30A - Final Reflection

1. From the beginning, this course has been very informative, and I feel like I have taken a lot of information and applied it directly to my concept idea. My favorite assignment was 8-Solving the Problem as I had to come up with a problem myself and had to stick with it for the rest of the semester. This was quite a challenge at the time, because I was brainstorming all the possible creative inventions and how my product would have to be different. The most challenging assignment was 24-Venture Concept as it was tough to collect all my thoughts and ideas and present it in a way for others to understand.

2. I think I would have to say that the most important lesson from this class is that there are a lot of factors to consider when creating your own business/idea. It is usually not always about the product, but also about the right audience and need. Even if your product is revolutionary, it would be a waste if no one understands or wants it at the moment. Sometimes, there is a right-place right-time with businesses. Now I realize the first step to creating a business is to conduct interviews with potential customers and see if they really need the product you are trying to sell to them. My most proud experiences are the interviews with the potential customers and the improvement in my elevator pitches.

3. Yes, I definitely see myself as an entrepreneur now! I never thought I would enjoy coming up with creative solutions to the common problems people face on a daily basis. I want to be able to meet a lot of entrepreneurs and like-minded individuals to get a better perspective of their entrepreneurial story.

4. A lot of the assignment in this class might be similar to other ones, but they are all different in the sense that they focus on different aspects of your idea. This is good to know and understand when progressing through the coursework so don’t think it is repetitive, but rather see that the assignments as challenging different perspectives you might encounter in a real venture. My suggestion for doing well in this class is to start the assignments early and provide great feedback on your peers’ work as it helps you develop the entrepreneurial mindset without worrying about grades. Overall, this class has been fantastic, Dr. Pryor’s lectures have been very helpful and insightful, due to that, I feel as though I might consider taking more business courses or even pursing an MBA in the future!

29A - Venture Concept No. 2

SimpleTrade – Who knew trading would be so simple?

Opportunity – The intended audience for my product are adults who are either young or inexperienced in the stock investment domain. The app does not really apply to experienced investors as they already have the knowledge required to be a successful investor. Many people earn money and route the cash to a savings account. On average, high yield savings accounts generate 1.0% APY (Annual Percent Yield) so for every $1000 invested you would earn $10 per year. In contrast, the stock market generates about 10% yield on average and in 2019 the S&P 500 had returns of 30% and even 33% (if dividends were reinvested). This would have generated about $330 per year for every $1000 invested. This data shows that there is a lot of opportunity in making money if an individual chooses the stock market instead of a standard savings account. The primary issue is that people are inexperienced and if they blindly invest, it could lead to significant losses. The window of opportunity is quite broad as people can start investing any time, especially right now in the middle of a pandemic, it is much easier to make returns as the price of most companies is low.

Innovation – My solution to the above problem is to develop a mobile application called SimpleTrade that would teach inexperienced adults how to begin investing in the market. My primary goal to make sure people feel comfortable buying and selling stocks and realizing that although trading is quite risky, it is a calculated risk and that you should not panic when the price of a certain stock goes down. The app will consist of many features such as a stock market simulation game, daily events and analysis of companies, and 1-on-1 meetings with expert investors. These features provide the necessary skills needed for a new individual to test out their skills and apply it to the market. The pricing structure for this app is quite straightforward. We will have a subscription-based model of 2 tiers. The first would have the user would pay $8/month to use all the features with no minimum contract length, they are also free to cancel the plan whenever they desire. The second plan would be a $6.50/month plan but would consist of a yearly contract and the whole year would be paid at once, this will come out to $78/year which is cheaper than the first plan’s $96/year. By default, we will provide one free 1-on-1 session with the expert investor but have a charge of $20 for each additional session. In order to promote our product, we would run a free month trial of the service to new users if they have been referred by a paying customer. The paying customer would also receive a free 1-on-1 expert meeting for every successful referral. This plan seems to be quite realistic and profitable as the app wouldn’t necessary have a lot of physical costs, just the cost to maintain the app as well as the 1-on-1 meeting cost (collected separately as shown above).

Venture Concept – The main reason people will start subscribing to the app is to gain knowledge and insight about stock trading. The motivation for this service is simple and can be similar to the famous quote - “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to finish and you feed him for a lifetime”. Customers understand this concept and wish to learn a skill they can use throughout their life. From my observations, there are not many apps that have similar functionality at a low cost like my app. This is beneficial for me as I don’t have to worry about customers switching from a comparable product to mine. The only competitors are professional investment agencies and other online resources (text, videos, courses), etc. In terms of professional agencies, those are too expensive and might not help the investor learn to invest themselves and might be reliant on the agencies for a long time. The online tutorials on the other hand have a lot of misinformation as they can be posted by anyone and could lead to bad trading habits and significant monetary loss. One thing for the user to consider is that although stock trading can bring about a lot of gains, it is a risky venture and that they could potentially lose a lot of money if done incorrectly. Therefore, they should also invest in money that might be comfortable losing. The company would need to have employees for marketing, maintaining the app, contacting experts, and customer support. It could be scaled but to start this is all we would require.

The three minor elements – As mentioned in the previous assignment, my most important resource is accessibility. This app is planned to be supported on both iOS and Android, there is no location restriction as the user could learn even from their own living rooms, and since the subscription is monthly they can cancel and choose other services if that is what they prefer. The product is essentially customer-centric and whatever they wish to get from it, they will receive. A big idea I could implement in the future would be real estate trading as that would open the app to a wider audience and help customers diversify their assets. This might also be less risky because people have a tangible product when it comes to real estate and would be more inclined to start investing. For the people who want a high-risk high-reward investment strategy, I plan to incorporate cryptocurrency trading in the near future. Cryptocurrency will soon become an essential part of society and my app will be ready to accommodate it. As for personal goals, I would like to see myself moving to San Francisco and growing my network. This would be of great value to this app as well as to ensure that the company can go public with an IPO in the future. My hope is to impact a lot of people while making it relatively easy for them to begin investing.

Feedback – From my previous Venture Concept assignment, folks were very interested in my idea and felt like it was unlike many of the other concepts. I have received some praise about my focus on accessibility and the inclusion of cryptocurrency in the future as people agree that these are major factors in the success of this idea. One point that was mentioned was to notify users of the app that there is risk involved in trading. I have to agree with this point, as no matter how trained you are in stocks, you could lose money and it is a risk that the app user needs to be aware of. It is a good point for me to include that in the terms and conditions as well to prevent people from suing me. I have added both future cryptocurrency support as well as notifying trading risks to users to my original Venture Concept.

28A - Your Exit Strategy

My exit strategy is quite situational, I feel like I would stay with the company for a long time if the idea is successful/popular enough to keep having customers and regular cashflow. When I plan a serious project, I like to see the end result and my impact on the lives of the user. This is the primary stance I would take. The alternative would be if the company is failing, I would leave the company after a couple of years.

It does not seem ideal to pursue an idea that people are not interested in, I feel like at this point I would go back to the drawing board and figure out another venture idea. It would be a lot more expensive and unproductive to further pursue this goal.

I don’t think it had a major impact on the other concepts/ideas I have about my product. Since it is more situational, I haven’t completely incorporated the exit strategy onto my plan. Another potential idea would be an acquisition of my product by a larger stock-focused company. This would be a great way to exit and pursue other entrepreneurial adventures.

27A - Reading Reflection No.3

For this assignment, I chose to read Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future by Ashlee Vance. I really enjoyed this book as I got to see the life of famous entrepreneur Elon Musk unfold in front of me.

1. One surprising moment of the book was that Elon used to try calling high-level executives and hoped that one of them would pick up and talk to him about his ideas. The thing that I admire most about Elon is his determination to believe in the most bizarre ideas. From a young age, he wanted people to move to other planets to save mankind in the event that something terrible was to happen. People would never seem to take his ideas seriously, but he never gave up! The thing that I admire least about Elon is that he is too child-ish at times and does not act professionally, which could also be seen as a positive to some, but not exactly to me. There was a time when Elon had to choose between saving Tesla and saving SpaceX, even though both companies were dear to his heart. He chose to take some financial gambles and made some last-minute payments to somehow keep both companies afloat at the time. Now you can see how common the Tesla car brand is and also how SpaceX is launching plenty of manned and unmanned rockets each year.

2. He was a really hard worker and always believed that working hard was the only way to achieve your dreams. He thinks that traveling and taking breaks are for lazy people who have no real ambitions in life.

3. The part that confuses me the most is how people gave Elon a chance even with his crazy ideas. I feel as though if I were a businessman listening to a person saying their goal is to “colonize Mars”, I would be taken aback and feel as though the person is just wasting my time.

4. The first question I would ask him is “Would he permanently move to Mars himself?” Because I feel like a person with the vision, should be able to try the path for themselves. The second question I would ask him is “What do you think the young and inspired people of today should do to let their ideas heard by the top executives (such as himself)?” I would like to know if he would continue to do the same things he did when he was young, in today’s day and age.

5. As I mentioned earlier, Elon is a huge advocate for hard work and feels as though he got to where he is now due to his passion and hard work mindset. I definitely share that opinion as well, as I don’t know many successful people who got there without the pain of working hard.

26A - Celebrating Failure

One of my failure moments from this semester included me cutting my own hair. Due to COVID, I wasn’t able to go to my regular barbershop and had to cut my hair at home. Since my parents are generally busy, I had to do it myself. The first time I had attempted this, it was quite a mess. The cut wasn’t even and I felt like it was too short but couldn’t do anything about it, aside from waiting for it to grow back. I then tried again after a couple of weeks but used a longer clip size so the hair wouldn’t be cut as short and the results were a lot better than the first time around. Soon after, I kept cutting my hair and adjusting the sizes and areas I cut to better suit the shape of my head and my preference. I can now say, after about 6 attempts, that I am fairly good at cutting my own and have even helped out some of my friends cut their own hair by giving them directions virtually. I am now debating if I should even go to the barbershop after the COVID situation as I feel confident about cutting my own hair and it is a cost-effective life skill. The main takeaway from this experience is that the more you try to do something, the better you come, and the more consistent you become. The first time was the worst and I felt like I couldn’t leave my house (due to fear of being mocked) but gradually I became a lot better at it. This class had also taught me this skill in terms of taking risks when it comes to ideas and to never give up. It might seem like a failing idea initially but if I can fail and find ways to improve, the idea could be revolutionary one day.

25A - What's Next?

Existing Market

An addition to the app in the future would include trading cryptocurrency. Most people have heard of cryptocurrency but have always given it second thoughts when deciding to purchase it. I feel as though it is a rising form of currency especially when we are shifting into mobile and online payment methods. I would need to include some cryptocurrency investors in the plan, but it seems like a definite step in the right direction. From the three interviews I conducted, the interviewees thought that my plan would be quite successful, there will all quite skeptical about it at first but felt like it would happen someday in the future. They also noted to include training videos that would assist users navigate the app as well as other segments within this product.

Overall, I think the interviews went really well and the plan to expand to cryptocurrency makes a lot of sense. The priority for now would definitely lie in the stock market portion of the product but we need to always be ready to take on the next big thing.

New Market

A radically different market I would take this app would be real estate investment. The reason this is radical is because of the target audience. A real estate investment app would be ideal for older folks who have saved up a lot of money throughout the years to make income. Real estate does not tend to excite younger folks and they tend to not have the initial capital to start investing. The app would be very similar to the stock market portion but would guide the user on what/where to look for when purchasing properties, potential times to begin, and even fees and taxes they would need to consider. The value of this idea comes from the fact that it would help older adults diversify their assets and if they buy a beatdown place, they could renovate it, and make a significant profit from it. There is endless potential in this area. The two people I interviewed strongly agree with my idea and said they would subscribe to this service if it ever came about. They are older and feel as if there aren’t many cost-effective solutions to help them understand the real estate domain. They suggested having a chat feature when users can share pictures of homes with each other and get a rough estimate of what people think the house should be worth. I think this is a great feature to include and would definitely work on it when I am ready to take on the real estate industry.

I would say the real estate market is more appealing to work on than cryptocurrency as more people are familiar with it. This is somewhat surprising to me as I feel like we are shifting into/currently in a tech-focused era. I feel like conducting interviews with folks around us is a great way of understanding what the general customer would prefer and helps us target those specific needs.

24A – Venture Concept No.1

SimpleTrade – Who knew trading would be so simple?

Opportunity – The intended audience for my product are adults who are either young or inexperienced in the stock investment domain. The app does not really apply to experienced investors as they already have the knowledge required to be a successful investor. Many people earn money and route the cash to a savings account. On average, high yield savings accounts generate 1.0% APY (Annual Percent Yield) so for every $1000 invested you would earn $10 per year. In contrast, the stock market generates about 10% yield on average and in 2019 the S&P 500 had returns of 30% and even 33% (if dividends were reinvested). This would have generated about $330 per year for every $1000 invested. This data shows that there is a lot of opportunity in making money if an individual chooses the stock market instead of a standard savings account. The primary issue is that people are inexperienced and if they blindly invest, it could lead to significant loses. The window of opportunity is quite broad as people can start investing anytime, especially right now in the middle of a pandemic, it is much easier to make returns as the price of most companies are low.

Innovation – My solution to the above problem is to develop a mobile application called SimpleTrade that would teach inexperienced adults how to begin investing in the market. My primary goal to make sure people feel comfortable buying and selling stocks and realizing that although trading is quite risky, it is a calculated risk and that you should not panic when the price of a certain stock goes down. The app will consist of many features such as a stock market simulation game, daily events and analysis of companies, and 1-on-1 meetings with expert investors. These features provide the necessary skills needed for a new individual to test out their skills and apply it to the market. The pricing structure for this app is quite straightforward. We will have a subscription-based model of 2 tiers. The first would have the user would pay $8/month to use all the features with no minimum contract length, they are also free to cancel the plan whenever they desire. The second plan would be a $6.50/month plan but would consist of a yearly contract and the whole year would be paid at once, this will come out to $78/year which is cheaper than the first plan’s $96/year. By default, we will provide one free 1-on-1 session with the expert investor but have a charge of $20 for each additional session. In order to promote our product, we would run a free month trial of the service to new users if they have been referred by a paying customer. The paying customer would also receive a free 1-on-1 expert meeting for every successful referral. This plan seems to be quite realistic and profitable as the app wouldn’t necessary have a lot of physical costs, just the cost to maintain the app as well as the 1-on-1 meeting cost (collected separately as shown above).

Venture Concept – The main reason people will start subscribing to the app is to gain the knowledge and insight about stock trading. The motivation for this service is simple and can be similar to the famous quote - “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to finish and you feed him for a lifetime”. Customers understand this concept and wish to learn a skill they can use throughout their life. From my observations, there are not many apps that have a similar functionality with a low cost like my app. This is beneficial for me as I don’t have to worry about customers switching from a comparable product to mine. The only competitors are professional investment agencies and other online resources (text, videos, courses), etc. In terms of professional agencies, those are too expensive and might not help the investor learn to invest themselves and might be reliant on the agencies for a long time. The online tutorials on the other hand have a lot of misinformation as they can be posted by anyone and could lead to bad trading habits and significant monetary loss. The company would need to have employees for marketing, maintaining the app, contacting experts, and customer support. It could be scaled but to start this is all we would require.

The three minor elements – As mentioned in the previous assignment, my most important resource is accessibility. This app is planned to be supported on both iOS and Android, there is no location restriction as the user could learn even from their own living rooms, and since the subscription is monthly they can cancel and choose other services if that is what they prefer. The product is essentially customer-centric and whatever they wish to get from it, they will receive. A big idea I could implement in the future would be real estate trading as that would open the app to a wider audience and help customers diversify their assets. This might also be less risky because people have a tangible product when it comes to real estate and would be more inclined to start investing. As for personal goals, I would like to see myself moving to San Francisco and growing my network. This would be of great value to this app as well as to ensure that the company can go public with an IPO in the future. My hope is to impact a lot of people while making it relatively easy for them to begin investing.