Reference no: EM133056340

A cornerstone of this course is the completion of a business plan and presentation for a fictitious business that you will create. This project forms a major part of your grade and as a consequence it will require you to put in an appropriate level of work. The project entails using many of the skills you have learned throughout your educational career, including writing, research, accounting, finance, spreadsheet, power point presentations and speaking in front of other students. Your final product will be three documents (wirtten business plan, Excel financial projections, 't& power point presentation) alone with an oral presentation of your business idea at the end of the semester.

Part One - The semester project is to prepare a fund seeking "package" for a startup business of your choice. That package will include a brief business plan, a set of financial projections and a power point presentation. The project will be due in sections, with one section being due approximately everyone to two weeks.

The first part is to come up with a business idea. It could be a totally new business, or it could be a twist on an existing business. The description of your business idea should be no more than two or three paragraphs.

The business you choose should qualify as an entrepreneurial venture. That means it needs to be able to achieve rapid enough growth and market penetration such that it can generate substantial profits and cash flow to satisfy the expectations of risk vs. reward of venture capital investors. Starting a food truck, while an interesting concept, it not an entrepreneurial venture that will create value. The business concept must meet the tests of a viable venture opportunity (see page 51 of the textbook.)

The textbook states that it must meet or create a customer need, initially provide a competitive advantage, have an attractive time-to-market profile, and offer the expectation of attractive returns.

Part Two - Part Two of the semester project is to perform research to try to come up with a typical customer and a market size. The typical customer will be a demographic description that could include such demographics as gender, age, ethnicity, race, lifestyle, income, wealth and so on. You should try to describe you target customer in as much detail as possible.

The next step is to try to come up with a market size both in terms of buyers and dollars. To do this you might need to think about how much customers will spend on your product, and how many of those customers exist. You might also research information on existing market sizes for products that your business will compete with. Checkout the definition of a Beachhead Customer.

You will add this market and customer information to the document you previously submitted for Part One of this project.

Part Three - In part one of the semester project you came up with an entrepreneurial business idea. In part two, you developed a profile of your target customer, and an estimate of the size of your target market. In part three of the semester project you need to develop a business model and what you will need to do to make that business model work. What is a business model? It is your strategy of getting your product to market (the customers) and how you will make money from that process.

So as an example, Uber has a business model where it matches drivers with passengers. Uber collects the passenger's money, takes its cut, and pays the rest to the driver. But to make this business model work Utter needs 1) a robust software platform, 2) a method of recruiting drivers, and 3) a strategy for marketing its services to consumers.

Let take another example. Samsung manufacturers cell phones. However, in order for it to sell its phones it must convince sell phone carriers, like T-Mobile, Sprint and AT&T to sell those phones to their customers. It must also provide for ongoing development of its operating system, so that the phones work properly. It must also provide customer support to cell phone owners to address problems with the phone. Samsung also must market directly to cell phone service subscribers to convince them they should buy a Samsung, as opposed to an I Phone.

With both of these business models, Mere are challenges and hurdles that the businesses must overcome for the businesses to be successful. In you business you will also have challenges and hurdles. You will need to explain what you business model looks like, how you will make money and what challenges and hurdles you will have to overcome to make it all work.

Part Four - Part four of the semester project is to develop your marketing strategy. How will you market your product? Will you need salesmen or will you do advertising? If you do advertising what kind will you do? Will you advertise on social media or Google? Will you use pay per click advertising? Will you employ direct response marketing? Will you use multi-level marketing? Will you enlist the assistance of influencers? Will you partner with strategic businesses who can market your products? Will you use television, radio or billboard advertising?
Your discussion of marketing should include both the marketing methods that you will use, but the costs of those marketing channels and how much of you will spend on marketing in order to generate sales revenue. It should also include any ongoing marketing to existing customers to gain repeat business, and what you will do to keep customers engaged and interested.

Again, reviewing the sample business plans posted on Blackboard would be a good start in completing this section of the semester project. Remember, you should be adding this section to what you have already written previously on you business idea, your market and customers and your business model.

Part Five - Now that you have developed your business idea, identified your target market, developed your business model, and developed your marketing strategy, now it is time to produce your financial projections. Your financial projections should go out month by month for five years, should include income statements, balance sheets and statements of cash flow. Further, your projections should be assumption driven, as discussed in class. Your projections should be created using Excel spreadsheets.

Part Six - Using the cash flow forecasts you prepared in part five of the semester project, do a business valuation on your business using the models we reviewed in class. Determine how much money you will need to raise for your venture, what your venture is worth, and how much of your company you will have to give up in order to raise the required capital to start the business.

Part Seven - Prepare a 5 to 10 slide pitch deck to be used in presenting your business idea to a group of potential investors. You will need to submit your pitch deck under this assignment section, but you will also have to "pitch" your fellow students on the last day of class. Note that due to time constraints your final oral pitch to your classmates will be limited to five minutes. You do not necessarily have to show your entire pitch deck during the pitch exercise, however you will have control of the Zoom meeting and so you will have the opportunity to present whatever material you feel is appropriate for your pitch.

Your final presentation should be a call for capital. In other words, you should be pitching your idea to your fellow classmates as if they were investors. That means you need to have a business idea that needs capital for its launch, and you have to determine as part of your work how much of your company you will be wiling to give up for the capital you need. You will figure that out in parts five and six of the semester project.

The project is due in seven parts. You will find the requirements for each part under Other Assignments. The due dates for each segment of this project are listed below.

'Please pay very careful attention to the instructions. My experience is many students who do poorly do so because they do not follow the instructions. Read the instructions, make sure you understand them and then let me know if you aren't 100% clear on what you are supposed to do.