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Business Process: A Slow Start, But A Bigger Impact

The Process of a Business

Coming in to the business world, in making and selling a product, one would think that it is quick and easy to be known by the public and sell it. But it’s not. The process of being a start-up business is not quick at all. Business plans are a need in order for the product to be well-planned and successful, and the fact that we still need to process the intellectual property of our own products.

Intellectual Property? Are those really important?

What is intellectual property? Intellectual property is a category of property that includes intangible creations of the human intellect. There are many types of intellectual property, and some countries recognize more than others. The most well-known types are copyrights, patents, trademarks, and trade secrets. Startups play a vital role in the businesses of the people, since it depicts the potential and the success of that business.

“All Rights Reserved”

Now that you know what intellectual properties mean, why should we know about copyrights? Copyright is a legal means of protecting an author's work. It is a type of intellectual property that provides exclusive publication, distribution, and usage rights for the author. In simpler terms, copyright is the right to copy. This means that the original creators of products and anyone they give authorization to are the only ones with the exclusive right to reproduce the work. Examples of products that are protected by copyright are songs, books, and films. That may be why you see terms “All rights reserved” on films and songs everywhere.

Qualifications of Being the “Product”

We head on to patents. What are patents, really? For people who are not that fond of businesses, patents are really confusing to understand. Sometimes people would confuse copyrights to patents. But now I’m going to explain what a patent really is. A patent is an exclusive right granted for an invention, which is a product or a process that provides, in general, a new way of doing something, or offers a new technical solution to a problem. To get a patent, technical information about the invention must be disclosed to the public in a patent application.  The invention that an inventor applying for a utility patent must prove that his/her invention is useful, beneficial, and operable to the people. If an invention must be granted and qualified for a patent, the invention must qualify the requirements. Like drugs and medical services, it must be qualified for a patent before it is released for the public to use.

Trademarks, Are They Important?

Lastly, we have trademarks. A trademark is a sign capable of distinguishing the goods or services of one enterprise from those of other enterprises. Trademarks are protected by intellectual property rights. A trademark registration will confer an exclusive right to the use of the registered trademark. This implies that the trademark can be exclusively used by its owner, or licensed to another party for use in return for payment. Registration provides legal certainty and reinforces the position of the right holder, for example, in case of litigation. In simple terms, it is a “name” that is legally registered to represent a company or a product such as Apple and Microsoft. As a businessperson, I could always imagine myself having a well-known company, and the company’s trademark would stick forever in the minds of people, like the tech giants we see in Microsoft and Tesla, they are trademarks that we all know worldwide. This is an interesting topic in the world of business.

Processing the intellectual properties of a product might seem hard, no? But it is a process that everyone in the business world should do, especially the startup companies. But the process is worth it considering that you have the right to your own product and that no one can steal it from your hands. Though a long process to do, it still is worth it to protect your own product to gain revenue. Let’s move on to startup ideas.

Start-up Ideas: The Start of the Process

In making startup ideas, we businesspeople or entrepreneurs aim to solve problems, whether it is a problem physically, mentally, nationally or in environmental aspects such as reducing our carbon footprints, etc. Well, our startup aims to solve a problem environmentally in which we are to reduce plastic waste worldwide.

Future of Environmental Conservation

Like I said in my previous blogs, we as a team aim to reduce the individual’s carbon footprint by using solar energy in order to charge our gadgets, stating that we, the people, are slowly helping the world environmentally. But not only that, the team is also aiming to reduce plastic waste in our oceans by a large percentage in the near future.

All the pollution on beaches and in the ocean is both harmful to both marine life and humans. So, we as a team are trying to stop some of the plastic waste before it reaches the ocean. This product might be a slow process into helping the environment, but like what people say, “Sometimes the smallest step in the right direction ends up being the biggest step of your life.” This is our startup into having a better life. Live life while being environmental friendly, because not only does would benefit the marine life, but it would also benefit the lives of the people around us as well. Join and help us in our conservation of the world by supporting our start-up product! Go green!

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Startups: How Do They Thrive In The Business World?

What is a startup?

A startup is a young company founded by one or more entrepreneurs to develop a unique product or service and bring it to market. By its nature, the typical startup tends to be a shoestring operation, with initial funding from the founders or their friends and families.

These are companies that typically are in the early stages of its development. These entrepreneurial ventures are typically started by 1-3 founders who focus on capitalizing upon a perceived market demand by developing a viable product, service, or platform.

When starting a business as a startup company, you usually start with small with little or no revenue. Though startups are really hard considering that you start small, most of the entrepreneurs we see right now that are very successful such as Bill Gates who founded Microsoft in 1975.  One of the startup's first tasks is raising a significant amount of money to further develop the product. To do that, they have to make a strong argument, if not a prototype, that supports their claim that their idea is truly new or a great improvement to something on the market.

As a person who is planning to start a business as a college student with no large capital to start with, startups are pretty hard of a phase to go up to, since other people cannot be easily convinced in investing on you knowing that you don’t have nothing to show to the investors that you know how to handle a business yet. But it is okay to start small as long as you have the drive to make sure that your startup business grows, like how Jeff Bezos started his own company.

Why do startup companies thrive in the business world?

Startup businesses thrive in the business world because unlike other companies, due to being a “small” business, people in the business work harder, with the drive of being an up-and-coming business in the business world, most of the companies we know worldwide were startups such as AirBnB and Amazon and they were all up-and-coming.

Startup companies show how they are on the rise and they are independent in striving to do more as a small company. It may be hard to tell, but startup companies usually start in the harder route as they start really small compared to others, and even though there are also a lot of startup companies who failed to meet their expectations, it is no surprise that the richest man in the world strived by having a startup company in Amazon.

People who initiate startup companies make sure that their products are unique, and that is a way to thrive in the business world - being different is a good thing in this concept. To describe it in more simpler forms, a startup company is like the modern version of an inventor where it finds a problem and then fixes it with a product they invent, and people would buy that product if they have the same problems, that’s why startup companies thrive in the market especially on these times.

 Insights? Tons.

In this subject, our startup business idea is not very cheap at all, since we are building a product that could spend at least 210 USD or 10,000 PHP in a smartphone. But what we have learned during the process is that it is entirely worth every single penny. Each day, each week, our proposal of a solar-powered smartphone is improving.

We have learned as a team that in order to sell our product and to gain a profit, we must compete with other smartphone manufacturers as well since, let’s be honest here, no one would buy a smartphone just because it’s “solar-powered.” Most smartphone users would also buy our product depending on the specifications that we put in our product. It’s just that, having a solar-powered phone is already an advantage compared to ordinary smartphones that we have to date.

But aside from being solar-powered, we strive to become as environmental friendly as we become, to be more eco-friendly to our planet and to produce lesser carbon footprint for the environment to be future-proof.

Though this product is not very friendly at all as a startup business idea, it is a very good product to begin with, knowing that we are living in the future where most or all the people in the world uses smartphones as a way of communicating, entertaining, and working. It might be a long-term investment and an expensive one too, but the team is making sure that it would thrive in the business world as much as possible.

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Home delivery- Advantages: Low cost Close to family Disadvantages: Lack of sterile utensils and equipment Unprepared for high risk complications

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Benefits of Having a Solar-powered Smartphone?

What is the purpose of making a solar-powered smartphone?

As the years go by, we tend to see ourselves having a bad environment in the near future. Air pollution, greenhouse gas emissions due to making products that are harming the environment have been destroying our planet every time we make products that are not eco-friendly. So, the team has decided to make a product that not only could satisfy the customers on their wants and needs, but also conserve our planet, reduce our carbon footprints, and help solving pollution; and that product is called IC-Gen 1 5G.

 What is IC-Gen 1 5G, you ask? It is a solar-powered smartphone that is capable of charging 30W in the sun, if you’re wondering how fast is 30W-charging, it is actually faster than what most of our smartphones currently have. This product could be charged just by standing at the sun from 0-100 in just 48 minutes, that’s impressive in smartphone standards. And not only does this phone could charge via solar-power, it is also made using recycled plastic bottles, which could save the environment by a large amount. Not only it is equipped with good specifications, it is also environmental friendly, and that’s what we need in this world – a product for the people and for the world.

  The Interview:

 We, the team have interviewed 10 people via video chat and calling – and this is what we have gathered.

 The majority of the people we interviewed have stated that when choosing a smartphone, the factors they look for will be focused on the processor speed, the battery life, and the memory. When asked about their current phones, most of the interviewees have stated that they are usually cautious in using their phones because of battery life; most have spent their time charging their phones for an average of 3-5 hours, and it is irritating.

 Another question that we have asked the interviewees were about the benefits of solar-power charging, and most of them were actually intrigued in having solar-powered smartphones stating that it could help thousands of people in saving money as it can lower the amount their paying for electricity, in words of our interviewee, “Daghan baya mi gacharge hahaha para mugamay2 amung bayrunon.”

 The people we have interviewed have also stated that aside from charging their phones plugged in on the outlet, they use powerbanks instead especially when they are not at their homes. The team has realized that using powerbanks could be a hassle since people have to carry two things at once just for their phones to charge, and that’s where solar-power comes in. The smartphone we have built is powered with a solar cell at the back of the phone so that it can charge via solar energy.

 So far, the majority of the people we have interviewed are intrigued by the concept of having a solar-powered smartphone as it can solve the solution they are struggling for them especially when they’re outside of their homes.

Team Options:

Team Sinag came up with two (2) options in addressing the consumers’ concern regarding of the smartphone product:

(1) Changing the build quality of the smartphone, making it more durable than what the team was proposing which is using recycled plastic for the product.

(2) Improving the specifications for the phone to improve its speed, camera, and other factors to satisfy the customers of the product.

The team has decided to improve the specifications for the phone to satisfy the needs of the customers and to ensure an eco-friendly product in using recycled plastic bottles as build materials for the product.

  Team Decision:

The team has decided to increase the processor speed and specifications, as well as build quality to satisfy the needs of our customers. The team has also decided to make the phone's price cheaper with a minimum of P10,000 as the starting price of the product.

  What are the lessons we have learned?

The team has learned that in order to bring satisfaction for the consumers, we must build a smartphone that is capable of doing tasks such as the powerful smartphones existing today. Also, Team Sinag has also learned that it is a must to use recycled plastic bottles in producing the product, as we focus on being environment friendly for our product. In addition, we now have learned that in making this product, not only does it benefit the environment for producing an eco-friendly smartphone product, it could also help the consumers as well since it helps them lower their electricity bill by a massive amount.

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Solar-Powered Smartphone?

For years, people have been using smartphones that don’t have long-lasting batteries to the point that it is reducing our productivity levels when it comes to work.  Our regular phones may be handy but not as handy and efficient compared to solar powered smartphones. Although it has been discussed that it is completely safe to use our regular phones while charging but we cannot erase the fear of overheating and damaging our batteries. The most tangible and substantial reason to go with solar phones is the reduction of energy costs, it rids hassles such as eyeing the space around for charging opportunities.

Solar-power has not been a trend in the smartphone industry today

Solar powered smartphones will provide a significant relief to the consumers especially to those who were buying readily available battery-operated smartphones. Solar powered smartphones are portable, ecologically friendly, has low maintenance cost, more efficient in terms of its availability for use, has higher lifespan, it promotes lower electricity bills, and these smartphones are independent with external electricity sources. 

By creating solar-powered smartphones, the struggle of having to charge on an electrical outlet during the day would be time-saving considering that we have to wait for hours to fully charge it. Solar-powered phones will charge while you are walking on a nice day, or relaxing at the beach, so you won’t have to feel the struggle again. These phones are portable and you can easily carry it anywhere, at the beach, on top of the mountains, without worrying of charging. 

In addition, the team has come up with the idea of making these solar-powered smartphones using durable materials with modern technology in comparison to flagship smartphones with a smaller price to pay. The smartphone is equipped with a solar cell that is capable of charging with 30 watts and above depending on the heat temperature, meaning it can be fully charged from zero to 100 in just 48 minutes! It is a technological advancement in the world of smartphones, and the advantages of this solar-powered phone are revolutionary.

Not only having these solar-powered smartphones useful for the people, but it is also useful for the environment as well, since smartphone charging could be a massive generator of carbon dioxide. The team has aimed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by the use of solar power in for our solar-powered product.

We, the team, has proposed a smartphone that is not only eco-friendly, but it could also benefit the consumers by producing a gadget capable of fast-processing, as well as great quality specifications which the team shall indicate in this article/blog.

Here are the specifications listed for the IC-Gen 1 5G

IC-Gen 1 5G

Body:

Weight: 200g

Glass Front (Gorilla Glass 5)

***Recycled Plastic/Solar Cell Back

***Recycled Plastic Frame

The team will use recycled plastic bottles for the materials on the product to have a positive impact to the environment. Display: Type: IPS LCD, HDR10, 450 nits (high brightness) Size: 6.5 inches (83% screen-to-body ratio) Resolution 1080 x 2400 pixels (1080p display) Protection: Corning Gorilla Glass 5 Platform: Android 10 (Upgradeable to Android 11) Chipset: Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G GPU: Adreno 618

Chipsets play a large role on a smartphone’s processing speed, which is faster than the average smartphone. Main Camera: 48mp main camera 12mp telephoto lens 8mp ultra-wide angle lens Zeiss optics, LED Flash, HDR, Panorama Selfie Camera: 20mp selfie camera

HDR

Charging type:

(IC-Gen 1 5G is equipped with both a USB-Type C charger as well as a solar-cell on the back frame)

Solar cell 16-30W (depending on the heat temperature) USB Type-C 30W Fast Charge **Battery: 5000mAh, non-removable **Benchmark score: 255,000 via AnTuTu

*Benchmark scores may differ depending on the processor of a smartphone*

Who are the target customers for this product?

The target audience are the vast majority of the world population aged 18 and older, and also the population of the whole world capable of handling a smartphone.

What are your team’s options and decisions? 

The team came up with two (2) options in addressing the rejection of the established hypothesis:

(1)    Modifying the startup product to address the claim of the instructor that anti-radiation glasses are only effective during the COVID-19 outbreak and that it is already an existing product. The product can be modified by adding more extra features such as adding full protection for the eyes of the customers. The concept will have drawbacks in the feasibility on the production process.

(2)    Change the startup product to a product of large potential target market. The team has decided to change the startup product since it can provide a pathway to obtaining a much better startup product that can further attract a larger market. Series of methodology and validation surveys will further be conducted.

         The team has decided to change the startup product since it can provide a pathway to obtaining a much better startup product that can further attract a larger market. Series of methodology and validation surveys are conducted.

What are the lessons learned by the team for this decision?

The team has learned to be innovative and patient. Though the possibility of producing this product is still a question at the moment, it is still possible.

Results

Results have shown that the majority of the 60 respondents we have surveyed:

Charged their smartphone 2-3 times a day, this problem can be solved by solar-power. Not only does it help the consumer have a product that can be charged just by being under the sun, but it can also help the environment as well as they are not constantly using electrical power.

Charge their smartphone 2-4 hours from 0% to 100%, by constantly charging the phone under the sun or just by being outside, consumers do not have to worry waiting for their phone to charge completely.

Respondents are afraid of putting their phone in the sun for too long, the team has decided to use recycled plastic bottles as it is not a good conductor of heat, hence, putting the phone under the heat will not be a problem for consumers.

Respondents consider having a cheaper price, a faster processing speed, and a good charging capability for the smartphones, the team has decided to have a 50% profit for the product and we assure that it is in a cheaper price. The product is also equipped with good specifications, and a good charging capability in having a 30W solar-cell panel in the phone to have charging speeds of 0% to 100% in just 48 minutes.