Service-oriented business models evolve over decades or centuries, often taking on the characteristics of the local, regional, or national culture. They are often archaic and slow to react to the changing dynamics that technology and automation force upon the business environment.
The evolution of technology, the Internet, and the wireless universe in which we now reside has created an opportunity to build systems that can, and will, fundamentally change the basic mechanics of many service-oriented business models. From insurance to banking to health care to brokerage and so on, we are witnessing the convergence of two powerful and often opposing business concepts – service and efficiency.
By building and/or adopting technology solutions that are designed to re-engineer the back-end delivery function of a service business, the framework of the service itself can be revolutionized, creating both price arbitrage that will allow the business to scale at a greater rate than the rest of the marketplace, as well as operational efficiency that can be used as a tool to attract and retain clients.
We, as a group, will endeavor to accomplish the following:
- identify a service oriented business model that we believe is outdated and flawed,
- determine the technological application that could, if deployed, revolutionize the business and address its shortcomings,
- develop a plan to build out our new business model,
- build the business case as to how we are going to execute upon our plan and why it should be funded, and
- raise the necessary capital (within the fiction of our classroom environment), and
- execute upon the first phase of our plan.
Method of instruction:
- Lectures and discussions regarding cutting edge business models and case studies
- Invited speakers who are specialists
- Analysis of relevant endeavors (successful and unsuccessful)
- Development of a detailed business plan and model
- Oral presentation and discussion of business plan
- Written assignments
- Analysis of cases
Most ventures within established marketplaces require substantial time and resources to launch. Often, within larger companies, the pressure to achieve quarterly results and the emphasis on maintaining the core revenue base dominates the culture and therefore inhibits models that may be directly at odds with the existing organization. With internet and high-tech ventures, where initial start-up costs are limited, these traditional barriers no longer exist which is why a record number of new companies have emerged over the past decade, such as Google, Ebay, Yahoo!, Amazon, etc. that have significantly altered the landscape of the markets in which they compete.
The course will emphasis the following: (1) research and analysis and the tools to disqualify ideas, (2) e-business and high-tech tools that are essential, (3) various financial alternatives and the value of private equity and strategic capital, and (4) execution in the early and late stages of corporate development.
One of the goals of this course will be to provide the students with a set of practical tools that will allow them analyze a market, write a business plan, raise capital if needed, and design the business schema or product prototype that will need to be launched. As students work in a group environment to tackle issues from budgeting capital needs, to hiring outside contractors, to managing a defined number or market resources, to generating revenue, they can expect to learn and benefit from the collaboration that a group process will provide. A additional benefit from the group and classroom environment is that a wide variety of talents and skills be inevitably be required for success, and the group will have to find ways to share and manage the intellectual tools that exist within the classroom and barter when appropriate to achieve human capital efficiencies across various groups. By learning from each other’s experiences and pooling intellectual capital, the classroom itself will gain efficiencies in achieving operational and strategic objectives.
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