Reading Reflection 3

• Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future, Ashlee Vance

1.The thing that surprised me the most was his personal relationships. He has been married three times already and two times to the same woman. The thing i admired most about Musk was that he cares. He wants to save humans and is continuously searching for ways to try and achieve that. His outside the box thinking is something that a lot of people can be appreciative of. The thing i least admired about Musk was that he was not family first.

2. The competencies i noticed that Musk shows was his ability to make a deadline. His dedication and will gave him this ability and im sure a lot of people thank him for that.

3. The thing that confused me while reading was some of his past business transactions and ventures.

4. Two questions

1. What was the most challenging thing you've done in your life so far?

2. When you were a child did you dream that the things you have done up to today was going to be possible?

5. I think Musk's idea of hard work is something that couldn't be imagined. His line of work is life changing so his "hard work" can't even be discussed.

Your Exit Strategy

My exit strategy would be to be sold within five years of activity. Hopefully by then the entire golf community is using and discussing my application enough for a big company to buy out the company for a great profit overall. I selected this particular exit strategy so i can venture on to other things in the future especially since i'd have my own funding. I think the idea of this being a relatively quick venture has had an impact on my exit strategy. It has impacted me on growth decisions and wanting to grow as fast as possible.

What's Next

The next steps for my venture are hiring the right people who can program and develop the application. Also getting the right people to set up advertisements and get the right companies on board with the app. Nest work be to put the app in beta testing and let who I currently know in the golf world to give it a try. Then they could use word of mouth to grow and help me get more and more feedback on the app. After the beta testing stage of development we roll out an initial launch to the public and make the necessary bug fixes and improvements based on initial costumer feedback. The great thing about the application is that once we launch we just have to keep one or two employees on to help performance and bug fixes on the app because once it's done it's done not too many improvement need to be made if the initial app does what it needs to do.

Currently i see my venture as a B2C market. If I wanted to get into a B2B  market I could sell to golf courses my app to be played strictly on their course in that area so they have a competitive advantage over other golf courses in that specific area. One initial lump sum could be a good thing. Also an exclusive partnership with a course could be appealing to advertisers to get into that course to advertise if they didn't already especially if it's on the higher end of golf courses.

Your Venture's Unfair Advantage

1. Technology Capability
Very valuable in producing the App
It's not rare
It can be imitable
No other resource can provide the same benefit

2. Human Capital
Very Valuable in getting the right people around for advertising and producing application
Rare resource in that the right people can be hard to find
Hard to imitate
Absolutely no other resource can provide same benefit

3. Financial Capital
It's Valuable but all the technology needed is already readily available
Non rare resource
Easily imitable
No other resource can provide same benefit

4. Social Capital
Very valuable to getting the foot in the door in the 'golf world"
Rare in that for this it's who you know not what you know
Can be imitable but is hard to be
No other resource can provide same benefit as this

I feel like human and social capital are tied for being my top resources available. Having the right people around you and knowing who to get you in the right place is very valuable and to a point of being priceless.

Venture Concept 1

So far this semester I have worked on an app for golfers. This app is called Green Reader. It reads the greens from where your ball is on the green to the hole and gives a line of best fit. It is for use on a smart phone and it is very accessible. It accesses the camera on the device and uses that to make the read on the green. The possible customers of this app are golfer who want to improve putting without putting in the time and effort of practicing because they either do not have the time or frankly do not want to. Reading greens and putting is one of the hardest things in golf to do and my app is there to help that. Currently golfers have an option of taking lessons on putting or hiring caddies, but those two options have an expensive price point and the average golfer does not want to spend that type of money to improve putting on the golf course. I see my idea as a big opportunity, and it appeals to all levels of golf and all levels of economic classes. For as long as golf is relevant this app has an opportunity to be around and to continue to help improve golfers. My app would be a paid for app costing no more than a monthly subscription of no more than ten dollars a month. It would include advertisement as another way of revenue to help improve the quality of the app of local golf courses and eateries at locations of which you are playing as well as tee time reservation apps and websites such as Supreme Golf and Golf Now. I think customers would use this product to improve their game at a price point that works for them. Improving at the game will allow it to become more enjoyable and in turn hopefully they would play that much more. Also, the app will be very easy to use allowing any age to be able to use it. The ease of access of the app will be my “secret sauce”. If the app is simple and does what it needs to and get to this market first and making the app do what it needs to will be a huge advantage to an untouched market. The great thing about the application is that it is make it, put it out there and forget about it. All that would need to happen is to have a person or two on hand to fix possible bugs with the app and to bring on advertisers. I won’t have to make it better and it will last for years to come. With this I would want to be able to expand in the next five years and get into different golf product investments. I think what I have now is a good starting point to make an initial income, but I believe that this app would create enough cash flow for different investments to be possible.

Celebrating Failure

One time I failed this past semester was outside of class. I golf quite a bit and for some reason my golf swing changed and I could not hit the ball how I was before and i didn't know what happened. But after work for a week straight i would go to the driving range and practice non stop. After a few days a realized what happened. In golf it's small changes that make a big difference and the thing i couldn't figure out what i was doing was I had messed with my grip on the club and it screwed me up so much. It was embarrassment after i figured out what happened and frustration.

Reading Reflection 2

I choose the book "How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big" by Scoot Adams. The general theme of the book was to try and always be proactive with your day everyday. If you can set systems for everyday then they will have a drive to get up and go onto accomplish these on a daily basis, Also you need to learn how to be able to accept failure and turn it into positive energy.

This book made me realize that i am in control of how i adapt to things good or bad and that if i put my entire self into something i can get it done. The book was helpful for this class because it taught me to believe in myself and what i put my mind to to be successful at whatever it is im doing.

An exercise i would design for the class based on the book was something that at first the class really struggled on but if they persevered through it, they would be reward at the end of it all.

While reading this book one of the biggest surprises to me  was when Adams discussed for getting goals and goals settings but set out a daily plan. With a daily plan or system its a procedure someone can get done everyday. This helped Adams stay positive and lead him down the slope to where he wanted to go.

Elevator Pitch 3

I have been sick for the past week and a half so i was not able to make any changes to my elevator pitch but if  i was able, i would have went more in depth on how the process of my app works and how to monetize the app to make it profitable.