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The Pitch.. Not perfect

     Since this will be our last blog, i will be blogging about our pitching last Wednesday since last week was the grand launching of USTP..

     The time has come to finally pitch our idea. We know that our progress as a group is not that much but we we’re prepared. We have a lot of time before our turn to pitch since we we’re the last group to pitch. We did’nt expect that Engr Mabulay will invite a guest. We are all in shocked, the level of pressure has raised up. We know that the panels will criticize our presentation since it was not perfect. But it’s part of growing up as a Entrepreneur and for the sake of our start up. Our revenue model was the first to be corrected. But we all do receive a good remarks (verbally) from the panels. When we knew that we have the same idea(helping “habal-habal” drivers) from our guest, she said that she will be inviting us if we finished our app. For a moment we we’re excited and come to realize that no one from our group is knowledgeable about android programming. 

     It was an opportunity for us to pursue our idea. We don’t know what will happened next since we can’t predict our future, but still we we’re given the chance to talk about our idea to solve a certain problem here in Cagayan de Oro. 

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One step before the finals

     Last time Engr. Mabulay gave us the outline for our final presentation this coming April 5. We should prepare our validated slide decks and it should be complete. We need to pitch for 4 minutes and should be in English. It will be a challenging one since we are not used to speak in English :) 

      He discussed about the “Value Proposition”. We learned that it’s not about our idea or product, it’s about solving a certain NEED or PROBLEM. It’s about satisfying a customer need. So it requires to have a persona. This will help us to know who to talk during customer development. To determine how to market to those customer. Again we have to go out on our comfort zone. We need to keep on validating ideas and interview to our early adopters.

     We are having troubles to our designated assignments since the deadline is near. Since we don’t have a class next week, we will utilize in making our requirements. 

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Customer Development

     Me and my teammates conduct an interview to the “habal-habal” drivers around Cagayan de Oro City. It happened after our last schedule which 9pm. My teammate Michael John Somodlayon was the one that do all the talking and Carl Christian Nayon takes picture for documentation and as for myself I’m taking down notes for our Empathy map. We receive different kinds of feedback which will help us to improve our start up.

     Last March 15, 2017 Engr. Mabulay discussed about Customer Development. We tackled on what is a business model. Basically its a continuation of the lean canvass. It includes the revenue model, key metrics and cost structure. We always have to pivot our gathered data and validate them by conducting interviews. Since we are selling a product and it has to be cheap so it will sell. But it was a big mistake, it has to be the customer to decide on how much will they pay for our product. We need to be specific on our upcoming interviews.

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Observing for good

     Last March 9, 2017 we had our make-up class and our instructor discussed about “The Voice of the User” which has a big role in doing start up. In this part we are going to know the perspective of our customers. It’s exciting to know their ideas about our product. It will begin by observing.

     Our reaction, interpretation and the way we understand things depends on how we observe it. It depends on our point of view of things. But when we are going to propose a product, its functionality and its usability. Our product should have a task to be solved. And every product has its meaning. That answer the question “why did you create that?”. Upon observing a specific event it may trigger them to reach out to us. 

     After our class, our instructor gave us an assignment which is an Empathy Map. We have to conduct an interview to validate our hypothesis in our product, We will fill up two Empathy Map since our product concerns in a two way market and we will be updating our slide deck for our next presentation

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Update

     Last week our instructor was on leave for a official travel however he instructed to update our start up. Since we are still far from the result but we’re giving our best efforts to move faster. We improved our UVP as what Engr. Mabulay suggested. 

     I as the hustler on our team, i was assigned to interview habal2 drivers. I interviewed habal-habal drivers knowing that this is a two way marketing. I forgot to interview passengers who are commuting using habal-habal. It is necessary to interview the passenger in order to pivot our validation board. So far we failed on our first problem because it was not specified.

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Leadership, Entrepreneurship, and Failure

     Last February 22, 2017 Engr. Mabulay once again inspired us to be an Technoprenuer. Entrepreneurs are made not born. Even to those who are already born rich. They were taught on how to deal with money and economical problems. It need your perseverance to be an Entrepreneur. This will help to your work ethics and how passionate you are on what you do.

     Most of the Entrepreneurs and Innovators live in Silicon Valley. It’s okay to fail but we have to move faster to catch up on the trend. We should persevere through failure and learn from it. Just like how Angry bird was made. Their company failed for more than 50 products. Imagine the time that they’ve spent and went almost broke. It takes wide imagination to create a game changing idea. To help us from our failures the book “The Other F Word” by John Danner and Mark Coopersmith. There were top 3 rules on how Entrepreneurs put their failures to work:

1.) Learn by watching - The best failure to learn is from somebody else’s.

2.) Learn by playing and thinking - The next best is to learn form simulated reality, games, or analysis.

3.) Learn by doing - Test first and prepare to be wrong.

    It is hard to be an Entrepreneur because of dealing with our failures but we were not alone to burden that feeling, we have a whole team to recognize our failure and reflect to make a fast rebound.

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The Creation

     Last February 15, 2017 we presented our assignment which is the first four part of a Lean Canvas. The problem, Customer Segment, Unique Value Proposition and our Solution. While waiting for our turn to present we’re watching and observing the other group’s presentation. We’re getting some ideas on how to present our slides. This might help us on constructing our lean canvas. 

     First on the line is our problem. As a technopreneur creating an idea is hard. It must be unique and has a purpose. Sir Mabulay suggested to pin down the main problem and what will be the possible solutions. Under the problem is the existing alternatives. It provides the conventional way on what is our problem also known as a  existing solution.

    For our solution which is to make an app for using “habal-habal” in this way they can easily past through a traffic. And here comes the customer segment. Our target customer are students with smartphones and the early adopters will be the student of our University.

   We formulated our unique value proposition which is “Travel around the city with safe rides that saves your time and money” and our high level concept will be the Go-jek in the Philippines. It is difficult to construct these phrase because we have to compete with other companies. Sir Mabulay suggested to rephrase our UVP upon submission of the  slide.

    Sir Mabulay as our mentor gave his comments and suggestion to our presentation and we will keep updating our lean canvass.

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Starter for a Start up.

    As we go deeper to be an entrepreneur, we realized that starting up your own company requires many processes. Just like making a business plan. Our Instructor taught us about on how to make a Lean Canvas.  Lean Canvas promises an actionable and entrepreneur-focused business plan. It focuses on problems, solutions, key metrics and competitive advantages.

    Why do we have to make a Lean Canvas for our start up? It is still a big question to our part because it will just add to our jobs and make us busy. Since we’re composed of lazy members hahaha. But we then realized it will help us on starting our start up. But as the slide indicate that there is no such thing as a perfect plan. It is done by empirical testing and you will deal with time. Time is the scarcest resource of a start up. Perfection is not a goal but rather a plan..

     The first part on making a Lean Canvas is to identify your Problem. We have to be specific to our problem to locate the pain points of our customer. The 5 Why’s technique may help you on analyzing your problem. Customer Segment comes second. We need to break down into smaller and specific customer to narrow our early adopters. UVP or Unique Value Proposition in this section it will tackle on how will you get the attention from the customers. Of course the Solution to your problem. Channels will come fifth. Making a way on how to connect or reach out to your beloved customers. And for the pricing of your offer will be the Revenue Streams. This shows the alternative way or existing alternative. Cost Structures, in this part you will put your creative addiction on how to build enough runway to your product. Second to the last will be the Key Metrics. You will be measuring your success, it will tell you on how is your business doing. You will also list the customer’s action and on how will you define success. Last but not the least will be your Unfair Advantage. In this part you have to show on how to defend your company against competition. For example you have to put a data that will make your own company unique or a data that makes other investor jealous.

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Pitching

Last time we presented our project proposal entitled “Grab Habal-habal” and Engr. Mabulay recommended to research more about Go-Jek which is similar to our project proposal. We researched about Go-Jek on how their start up works. Their company caters many services but we all know that a start up starts with only one service and then expand. 

Our idea have the same concept with the Go-Jek, Grab and Uber. We are just going to create a concept that is only a small scale for mobile application here in Cagayan de Oro City. We will make an mobile app which offers transport service that uses motorcycles by using smart phones. Here in Cagayan De Oro City there are habal-habal drivers had their own alley station with their favorable location and different price range for fare. Our target market will be here in Cagayan de Oro which are students and workers. There are a lot of night shift and early shift here having difficult time finding transportation. 

Our pitching gone well since we all know that this app is doable. Our next move will be going to the driver’s side and interview them. Our instructor also teach us on how to deal into customer and what is reality. This may be hard because all of us has a shyness inside of us which is hard to deal with and we have to conquer it in order to be one of the customer and reach their concerns. 

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Presenting Idea!

Last January 25, 2017 we had our presentation of idea for our Technopreneurship class. We we’re required to present at least two ideas. First is we identify our pain points. One of my groupmates raised an idea and this is finding a boarding house, apartments and etc. And the other one was “habal-habal”. 

Finding a place to stay is very difficult if you’re not in your place. Just like my groupmate that raised her pain point. Based on her experience as a boarder she struggle to find a place to stay or to board. So we generate a solution for this problem. We decided to make a website or an app for this as a solution. We believe that this is not just a problem here in Cagayan de Oro but also anywhere in the Philippines. 

Second idea is about “habal-habal”. We experienced during later at night that It is hard to find a ride to our way home. there are only limited vehicle to travel at night: taxi, motor, and motorela. We decided to go with the “habal-habal” drivers because they can also travel during at daytime. 

Presenting our idea was hard. Our instructor said that to choose only one idea so we decided to pursue the grab habal- habal. We were unable to pursue the “finding boarding house” because there is a different team that have proposed it first. 

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Top 3 players for your start up :)

We were task to search for the top 3 players in line for our start up. It may be in software or hardware. But in this era, information technology has taken a big part in today’s technology. Downloading apps in our smart phone makes our life easier. Me and my groupmates came up to an idea for our project that is in line in making application here in South East Asia. So I will list the top 3 players belongs to the market the making and developing software or application.

1.)  Affle AppStudioz

t is a Singapore-HQ mobile application development company that works on the development wing of Affle MAASA (mobile Audience as Service) platform, Specializing in UX, design and mobility. Affle AppStudioz has a team of 300+ professionals that specializes in using Agile Scrum methodology for developing mobile Apps.

2.)  Elinext Group

It is a custom software development and consulting company focusing in web, mobile, desktop and embedded software development, QA consulting.

3.) QSoft Vietnam

The third based mobile app company is QSoft Vietnam a professional Offshore Software Outsourcing company with recognized expertise in Mobile Application Development, Responsive Website Design & Development and Custom Business Software development.

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Self-analysis

What are your strong suits?

One of my strong suits is having a good personal relationship with my friends, classmates or teammates. In this way, our work is more enjoyable and people are more likely to go along with changes that we want to implement, and we’re more innovative and creative. It gives us freedom to express our ideas. I can also consider having a loud voice as my strong suit. Even if it was not intentional, I can easily get the attention of my teammates. Sometimes I can be a best supporter. Supporting my friends or teammates to their strong points. I will help them even in technical. Anything for the group that I can do with my abilities, I will support them.

What are your weaknesses?

Although I can build a good relationship to others but it doesn’t hide the fact of me being timid. I’m afraid to share my ideas to my teammates because I think my ideas are dumb. I lack confidence to myself despite of having a loud voice.

What is your topic interest?

I don’t have a specific topic interest. If the topic is in line with technology, art and science, it always interest me. Just like making an application. I don’t know how to make an app for something but i hope i will be knowledgeable soon for that. Because in the future application from our smart phones will help us to live easier.

Why do you want to do a start up?

Having your own company which interest you can be the best job in the world. Aside from being happy for myself, I can help other people for job applications. And help our poverty to be lessen. I can be one of the entrepreneur that helps our economy here in the Philippines.

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Start up

Starting up a new journey as a student. I never imagined it would be an entrepreneur and a blogger’s life. I am not good at writing and expressing my feelings into words. Basically I’m a shy type person. But having this kind of personality will not help me to be a Technopreneur student. So I’m taking this as a challenge to improve my social skill and personal relationship.

Last Wednesday we we’re introduced to a new subject in our course outline, it was Technoprenuership. Our instructor enlightened us to take this opportunity to be a businessman. It requires to move out on comfort zone. He was talking that entrepreneurs are not gamblers. They are expert “risk mitigators.” People should not be afraid if they failed because failure parallels to success. 

As Benjamin Franklin said "An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.” When it comes to investing, nothing will pay off more than educating yourself. Do the necessary research, study and analysis before making any decisions. Educating ourselves today will be a big help to our future. I will be expecting for more knowledge and lessons in life. It will be hard for us to plant a new seed as a student but I’m sure when the time comes it will be a good harvesting time.