Something useful for People & Tech

http://terpconnect.umd.edu/~toh/OLC.html

Good ideas are most beneficial when they are made to work technically and commercially

"Companies that do no invest in innovation put their future at risk. Their business is unlikely to prosper, and they are unlikely to be able to compete if they do not seek innovative solutions to emerging problems".
www.dest.gov.au/sectors/science_innovation

Suggestions for CRIS

I hope this is useful

• The website should be more dynamic. Short video clips of successful research/completed projects can be show cased
• Introduce e-magazine or e-newsletter
• Create a feedback channel on the website where people can ask questions and probably make suggestions, etc
• Place ads on popular sites like Facebook, Google (contact Naomi Jane[naomi@4wdfoundation.org] she's an alumni of RHUL and has history with Google. trust she'll be a good asset to CRIS)
• Rather than the long video clip which introduces what CRIS is about, why not have shorter ones showing what each group is involved in?
• You can include project sponsors in your listed projects

How to Write a Great Business Plan

Few areas of business attract as much attention as new ventures, and few aspects of new-venture creation attract as much attention as the business plan. Countless books and articles in the popular press dissect the topic. A growing number of annual business-plan contests are springing up across the United States and, increasingly, in other countries. Both graduate and undergraduate schools devote entire courses to the subject. Indeed, judging by all the hoopla surrounding business plans, you would think that the only things standing between a would-be entrepreneur and spectacular success are glossy five-color charts, a bundle of meticulous-looking spreadsheets, and a decade of month-by-month financial projections.

Nothing could be further from the truth. In my experience with hundreds of entrepreneurial startups, business plans rank no higher than 2—on a scale from 1 to 10—as a predictor of a new venture’s success. And sometimes, in fact, the more elaborately crafted the document, the more likely the venture is to, well, flop, for lack of a more euphemistic word.

What’s wrong with most business plans? The answer is relatively straightforward. Most waste too much ink on numbers and devote too little to the information that really matters to intelligent investors. As every seasoned investor knows, financial projections for a new company—especially detailed, month-by-month projections that stretch out for more than a year—are an act of imagination. An entrepreneurial venture faces far too many unknowns to predict revenues, let alone profits. Moreover, few if any entrepreneurs correctly anticipate how much capital and time will be required to accomplish their objectives. Typically, they are wildly optimistic, padding their projections. Investors know about the padding effect and therefore discount the figures in business plans. These maneuvers create a vicious circle of inaccuracy that benefits no one.

Don’t misunderstand me: business plans should include some numbers. But those numbers should appear mainly in the form of a business model that shows the entrepreneurial team has thought through the key drivers of the venture’s success or failure. In manufacturing, such a driver might be the yield on a production process; in magazine publishing, the anticipated renewal rate; or in software, the impact of using various distribution channels. The model should also address the break-even issue: At what level of sales does the business begin to make a profit? And even more important, When does cash flow turn positive? Without a doubt, these questions deserve a few pages in any business plan. Near the back.

What goes at the front? What information does a good business plan contain?

If you want to speak the language of investors—and also make sure you have asked yourself the right questions before setting out on the most daunting journey of a businessperson’s career—I recommend basing your business plan on the framework that follows. It does not provide the kind of “winning” formula touted by some current how-to books and software programs for entrepreneurs. Nor is it a guide to brain surgery. Rather, the framework systematically assesses the four interdependent factors critical to every new venture:

The People. The men and women starting and running the venture, as well as the outside parties providing key services or important resources for it, such as its lawyers, accountants, and suppliers.

The Opportunity. A profile of the business itself—what it will sell and to whom, whether the business can grow and how fast, what its economics are, who and what stand in the way of success.

The Context. The big picture—the regulatory environment, interest rates, demographic trends, and inflation (factors that inevitably change but cannot be controlled by the entrepreneur.

Risk and Reward. An assessment of everything that can go wrong and right, and a discussion of how the entrepreneurial team can respond.

Sell-side e-commerce for AMAZON

The Sell-side e-commerce involves the “sale of products to an organization's customers” (Chaffey, 2010).

The model adopted here is the Business-to-Consumer model where Amazon is a Transactional e-commerce site, i.e. it helps to facilitate the purchase of products online.

The map represents how HP interacts with Customers through AMAZON, the intermediary, who helps to facilitate purchase of products online.

HP gets its products across to AMAZON through via a courier service which can be viewed as a Supplier's (HP) supplier and possibly scanned pictures via the internet (the internet here can be thought of as a marketing tool). 
AMAZON in turn uploads photos of these items on its website along with useful information/details about each item, which will be considered important by the Customer, most especially the price and in most cases the product rating as judged / determined by previous buyers.

The main benefits lie in the convenience of the transactions, which entail searching for products from the comfort of your present location and indicating interest by making an order, and then proceeding to make an online payment. 

The Business-to-Cconsumer interaction is further strengthened through the use of ICT tools such as Blogs, Websites, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, RSS Feeds, Customer Database, E-mail, etc.

Customers get to communicate with HP via E-mail, HP website, HP Twitter, HP Blog, etc. 
HP responds to customer requests, inquiries or complaints via almost similar channels like the E-mail, FAQs on the website, RSS Feeds, Customer Database, etc.