Hello all,
As our final class approaches, this blog post will talk a little bit about my entrepreneurial journey and some of its biggest takeaways, as well as some of the highlights and lowlights of the class and the whole process. The class has really flown by - it seems like not too long ago that we were packed into a room in Giannini, and no we're hours away from doing our final run through in front of the class. I can say with certainty that I've learned a lot. I'll first be talking about the most important takeaways from the entrepreneurial journey.
Find the perfect balance between ideal and practical. I believe that a big part of the entrepreneurial journey is compromise. You're always going to have an "ideal" situation, an "ideal" product - given infinite time, resources, this is the best product you can design. But there are always restrictions. One of the big things we learned how to do was compromise between our ideal vision of the project and the vision that we could realistically create and implement. One big example of this was when we were debating about whether or not to choose CRISPR as our patent. On one hand, all of us were very excited about the visionary technology and what it could mean if it was developed further. On the other hand, that vision was many years of R&D and a lot of investments away from becoming a reality - not the best choice for a startup to tackle. And, in that case, we had to sacrifice our ideal choice for a more practical choice - a patent we were almost equally excited about, but one that was far more realistic. That's not to say you should always give up and pivot at the first sign of trouble, but I think it's important to go into the entrepreneurial journey with an open mind and the willingness to change or stand firm, given a certain situation.
You don't always have to meet all your deadlines, but you have to set them. To clarify, I am not saying that it's ok to miss deadlines because you're being lazy or because you choose not to do some work on time - that's a recipe for disaster. I do believe, however, that when something comes up, it's ok and even important to deviate from schedule. The key, however, is to HAVE a schedule in the first place, so you can always come back to it. For example, after switching patents, we fell 1-2 weeks behind every other team that had stuck to their initial ideas. We also fell behind on our customer surveys, because we spent a long time researching our patent and understanding the technology, reaching out to the research teams, etc. But I'd say these were both valuable "tangents," because we picked a more realistic patent and garnered an excellent understanding of our patent and the underlying technology, and that's helped us immensely in the process of creating the product and the pitch. But, we still had a schedule we were on, and we were able to get back to it. We have Rick and Tal to thank for this - they had set a schedule for the class, with benchmarks for what to get done every week. Many of the weeks, we didn't necessarily meet these benchmarks. But the fact that the schedule was there meant we had a mark to aspire to, with a hard deadline to have the deck done & the pitch ready. We worked harder and faster over the last few weeks to make up for lost time, and we are now ready with the deck and ready to present in today's class. If we hadn't had a schedule, with a hard stop date, we would have never actually gotten back on track.
Clear communication and delegation are vital to having good teamwork. The most efficient way to do a group project is to have open channels of communication, constant debate and discussion, and clear delegation/segmentation of tasks. At the beginning of the project, we definitely did not talk very often. As a result, no one knew exactly what they were supposed to do for a given week, and we ended up not working too efficiently. But as the semester progressed, we learned to have very clear delegation of tasks. We got into the habit of setting up a whiteboard or google doc in our virtual/in-person meetings, and we would list every task that needed to be accomplished and put someone's name next to it. By doing this, everyone knew what he/she was responsible for, and there was far more visibility and accountability. These are small, but vital processes that made our team more efficient.
Now, I will briefly look into some of the highs and lows of our project before wrapping up. I'd say the lows were primarily concentrated during times where we felt too far behind schedule or too overwhelmed with work. Specifically, right after we rejected the idea of a CRISPR-based product, I was worried about catching up to the rest of the class, and I was worried that our final pitch would suffer as a result of having less time to work on it. It was also concerning when we were struggling to get replies from different professors (especially the Berkeley team) to discuss their patents. However, I'd say that the lows were never too bad - I personally always had confidence that our team was talented and hardworking enough to succeed in the end. The highs were in the moments that everything came together - when we got excellent customer data supporting our product idea, when we finally put together our deck and did our first pitch, etc. These moments were pretty fulfilling, as they showed that all our hard work had come to fruition.
I would say that IEOR 185 has fulfilled my expectations and more. I signed up for this class because I wanted to learn real-life entrepreneurial skills, and I have been able to do that in a very hands-on way. I would definitely look to take another IEOR challenge lab class in the future.
Thursday, April 27, 2017
Private blog post 5 - What keeps you up at night regarding your project?
Hello all,
In today's blog post I will be talking about the prompt, "What keeps you up at night regarding your project?" I would say that, for the most part, I am very happy with the way our product has been put together. We have a TON of customer data - both through surveys we have done as well as customer data that we got from the UC Davis researchers, which justify that people would buy our product. We have also conducted good financial research to justify our P&L, as well as analyze competitor companies with similar wearables to understand what sells and what doesn't.
I would say my main concern with this product is the willingness of the subject - namely children - to wear the band. One major concern, that I have had since the beginning of the project, is the issue of privacy. Obviously this is more of a concern to older kids & adults (who would probably have the wearable uploading data to an app on their own phone, not a parent or guardian), but I still think younger children would feel uncomfortable with having their parents able to see exactly what they are seeing at every moment in the day. This is a major concern, because if the children stop wearing the product, the product will garner bad reviews and future parents will be hesitant to buy. We are trying to address this issue in our go-to-market strategy, where we have discussed different strategies for marketing (product placement in superhero movies, ads that appeal to children, etc.). It's a double edged sword - the whole point of our product is to give parents a deeper insight into their children's feelings, which they tend to keep silent. Obviously, children would show some resistance to having their parents see this information.
Ultimately, this is a valid concern, but I do not think it is something that cannot be appropriately addressed. With a strong marketing message that appeals to both kids and parents, many of these concerns should be assuaged. Additionally, the product will only fall flat in situations where kids are upset enough to defy their parents' orders and remove the wearable (which the parents would be made aware of). Given that this should theoretically be a small percent of our customer base, I have high hopes that this product would sell well, with high customer satisfaction in most cases.
In today's blog post I will be talking about the prompt, "What keeps you up at night regarding your project?" I would say that, for the most part, I am very happy with the way our product has been put together. We have a TON of customer data - both through surveys we have done as well as customer data that we got from the UC Davis researchers, which justify that people would buy our product. We have also conducted good financial research to justify our P&L, as well as analyze competitor companies with similar wearables to understand what sells and what doesn't.
I would say my main concern with this product is the willingness of the subject - namely children - to wear the band. One major concern, that I have had since the beginning of the project, is the issue of privacy. Obviously this is more of a concern to older kids & adults (who would probably have the wearable uploading data to an app on their own phone, not a parent or guardian), but I still think younger children would feel uncomfortable with having their parents able to see exactly what they are seeing at every moment in the day. This is a major concern, because if the children stop wearing the product, the product will garner bad reviews and future parents will be hesitant to buy. We are trying to address this issue in our go-to-market strategy, where we have discussed different strategies for marketing (product placement in superhero movies, ads that appeal to children, etc.). It's a double edged sword - the whole point of our product is to give parents a deeper insight into their children's feelings, which they tend to keep silent. Obviously, children would show some resistance to having their parents see this information.
Ultimately, this is a valid concern, but I do not think it is something that cannot be appropriately addressed. With a strong marketing message that appeals to both kids and parents, many of these concerns should be assuaged. Additionally, the product will only fall flat in situations where kids are upset enough to defy their parents' orders and remove the wearable (which the parents would be made aware of). Given that this should theoretically be a small percent of our customer base, I have high hopes that this product would sell well, with high customer satisfaction in most cases.
Thursday, April 20, 2017
Private blog post 6 - Are you ready?
Hello all,
As we approach the end of the semester and our project, this week's blog post will cover one question: "Are we ready?" Simply put, I believe we are.
Our team has put a lot of time and thinking into every part of this project - even including the selection of the patent(s). We bounced around CRISPR and then 1-2 other options before we selected these 2 patents. After we selected the patent, we didn't immediately start designing a product - we first ensured that we understood it. This process actually set us back a few weeks, in terms of keeping up with the class, but I believe it was invaluable. Collectively, we reached out to the Berkeley & Davis teams that built and designed these technologies, read several scientific articles, and watched YouTube videos that demonstrated live demos of the technology. Afterwards, we shared our findings with one another, and this ensured one important thing - each member of our team knew our patents like the back of their hand.
As our understanding of the technology matured, we carried out several customer interviews. Not only did we carry out our own customer surveys, we actually reached out to the Davis team to ask if they had any data here. This proved to be a huge boon, as their team sent us a customer survey report that assuaged some of our concerns - they showed, overwhelmingly, that surveyed people would be willing to buy a product based on this technology. Given that, we were able to design a product with a thorough understanding of how it works, and then provide justifiable financials to make it a reality.
I firmly believe it is impossible to pitch an idea to someone else unless you understand that idea yourself. It's the same thing with pitching a product - and we understand and know this product incredibly well, and I think that's going to allow us to succeed in our pitch and in our Q&A. Our journey was a bit rocky at times, but now, as we finish up the deck and shore up the final holes in our presentation, I can say with confidence that we are ready.
As we approach the end of the semester and our project, this week's blog post will cover one question: "Are we ready?" Simply put, I believe we are.
Our team has put a lot of time and thinking into every part of this project - even including the selection of the patent(s). We bounced around CRISPR and then 1-2 other options before we selected these 2 patents. After we selected the patent, we didn't immediately start designing a product - we first ensured that we understood it. This process actually set us back a few weeks, in terms of keeping up with the class, but I believe it was invaluable. Collectively, we reached out to the Berkeley & Davis teams that built and designed these technologies, read several scientific articles, and watched YouTube videos that demonstrated live demos of the technology. Afterwards, we shared our findings with one another, and this ensured one important thing - each member of our team knew our patents like the back of their hand.
As our understanding of the technology matured, we carried out several customer interviews. Not only did we carry out our own customer surveys, we actually reached out to the Davis team to ask if they had any data here. This proved to be a huge boon, as their team sent us a customer survey report that assuaged some of our concerns - they showed, overwhelmingly, that surveyed people would be willing to buy a product based on this technology. Given that, we were able to design a product with a thorough understanding of how it works, and then provide justifiable financials to make it a reality.
I firmly believe it is impossible to pitch an idea to someone else unless you understand that idea yourself. It's the same thing with pitching a product - and we understand and know this product incredibly well, and I think that's going to allow us to succeed in our pitch and in our Q&A. Our journey was a bit rocky at times, but now, as we finish up the deck and shore up the final holes in our presentation, I can say with confidence that we are ready.
Thursday, April 13, 2017
Private blog post 4 - Details about our Patent
Our patent is a wearable tech device that monitors sweat, heart rate, temperature, and other factors in order to track the body's sympathetic and parasympathetic pathways and display the person's response to stimuli. The patent is for a fabric that stretches over a certain part of the body - currently it is designed to be a glove, but our research shows that a strap that goes across the palm and then the wrist would also be technologically feasible. The band uses a technology called GSR - galvanized skin reading - in order to measure the body's response to different stimuli using an electric current. It also measures skin resistance and sweat resistance, both of which change when a person is exposed to various stimuli that increase put stress on the body. This tech is very very sensitive to even small changes - one video we watched showed that it can pick up even small disturbances - a person who was wearing it was lightly punched on the arm, and the graph showed a spike, indicating the body's reaction. This makes it extremely feasible as a device to track a person's mental/emotional health throughout the day, as it can pick up on even subtle moments of stress/reaction in people.
This patent is still pending, so we cannot list the claims in details.
The business potential of this patent is simple - we are essentially selling information about how the human body responds to various stimuli throughout the day, and there are a number of parties that would be interested in using that information for some benefit. The first types of customers would be those who would use it to improve their own health or the health of a loved one. This category would include people who have kids or loved ones with mental health illnesses like PTSD or autism. This device was actually designed for people with ASD for a few reasons - one important one being that people with autism often have episodes of panic or stress. However, leading up these episodes, there are several telltale signs (increased heart rate, elevated stress levels, changes in sweat, etc.) that could be tracked by this technology. Thus, parents, teachers, or even people with ASD themselves could notice when such an episode was going to occur and take steps to prevent it. It can be similarly used for people with PTSD. The second types of customers would be hospitals and mental health rehabilitation facilities - they can use this type of product to better track and provide care for all of their patients. The final market we could expand into is the media/advertising market. Companies, film producers, etc. can have test subjects wear the band and then display different types of advertisements, media, and track the subjects response. This would be a more effective way for them to determine what kind of imagery elicits a positive response in people, and, therefore, more effectively sells products.
This patent is still pending, so we cannot list the claims in details.
The business potential of this patent is simple - we are essentially selling information about how the human body responds to various stimuli throughout the day, and there are a number of parties that would be interested in using that information for some benefit. The first types of customers would be those who would use it to improve their own health or the health of a loved one. This category would include people who have kids or loved ones with mental health illnesses like PTSD or autism. This device was actually designed for people with ASD for a few reasons - one important one being that people with autism often have episodes of panic or stress. However, leading up these episodes, there are several telltale signs (increased heart rate, elevated stress levels, changes in sweat, etc.) that could be tracked by this technology. Thus, parents, teachers, or even people with ASD themselves could notice when such an episode was going to occur and take steps to prevent it. It can be similarly used for people with PTSD. The second types of customers would be hospitals and mental health rehabilitation facilities - they can use this type of product to better track and provide care for all of their patients. The final market we could expand into is the media/advertising market. Companies, film producers, etc. can have test subjects wear the band and then display different types of advertisements, media, and track the subjects response. This would be a more effective way for them to determine what kind of imagery elicits a positive response in people, and, therefore, more effectively sells products.
Thursday, April 6, 2017
Private Blog Post 3
Hello all,
One of the big decisions our team needs to make this week is deciding which market we want to expand into initially. We are considering 4 major options - people with autism and other mental health illnesses, media/business who would use it to see emotional responses to advertising, and the general population, where it would just serve as a tool for people to track their mental and emotional health. We would also have to make the decision to either simply sell the product to a large distributer company that would then handle it, or to make, market, and sell the product ourselves.
After our discussion with Rick, we concluded that we would spend some more time doing research, mostly in the form of learning more about each of these markets and talking to people in them, but ultimately, as we were advised, if that didn't lead us to one obvious choice, we plan to just pick the option that we're most passionate about. I personally feel most excited about introducing the product as a device to help people with mental illnesses and then ultimately expanding it to the general population. In the entrepreneurial spirit, I'd also prefer to maintain and grow the company, rather than sell to a tech giant for immediate profit.
In terms of our team work and schedule, we are currently looking to pick a weekend in which we can meet and hammer out the final presentation. Scheduling has been a concern for us, as the weekends following spring break look pretty busy for some of our members. Another issue that is vital to address moving forward is splitting up roles for our final pitch - we have yet to fully organize and segment the rest of the tasks on our to-do list. Looking to accomplish this in the coming weeks.
One of the big decisions our team needs to make this week is deciding which market we want to expand into initially. We are considering 4 major options - people with autism and other mental health illnesses, media/business who would use it to see emotional responses to advertising, and the general population, where it would just serve as a tool for people to track their mental and emotional health. We would also have to make the decision to either simply sell the product to a large distributer company that would then handle it, or to make, market, and sell the product ourselves.
After our discussion with Rick, we concluded that we would spend some more time doing research, mostly in the form of learning more about each of these markets and talking to people in them, but ultimately, as we were advised, if that didn't lead us to one obvious choice, we plan to just pick the option that we're most passionate about. I personally feel most excited about introducing the product as a device to help people with mental illnesses and then ultimately expanding it to the general population. In the entrepreneurial spirit, I'd also prefer to maintain and grow the company, rather than sell to a tech giant for immediate profit.
In terms of our team work and schedule, we are currently looking to pick a weekend in which we can meet and hammer out the final presentation. Scheduling has been a concern for us, as the weekends following spring break look pretty busy for some of our members. Another issue that is vital to address moving forward is splitting up roles for our final pitch - we have yet to fully organize and segment the rest of the tasks on our to-do list. Looking to accomplish this in the coming weeks.
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