30A – Final Reflection

1) In the beginning I was very excited about this class. I put a lot of work into this class. However, I quickly became less excited with my idea. I did not realize that we would have to work off this one idea for the entire rest of the semester. As the semester wore on especially around the time where there were a lot of assignments to interview people I lost interest in the class. I think this is reflected in my blog. Then as we moved away from the interviews I regained some interest.

2) The most formative experience I believe where the elevator pitches. These taught me a lot about explaining my idea simply and quickly. They also helped me have a better understanding of my own idea and service. As I spoke my ideas out loud there were certain things that I thought "wow that sounded better in my head". There were other things that I hadn't really thought to much about but when I vocalized them I thought wow that would be really cool.

3) I don't see myself as an entrepreneur yet but I think this class helped me move towards that mindset. I still have a long ways to go and a lot to learn. However, this class definitely helped me in identifying opportunities and looking at their strengths and weaknesses. Staying on my one idea all semester made me see a lot of weaknesses I did not previously know to look for.

4) This class really does not require very much work. To get the most out of it watch the lectures in the beginning of the week and look at the prompts. Some prompts can require a couple days to complete if they require interviews. If it doesn't throughout the week just think about whatever the prompt is. When you have an idea write it down. Then at the end of the week bring all your ideas together for your blog post.

29A – Venture Concept No. 2

1) Opportunity

      Everyone has the need for VR many people just don't know it. As VR and AR improve it could revolutionize the way we are presented information.

What are the forces or changes in the environment creating this opportunity?

Changing technology is the biggest change in the environment. We are finally getting to the point where soon this technology will be possible.
How is this market defined geographically and demographically?
Well my original idea was to focus on historic sites. I believe that the true value of this technology is in the technology to allow realistic renderings on top of objects. The demographic this appeals to is younger people who are open to the idea of VR and AR. Once this technology is invented the possibilities are endless.
How are customers currently satisfying this need?  And how loyal are they to whatever they use now?  
Currently their are some limited VR and AR solutions like the HTC Vive, Oculus Rift, and Google Cardboard. These are all fairly new products that people don't have a sense of loyalty to. They also are pure VR and do not do AR with realistic rendering mixed with views from real life.
How big is this opportunity?
This opportunity is huge. If things could be realistically rendered along side and with real life objects the possibilities would be endless. For example when driving your car a rendering pops up over the a business your driving by displaying some deal. Or something like my original idea to use this technology for tourism purposes.
How long will the “window of opportunity” be open?
This window will be open until someone comes to dominate the VR and AR market. It is a race to develop the technology to make this possible before anyone else. Even once the technology is created depending on how it is licensed it may be possible to pursue opportunities within this field using someone else technology.

     Innovation

The innovation here is new and advanced VR and AR technology. VR technology obviously already exists but it currently requires a very powerful computer to run it well. There are still massive strides to be taken in the field. Especially with AR which is augmented reality. We can create awesome virtual worlds but mixing the real world and the digital world with a smooth transition between the two has proven very difficult.

Venture Concept

People will buy my AR/VR solution simply because there is nothing like it out their yet. My goal is to try to create something brand new. I want to create my own market not enter an already existing one. This means that if I were successful with inventing this technology I believe it would not be very difficult to convince people to use it.

2) Feedback

Based on the feedback I received I became less attached to my business idea and more attached to the technology as a whole. I realized I was thinking to small. This technology if invented could have many possibilities.

3) Change

Because of my feedback I have pretty much stopped focusing on my original idea. I want to completely focus on the technology behind making this product possible. That technology is what builds the value of this company. Once that technology is invented products and services can be built off it in any direction.

4) 

27A – Reading Reflection No. 3

Mindset: Carol Dweck

1. What was the general theme or argument of the book?

The general theme of the book is that there are two mindsets. One is that talent in an inherent trait we are born with. The growth mindset on the other hand believes that most basic abilities can be taught through hard work. It tells the reader how having a growth mindset will lead to more success for a person.

2. How did the book, in your opinion, connect with and enhance what you are learning in ENT 3003?

Having a growth mindset is important for success in general I believe. Therefor it is of course relevant to the class because we wish to be successful entrepreneurs. As an entrepreneur you face hardship and difficulties that you would not face in other situations. You will have to do things you don't know how to and learn.

3. If you had to design an exercise for this class, based on the book you read, what would that exercise involve?

Think about your mindset and which mindset you think you have. Pick something you don't know how to do, it doesn't have to be something super difficult and do it. Talk about you experience learning to do that. That wasn't an inherent talent that was something you just learned to do. And by learning you have grown. Take this and expand it to the rest of your life.

4. What was your biggest surprise or 'aha' moment when reading the book? In other words, what did you learn that differed most from your expectations?

Honestly I was not really surprised by this book at any moment. Everything I read I thought this makes sense to me. However here are some cool examples of people who went on to do great things but were not recognized for it early then later became great. Geraldine Page a famous actress was told to quit because she wasn't any good. Darwin and Tolstoy were consider ordinary children.

28A – Your Exit Strategy

My exit strategy goal would be to have my company be acquired by a larger tech company. I don't have a set amount of time I would want to work on my business before being acquired, as long as it took to build something good enough to get the right offer. This might require building the company completely or just partially. The modern technology giants have so much money that they acquire tons of companies that have "cool" and potentially useful technology. They have even been known to buy entire companies for certain patents and scrap the product. Another thing they have done is to buy companies just to get all the engineers working their.

I couldn't see myself staying at one job for decades. Im an engineer I like to create and build, once you reach a certain point in a company the creating and building are done and its just about running it. I would want to do this for a while but knowing myself I would want to eventually leave and move on to creating something else new.

I think this is a very common exit strategy or hope I suppose for tech companies. I think it has affected my business ideas because it means I have no interest in creating a "small business". A large company isn't going to be willing to pay (hopefully lots of money) for something small. For that to happen requires you to be developing technology that a) you have some protected Intellectual Property that is valuable. I think thats what my company idea really comes down to, the whole using it to VR and AR travel is just an example. The real value would be I believe in the technology required to create these realistic renderings, and having that technology better and/or before others.

Due to this I think that it has affected how I would allocate resources with putting a lot into the engineering behind creating this technology.

26A – Celebrating Failure

My biggest failure this semester was having to drop my engineering statistics course. I knew the class would be difficult going in but it was much harder than I anticipated. It started out easy enough because I took and passed AP statistics in high school. However by the end of the first exam we moved on to materials I was not familiar with. The graduate student instructor was terrible at explaining things and extremely boring. We often compared him to Ross from Friends. I tried to study by myself but failed miserably due to a difficult to understand book. I think failure is a lesson. I think if I had dedicated more time to the class and watching videos like khan academy I could have succeeded. Im upset with myself about that. If you try your absolute hardest then it is no big deal.

25A – What’s Next?

Existing Market
The biggest thing that is next for my current market is developing the technology behind it. This will be the hardest part of the entire venture I believe. Pretty much everyone I talked to agreed with me that the thing I needed to focus on was the underlying technology. That will really make or break the whole business. If it is good enough to provide an immersive experience it will be great. If it is unrealistic, grainy, and jerky people will not pay for it. They also all said why limit yourself to this travel VR or AR. If you develop the technology that is good enough companies will be all over you to use it for their purposes.
New Market
The applications for VR and AR are endless. With the technology developed for my original concept I could reach many other markets. One market I thought of is as a training tool.  Think about a medical school student for example. They could use VR to practice or learn more about surgery for example. This creates value because it may allow people to train to do tasks where actually doing those tasks over and over again might be expensive or unrealistic. The first person I interviewed was my aunt who is a doctor. She said she could definitely see an application for this especially among starting med school students. The next person I talked to is my roommates dad who is a former air traffic controller. He said it would be a great training tool for pilots.

22A – Elevator Pitch No. 3

I tried to be clear and straight to the point. I wanted the pitch to be easy to understand for someone with out any technical knowledge.