovation – Why Doing the Right Things is Not Enough, Zoho, July 21, 2020.
• Meaningful Metrics Are Simpler Than You Think, Solutions IQ, July 21, 2020.
• Brett Harned, Innovation Process with John Carter, Team Gantt, August 3, 2020.
• Nick Skillicorn, Overcoming the Hurdles of Designing New Technology, Idea to Value, October 12, 2020.
• Michael Luchen, How To Cultivate Innovation In Product, The Product Manager, June 7, 2021.
• Terri Williams, Debunking Myths About Agile (and How to Use it Well), The Economist, July 23, 2021.
• Tim Reitsma, How To Build a Culture of Innovation, People Managing People.
• Jesse Nieminen, Innovating Faster & Navigating Barriers to Innovation with John Carter, Viima.

TCGen Owner and Principal

Nolan Myers

Nolan Myers is the owner and Principal Consultant of TCGen, where he helps organizations accelerate innovation, improve product execution, and deliver better products to market faster. A Harvard-trained computer scientist, Nolan has led teams that created products used by millions — from an education platform adopted by half of California’s public schools to a digital publishing platform powering content workflows at McGraw-Hill, Pearson, Starbucks, and McDonald’s.

At TCGen, Nolan partners with leaders to strengthen product strategy, execution, and speed to market. TCGen’s clients rely on its proven frameworks to cut time to market, scale product delivery, and embed innovation practices that stick.

A lifelong musician and technologist, Nolan explores how art, science, and teamwork combine to create exceptional products. He lives in the Bay Area, where he spends his time trying to stay fit, cooking, and studying how AI can amplify human creativity.