Assignment brief
You have just been hired by one of London’s top VC firms ‘ABC’ as a consultant/analyst. Congratulations! You have been tasked to identify and evaluate an investment contender for the growth fund portfolio of the firm. Come back with a comprehensive yet succinct report, and an answer: Yes/No? Why?
Select an early-stage company (ref resources) that has launched an innovative product or service within the last 3-4 years and that you consider a good example of an ‘entrepreneurial marketing’ organisation. You can select a company of any size, from any country and sector, as long as the company is still operating and is actively marketing. Try and select a company with an innovative product/service that is demonstrable, backed by implementation, and possibly, have existing customer experience.
Working with the product or service recently launched as the main example, please answer the following questions:
1) Briefly introduce the company and the product or service that you have selected (if they offer a range). Share an overview of the industry and the market they operate in, providing a competitive landscape. Then, focusing on the selected offering, explain how this product or service provides value for customers (acceptability) and describe the main customer segment(s) served by the product/service offering (±250 words).
2) Analyse and reflect on their pricing strategy (affordability). Compare their strategy with other competing products/services that address the same customer needs (±250 words).
3) Describe and reflect on the distribution strategy (accessibility) of the selected product and provide a diagram of their go-to-market strategy (±250 words). Diagram can be a simple infographic/flowchart/timeline of their rollout plan starting from launch till date.
4) Explain the branding and communication strategy (awareness) used for the selected product or service (±250 words).
5) Based on your previous answers, suggest two improvements to their current marketing strategy that would help them boost their performance in the future (support/cite your recommendations with information from the company’s report, market and industry data, business reports, market trends reports, and/or other academic sources such as peer-reviewed journals). Comment on the potential benefits, challenges, risks, and limitations of your proposed improvement. (±400 words).
Conclude with a statement stating if (and why) this company is a good potential investment or not. (±100 words)
ADD A LEAN CANVAS OF THE BUSINESS TO THE REPORT.
Submission Format: .docx/.doc for the report + LEAN CANVAS PDF
Word Limit: 1500 words (±10%) for the main text,i.e., the answers to questions 1-5. Provide a word count at the top of your document. Everything before the main text (e.g. abstract, index/content) and everything after the main text (e.g. Lean canvas, references, bibliographies, appendices) is not included in the word count limit. Try and use visuals rather than words to communicate.
You can include figures, charts, and tables in the main text, giving each of them a number and title.
Extra info:
1. Late submissions will be penalised -10% starting 5 minutes after deadline till 48hours. Please do not submit late.
2. Plagiarism & self-plagiarism: You must have a score of ±10% or less on Turnitin else I am obligated to report the submission to the AIC (Academic Integrity Committee). If it is more, the similarities must only be in the references.
3. Submission document requirements:
- Your Title Page should include:
- Your name,
- Course and Cohort
- Professor (my name!)
- Title of your report
- Assignment name
- Date
- Number of words
- Your report should have page numbers
- Your contents page/index should indicate all sections and sub-sections and their page numbers.
- Please make sure you include screengrabs of the web pages and charts showing the analytics if any.
- Appendices are optional. But if you use an appendix, make it a self-contained section, do not simply put a diagram there.
- Your References page should show all the sources you have cited in the report. See the ‘Referencing and Citation’ documents in Academic Standards in Toolbox on MyCourses.
- Your Bibliography page should show all the further sources you used for research but did not cite in the report.
- Copying and pasting of text is strictly forbidden. If you think you need to use a direct quote, ensure it is important that we have the words of the person concerned and you must cite them appropriately. It is usually unlikely that someone needs to be quoted directly in a report of this nature, so far better that you incorporate their thoughts and ideas into your own text and contrast them with other opinions. Reference the thoughts and ideas!
- Reference everything! Remember we use the APA7 system, see the PDF of notes and the links on MyCourses.
- Academic integrity is central to our learning. If there are still areas you need clarity on, check the relevant documents on MyCourses or in the student handbook.
