Technology Ventures

Prompt:

Rutgers professors have invented a novel method for real-time tracking of the position of 3D wireless transmitters in indoor environments. It provides positioning software and core tracking services for various wireless technologies, including WiFi, ZigBee as well as active RFID tags. The unique combination of hardware and software works with minimal human effort. Users can begin tracking devices on their existing wireless networks by simply placing a few Kortrax landmarks in their building. No additional set up is required.

1. What problem(s) likely led to recognition of the technology? Provide a full market understanding for one of the problems you identify - be sure to discuss the nature of the problem - and describe the technical understanding that made this invention possible. (50 Points) (2 pages, single-spaced max.)

Problem
There were several underlying issues that created a need for this 3D tracking Wireless technology, which dealt mostly with the lack of efficiency in certain environments. Wireless technologies already aide in improving efficiencies—for example, the use of RFIDs by Walmart has immensely helped manage its inventories and overall, improve its supply chain. However, there is a large gap in accurately tracking their inventory in each phase, especially in an indoor environment. To offer a better example of this problem, it will be helpful to look at how this tracking technology affects the emergency services and hospital industry.
According to themedica.com, the United States has one of the largest medical and healthcare industries in the world, with over 750,000 physicians and 5,200 hospitals. Furthermore, the United States makes up about 45% of global sales of healthcare products, which highlights the importance of constantly improving products with the rapid change of technology. This also shows that there is a market demand for a product to improve the medical workspace and, if introduced properly, it can have the potential to generate large profits.
Doctors and medical staff use wireless technology in various means. Wireless technology not only improves the quality of life of patients and the doctor-patient efficiency, but it also enables nurses to monitor patients remotely and give them real-time information, health reminders, and support, thereby easing the roles for caregivers and family members. And though wireless technology can assist doctors in their prognosis, there is little development of technology that can assist doctors in keeping track of patients without physically monitoring them via camera. Many hospitals still use traditional methods of monitoring their patients through camera surveillance. Some “high-tech” hospitals use a variety of sensors, but these need to constantly be disconnected and reconnected to work effectively. In addition, often times these methods force the patient to be bed-bound and immobile.
Staff members also unable to be fully productive on the job and instead must focus on trivial issues that could instead be automated. According to clinical research conducted by Dr. Eiman Elnahrawy and Dr. Richard Martin, the Rutgers professors who developed the Kortrax concept, about 20% - 50% of care providers’ time was spent on overhead, as opposed to direct or indirect care-related tasks (flintbox.com). Hereby lies a need-based opportunity for wireless technology to let medical devices communicate with a gateway that connects to the hospital’s medical network and transmit data to alert the proper authorities. The ability for individuals to track that technology in an enclosed sphere gives way to innovations such as Kortrax.
Kortrax offers a way for doctors to utilize wireless technology as effectively as possible without extending manual labor. It combines both hardware and software together to create a system to track where the signal is in real-time. Set-up is easy and simply involves placing Kortrax markers in various areas around the hospital to detect transmission signals. This can allow patients to leave their beds and move around while still allowing doctors to monitor their status and whereabouts. Such technology can also be applicable for those people in mental institutions and in retirement homes.

2. Based on the market understanding for a problem you identified, and the technical description provided above, what innovation concept would you develop to address the problem? Be sure to describe your concept in detail. (50 Points) (1 page, single-spaced max) The purpose of an innovation concept is to compile information from the Opportunity Recognition phase of the Innovation Process cycle and to develop an idea for what can address some of those issues. As Reis mentions, the goal of this phase is to “not gain definitive answers…Instead it is to clarify at a basic, coarse level that we understand out potential customer and what problems they have” (Reis, 99). The innovation concept in this example would be to use the Kortrax indoor wireless tracking system in hospitals and retirement homes to increase workflow efficiency and to help track patients. Once the idea is set, the team needs to complete a market and technical inquiry to ensure proper planning before any money into research and development is invested. The market inquiry deals with which specific market the concept should be targeted to and why. This is based on numerical and qualitative data identified in the problem recognition phase. For this example, the Kortrax product can be marketed to hospitals and retirement homes because of their need to constantly monitor patients even at the busiest of times. According the professors of the study, one of the most ideal applications of this product that can yield positive returns on investment is its ability to “improve patient flow through large healthcare facilities by improving the dynamic assignment of staff and equipment in response to surges” (flintbox.com). The technical inquiry deals with whether there is sufficient technology readily available for the team to efficiently create the product and how the technology can be used to complement or even enhance the product. In this case, Rutgers professors were able to conduct much of the technical research needed in order for the team to create the product. Dr. Martin and Dr. Elnahrawy, both aimed to increase the affordability of key hardware components of their product along with developing a cost-effective way to track the movements of mobile objects within an indoor environment. In effect, they found that the technology requires much less signal map generation and maintenance than other, more traditional approaches and thus, can operate at an overall lower cost. Furthermore, the ease of the technology allows it to be applied to a variety of applications (flintbox.com). This can possibly be of benefit further on in the process if Kortrax becomes successful and if the team wants to expand its uses into other markets. Of course, at that point it would be advisable for the team to perform another market and testing inquiry to ensure that there is still profit potential. To close, the innovation concept step is a crucial component of the Innovation Process cycle. It attempts to provide an objective view to the marketplace and allow researchers to see how their product can help fill in a need before it even gets to the problem solving and prototype development phase.

3. Develop an MVP for your concept. Describe what it is, how it would work, and who you would target to talk to for testing. Be specific, not generic! (50 Points) (2 pages, single-spaced max.)

Target
The target of this MVP would be split between hospitals and retirement homes. The team would develop a rough, concierge-type MVP to demonstrate how Kortrax works. Specifically, it would be wise to talk to doctors, medical personnel at the hospital, and patients about the products, and then eventually to lawmakers who have the legislative power to implement the use of Kortrax technologies. The goal of reaching out to medical staff in hospitals is to examine their current process of tracking and monitoring patients. How many of their patients use wireless technology and for what purpose? What are their movement habits and are they limited in movement due to their technology in any way? How is the staff tracking these movements? The team can see how the personnel interact with the wireless technology in hospitals and to see if and where any inefficiency lies. Once identifying these inefficiencies, they can develop a plan to prove how the Kortrax device will help eliminate those problems and allow all parties to me more synchronized.
Besides efficiency, the secondary objective for an MVP of the Kortrax technology would be safety. The MVP can give the parties involved a good sense of whether certain functions within the hospital are safe or not. For example, if a patient sleepwalks out of the hospital, current technologies may be able to track the end location of the patient (outside the hospital). However, Kortrax may have the ability to alert medical staff as soon as the patient leaves his or her own room and they can prevent further movement from the very beginning.
Function
Reis mentions that the purpose of an MVP is to test fundamental business hypotheses (Reis, 94). The goal of this MVP would be for the team to learn how the current system of wireless technology is used in these environments and how to modify Kortrax to improve those systems without causing too much of a disruption in workflow and safety. First, there would be a step-by-step explanation of the process of syncing the wireless technology in a patient with the Kortrax technology. Then the team would show how the Kortrax hardware would track the signals. Perhaps a low-bandwidth radio frequency could be used to simulate the range of service between the wireless technology and the Kortrax receiver. Since one receiver is capable of receiving multiple signals of technology, it would be advisable to test the MVP on multiple patients and track the range of their movements within the hospital. The hospital can then decide on the best locations to place the Kortrax hardware.
Overall, there would be many similarities with the use of the MVP in retirement homes and in hospitals. The MVPs would be similar, although the main differentiation would lie in the need to persuade patients to try the MVP. Hereby lies the chance for Kortrax to take a leap of faith. Will people trust this new technology to track their movements? Will privacy be a major issue that can hinder the success of the product? As it is, older demographics are less willing to try out new technologies and have a general skepticism over being constantly tracked by the authorities. Therefore, additional persuasion and examples of the MVP may be needed to gain the trust of those users. The goal would be to make them feel comfortable trying the MVP without consciously altering their movement patterns. The concierge-type MVP would be ideal for Kortrax because it provides the personal touch to each customer. The positive effects of this are twofold—Kortrax benefits from having the ability to gain loyal customers one at a time (by targeting the influential early adopters) and the customer benefits from receiving great service on their trial run of the product. This is similar to the case of Manuel Rosso and his Food On The Table startup and their business model of providing exceptional service to each customer during testing and learning an immense amount of information for their future work, even if that meant initially operating at a loss (Reis, 101).

4. Assume you are building a company to exploit the concept you developed in Question 2. In what ways would your company be similar to and different from the way Amazon was built. Be sure to address both similarities and differences. (50 Points) (2 pages, single-spaced max)
Although building a company is difficult in general, building a company around the medical industry offers further challenges primarily due to heavy governmental regulation of the industry. However, the fact that Kortrax provides an interesting hybrid between the technology and medical fields, similar to how Amazon was a hybrid between old-school retailing and new-age Internet browsing, is worth noting. And though Amazon has been regarded as one of the most successful startup companies, it had its early struggles. There are several issues that Amazon’s upper management could have managed better regarding its culture, hiring processes, and growth strategy that I would want to do differently with my company. Regarding culture, I would envision that the culture of my Kortrax company would be as a hybrid version of how Jeff Bezos initially ran Amazon. In the initial years of the company, Bezos managed his company almost like a sweatshop: employees had to work on weekends, miss sick days, and pay for parking. While I would not implement some of these policies, I would want to utilize his approach to effective communication. The world of business is changing and I would agree with Bezos that traditional ways of communicating internally have to be banished. For example, it was known that Bezos had removed all television sets from the company’s conference rooms, citing them as “clumsy attempts at interoffice communication” (Stone, 133). He also insisted on employees not sharing information via PowerPoint; rather, they should use prose in their briefs to fully express their ideas. I believe that these simple policies within the office can affect the entire company, regardless of what phase of growth it is in. Hiring and retaining employees would be a main point of difference between Bezos and myself. Amazon established itself from the very beginning as hiring only the best. David Shaw insisted on hiring only those who made dean’s list and who attended the best colleges (Stone, 19). In my humble opinion, this is impractical for a startup firm to do. While I would want to hire great employees, I would also realize that the best talent might not always come from “the best schools” (after all, it was Rutgers professors—not Stanford professors—whom created Kortrax). Instead, I would look for potential employees who enjoy technical problem solving and helping people, but who can also challenge the status quo.
Furthermore, I would do my best to balance out efforts to retain my employees while still remaining frugal. This starts from upper management instilling a proper culture within the company and compromising on certain requests. Bezos tried to do this through his own actions by building his desk from scratch and insisting on paying for the corporate jet himself (Stone, 70). However, there is a fine balance between taking care of your employees and frugality and it appeared that Amazon did not appreciate its employees as much as they worked. Perhaps if Amazon had continually reminded its employees that their hard work and sacrifices would lead to fortune and offer some incentives along the way, then they would be more willing to work harder and not stress about a hectic work environment. Amazon’s acceleration period was interesting to learn about, and though their acquisition ventures failed, I would wager that acquiring small companies while still growing could be a viable option for success. I think I would be interested in buying competing firms as Kortrax grows, which could include other wireless technology companies. If it’s within Kortrax’s core competencies to develop its own wireless devices, as opposed to relying on receiving Wi-Fi or RFID information, perhaps the company should consider that. Eliminating the competition by buying them out (as Amazon did with Zappos) could seem like a possibility for the way I would run my company’s growth strategy. However, I would be cautious with engaging in a price war, especially when the company is first starting out. Fortunately for Amazon, it had the established revenues needed to compete with Zappos over a long period of time, which is why they eventually, pun intended, wore down Zappos to the sole. In conclusion, though there would be numerous ways to emulate Jeff Bezos and his management styles of Amazon, it would be fruitless to use every type of style for the Kortrax company. At times, it has been said that only Bezos could have started and managed Amazon to make it as successful as it is today. Ideally, I would like people to say the same about myself and Kortrax.

Works Cited

http://www.cs.rutgers.edu/~rmartin/papers/perhealth_2010.pdf http://www.flintbox.com/public/filedownload/1965/Martin-06-135.pdf http://www.themedica.com/industry-overview.html
The Everything Store—Brad Stone
The Lean Startup—Eric Reis