Activelect and power harvesting system - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 32 Words: 9676 Downloads: 8 Date added: 2017/06/26 Category Statistics Essay Did you like this example? ActiveSteps by Activelect Co. 1 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Activelect creates innovative power harvesting systems for households, bussiness owners and the construction sector. We are aiming to use all our resources in the most efficient way possible, offering both high returns to the shareholders and revolutionary solutions to worlds energy problems. The following business plan will summarize our methods, techniques and strategies that we believe will lead us to success. Activelect Corporation was founded in 2009 by its five shareholders. We believe in the capabilites of our young, innovative and dynamic members, all of which are technology and strategy makers whose knowledge, relevant backgrounds and careers form the strong stature of Activelect. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Activelect and power harvesting system" essay for you Create order Activelect is introducing itself to the market with an innovative product called ActiveSteps which harvests an individuals kinetical energy when they are climbing the stairs, converts it to electrical energy and uses it to power the stair lights when needed. It has countless benefits ranging from environmental friendliness to drastically reduced construction costs. We are confident that ActiveSteps will revolutionize the power harvesting industry and encourage many similar innovations around the globe. Our strategy for reaching such an ambitious goal is staying active, aggressive and dynamic. Activelect will fully utilize available resources to gain a significant share at this newly emerging market. We plan on incorporating various marketing, bussiness and advertisement strategies to draw attention to our company and, in the long term, help it evolve into a successful enterprise. As a startup company, Activelect expects no income for the first year, in which full resources will be assigned for RD to create a perfect final product. After the first year we expect Activelect to be both a financial success that brings considerable profits to its shareholders and a pioneer in the green energy systems field. 2 COMPANY PROFILE 2.1 Our Vision Our vision is to become recognized and respected as one of the premier companies that help saving the environment and natural resources by bringing useful and innovative solutions in the energy sector. By developing the necessary tools to harvest the otherwise-wasted energy from our everyday consumption, we are striving to make clean, safe, renewable and self-sufficient energy the prime source of powering the futures demand. 2.2 Our Mission As a business, we develop and utilize market driven economics to create demand for the self-sufficient, clean, economic and innovative energy production mechanisms. As environmentally conscious individuals, we strive to build understanding and working relationships with the public through science-based outreach, research and demonstration. 2.3 Basic Company Information * Name of the Company: Activelect Corporation * Status: Corporate * Chief Executive Officer: Cansu Trkay It is the responsibility of the chief executive officer to align the company, internally and externally, with their strategic vision. Her core duty is to facilitate business outside of the company while guiding the rest of the employees and other executive officers towards a central objective. Chief Financial Officer: Ekin lhan The chief financial officer is the corporate officer primarily responsible for managing the financial risks of Activelect. She is also responsible for financial planning and record-keeping, as well as financial reporting to the company partners. * Engineering Force: Can Celasun nar Yeil The engineering force works to develop economical and safe solutions to practical problems, by applying mathematics and scientific knowledge while considering technical constraints. They use the scientific method and are involved in every step of product development including design, testing, assembling and delivering the final product. Requirements, feedback and suggestions from the CEO and CFO are taken into consideration by the engineers and changes are made to the production steps if necessary. * Design Team: Anda Bingl The designer is a professional within the graphic design and graphic arts industry who assembles together images, typography or motion graphics to create a piece of design. He creates the graphics primarily for published, printed or electronic media, such as brochures and advertising. He is also responsible illustrations and web design. His main duty is to present information in a way that is both accessible and memorable. 3 MARKET AND COMPETITOR ANALYSIS ActiveSteps is a product that integrates usefulness with design. Moreover in the long run it is expected to contribute to economic savings of households or buildings and most importantly it is expected to contribute to environmental health. Market conditions and competitive analysis is investigated by starting from the general aspects of the market environment and then focusing down to competitors to make it easier for the readers of this business plan to comprehend. 3.1 Industry and Product Classification The first step for determining the marketing environment we must first start defining which industry class our product fits in to. At first glance Active Steps may be classified as another illumunating product but it is certain that it is much more than that. It is something that will ease peoples lives, to add an aesthetic and quality to their living environment and in the long run to protect the environment as well savings from cutting electricity usage. Mainly many products of illuminating sector has a design, quality and an aesthetic side to it. The place where our product differs is that it has a very innovative design and technology. An illuminating stareway as people walk on it is a very new concept in both matters- technology and design. When we consider these two effects- technology and design it is posiible place Active Steps in Architecture and Engineering industry. As far as our product is concerned, it fits this industry rather perfectly. The industry combines the technological aspects of innovative design products. So there are mainly 2 market bases exist, if properly used, can easily allow us to achieve our stated revenue and growth goals. Our targeted client base is taken from the following sectors: 1) Lighting Fixtures Sector 2) Architecture and Engineering Secotor 3.2 Illumination Sector In Turkey Electric illumination sector is one of the candidates of being a locomotive sector in Turkey. In late years it has been one of the sectors that has been expanding, increasing its competitive power and exportings at a huge amount. The volume of the market is an estimated of 350 million dolars. Its is assumed that 130 million dolars cover the lightening products such as lamps and 220 million dolar is lightening fixtures. Today illumination sector constracts an important detail in space decoration. Design and tastes change every year so the way to win a certain place in the market technological development and innovation is crucial. There is where our product steps in. The technology ActiveSteps uses is unfamiliar to the rest of the world. The concept of cutting usage of electricty entirely for illumination is one of the top technological procedures of the illumination industry. When the importance of the industry for the country is investigated we can see that market is condensed with the companies importing illumination products. There is a great expectation that the market volume increase that has been observed since 2002 will continue at an increasing speed. The table below shows the value of output for years 2000-2004 to observe the increase in the volume of the sector at the given years. TABLE 1: Value of Output of illumination products for years 2000-2004 in Turkey YEAR Value of the Output ( million TL ) 2000 4.969.199 2001 6.552.975 2002 12.918.373 2003 19.035.189 2004 18.939.798 The production value of 4.9 million TL on 2000 has been quadrupled in 4 years. So this industry is a fast improving, expanding, high return sector for Turkey. The illumination sector also has a great stance in Tourism, Constraction and Architectural Design sector. So the two sectors that ActiveSteps may have stance in are also related with each other. 3.3 Construction Architectural Design Industry in Turkey Construciton Sector in Turkey is one of the most rooted and high domained industries. Every year the biggest 225 international contracting companies are determined by an international construction sector magazine Engineering News Record (ENR), there were 23 Turkish companies among the biggest 225 international contracting companies in the world in 2008. Income earned from the previous years works abroad was taken as a basis in the research. In 2008, 23 Turkish contracting companies made it to this list and in 2007 there were 22 Turkish contracting companies on this list. The Turkish companies that made it to the ENR list are as follows: Nurol, Enka, Gam, Renaissance, Tekfen, Yksel, Kay, Baytur, Tav,, Mak-Yol, STFA, Hazinedarolu, Summa, Gap, Yenign, Cengiz, Rasen, Dou, Alarko, Mesa, Yaar zkan, TML, stay. Turkey, is the third country on the list with the most contracting companies. The architecture design has been a rooted sector in Turkey as well, since the Otoman empire. Although the architecture industry gets hit pretty quickly in a downward economy, it has maintained its place in Turkey among the profitable sectors and expecting growth intenrationally. Modern architecture is a growing sector and innovative designs are being used such as the Azizpasa yals and therefore the product will fall to the right segment. 3.4 Competitor Analysis 3.4.1 Primary Competitor The main competitor of our product- Active Steps is also an innovative design that is currently being used in the market and it is called Heel Strike Generator which is a device that generates power by the help of piezoelectric materials. Christopher A. Howells explains the mechanism of the Heel-Strike Generator on the web page Science Direct with an article as: Piezoelectric materials can be used to convert oscillatory mechanical energy into electrical energy. This technology, together with innovative mechanical coupling designs, can form the basis for harvesting energy from mechanical motion. Piezoelectric energy can be harvested to convert walking motion from the human body into electrical power. Recently four proof-of-concept Heel Strike Units were developed where each unit is essentially a small electric generator that utilizes piezoelectric elements to convert mechanical motion into electrical power in the form factor of the heel of a boot. The device was initially designed for the U.S military. The objective was to lighten the weight that the soldiers carry as most of the weight comes from the weight of the batteries they carry. This technology was developed by Ronald E. Pelrine, Roy D.Kornbluh, Joseph Stephen Eckerle, Scott E. Stanford, Seajin Oh and Pablo E. Garcia. What they have initially designed was a system that was placed under the heels of the soldiers boots. The inventors explain the mechanism as: Disclosed generators include one or more transducers that use electro active polymer films to convert mechanical energy to electrical energy. The generators may include one or more transmission mechanisms that transfer a portion of an unused biological energy source, an unused environmental energy source or combinations of both to the one or more transducers located in the generators. The energy received by the transducers may be converted to electrical energy by the transducers in conjunction with conditioning electronics located within the generator. A heel-strike generator is disclosed that is integrated into the heel of footwear and is used to convert mechanical energy generated during human bipedal motion to electrical energy. (See Exhibit 1) The first large-scale application was used in Spinnaker Tower viewing platform in Portsmouth, UK in 2005. The Heel Strike Generators were placed on the stairs on the tower to collect energy from pedestrians who visit the tower. There have been no other widely known applications of the product. The Facility : Innovative is a London based design firm which is interested in environmental projects is planning on implementing this technique on the shopping malls and Tubes in London to power the underground generators. There are many foreseen applications of the Heel Strike Generator and it seems that it can be a widely used system in the future. Spinnaker Tower Stairs to Generate Electricity Kinetic energy is looking more and more promising, particularly as a way to create small amounts of energy for individual devices. Expect to hear more about this field in the coming months. (Inhabitiat; June 19, 2008) Light fantastic: pedestrians to generate power The power of the wind and the tide have been harnessed now the footfall of trudging shoppers is to become the latest source of emission-free energy. (The Sunday Times; June 8, 2008) The Facility Innovate is a sister company of The Facility Architects born from their innovative RD projects and is also developing a variety of other methods to harvest lost energy. The devices they develop convert the mechanical movement associated with footsteps or transport vibration into electricity. When harvesting power from footsteps they use a flooring system that incorporates a matrix of hydraulic compression cushions. The energy harvested from every footstep pushes fluid through a micro-turbine, generating power that is stored in a super-capacitor. This electricity is then utilised locally. When harvesting power from vibrations they use a magnetic beam and coil arrangement to power light fittings. The beam resonates in tune with ambient transport vibration within the generating coil. This electricity is then used to power LED emitters within the self-contained units. Charging up the stairs Energy harvesting is an exciting field to explore, looking at ways to tap into the energy available from the workings of the human body or transport vibrations. (BBCNews; May 24, 2006) Another main competitor is US Patent 6768246 Biologically powered electroactive polymer generators Disclosed generators includes one or more transducers that use electroactive polymer films to convert mechanical energy to electrical energy. The generators may include one or more transmission mechanisms that transfer a portion of an unused biological energy source, an unused environmental energy source or combinations of both to the one or more transducers located in the generators. The energy received by the transducers may be converted to electrical energy by the transducers in conjunction with conditioning electronics located within the generator. A heel-strike generator is disclosed that is integrated into the heel of footwear and is used to convert mechanical energy generated during human bipedal motion to electrical energy. Competitive Advantage: The main benefit we have against the Heel-Strike Generator is that, our product Active Steps is a less costly system. 3.4.2 Secondary and Third Degree Competitors One of the competitions from similar products that can be counted as a substitute product is Thermo Electric Generators and they can be explained as: In 1821, Thomas Johann Seebeck discovered that a thermal gradient formed between two dissimilar conductors produces a voltage. At the heart of the thermoelectric effect is the fact that a temperature gradient in a conducting material results in heat flow; this results in the diffusion of charge carriers. The flow of charge carriers between the hot and cold regions in turn creates a voltage difference. In 1834, Jean Charles Athanase Peltier discovered that running an electric current through the junction of two dissimilar conductors could, depending on the direction of current flow, cause it to act as a heater or cooler. The heat absorbed or produced is proportional to the current, and the proportionality constant is known as the Peltier coefficient. Today, due to knowledge of the Seebeck and Peltier effects, thermoelectric materials can be used as heaters, coolers and generators (TEGs). Ideal thermoelectric materials have a high Seebeck coefficient, high electrical conductivity, and low thermal conductivity. Low thermal conductivity is necessary to maintain a high thermal gradient at the junction. Standard thermoelectric modules manufactured today consist of P- and N-doped bismuth-telluride semiconductors sandwiched between two metalized ceramic plates. The ceramic plates add rigidity and electrical insulation to the system. The semiconductors are connected electrically in series and thermally in parallel. Miniature thermocouples have been developed that convert body heat into electricity and generate 40W at 3V with a 5 degree temperature gradient, while on the other end of the scale, large thermocouples are used in nuclear RTG batteries. Practical examples are the finger-heartratemeter by the Holst Centre and the thermo generators by the Fraunhofer Gesellschaft. Advantages to thermoelectric: No moving parts allow continuous operation for many years. Tellurex (a thermoelectric production company) claims that thermoelectric are capable of over 100,000 hours of steady state operation. Thermoelectric contain no materials that must be replenished. Heating and cooling can be reversed. One downside to thermoelectric energy conversion is low efficiency (currently less than 10%). The development of materials that are able to operate in higher temperature gradients, and that can conduct electricity well without also conducting heat (something that was until recently thought impossible), will result in increased efficiency. The price range of Thermo Electric Generators are known to be around 195$ to 235 $. Another similar product may be a wind turbine that converts the kinetic energy of the wind to mechanical energy by the help of turbines. The Wind Turbine system is explained by: Wind turbines are designed to exploit the wind energy that exists at a location. Aerodynamic modeling is used to determine the optimum tower height, control systems, number of blades {fact|April 2009} and blade shape.(See Exhibit 2) Wind turbines convert wind energy to electricity for distribution. Conventional horizontal axis turbines can be divided into three components. * The rotor component, which is approximately 20% of the wind turbine cost, includes the blades for converting wind energy to low speed rotational energy. * The generator component, which is approximately 34% of the wind turbine cost, includes the electrical generator, the control electronics, and most likely a gearbox component for converting the low speed incoming rotation to high-speed rotation suitable for generating electricity. * The structural support component, which is approximately 15% of the wind turbine cost, includes the tower and rotor yaw mechanism. Wind Turbines are systems that are not very useful for small buildings but are generally used as a source of electricity for cities. There are also small Wind Turbines for limited usage. The price of a typical 1kW wind turbine is $13379.00. Another substitute product may be solar panels. The system is explained as: Solar Panels use light energy (photons) from the sun to generate electricity through photovoltaic effect (this is the photo-electric effect). The majority of modules use wafer-based crystalline silicon cells or a thin-film cell based on cadmium telluride or silicon. Crystalline silicon, which is commonly used in the wafer form in photovoltaic (PV) modules, is derived from silicon, a commonly used semi-conductor. In order to use the cells in practical applications, they must be: * connected electrically to one another and to the rest of the system * protected from mechanical damage during manufacture, transport, installation and use (in particular against hail impact, wind and snow loads). This is especially important for wafer-based silicon cells, which are brittle. * protected from moisture, which corrodes metal contacts and interconnects, (and for thin-film cells the transparent conductive oxide layer) thus decreasing performance and lifetime. Most modules are usually rigid, but there are some flexible modules available, based on thin-film cells. Electrical connections are made in series to achieve a desired output voltage and/or in parallel to provide a desired amount of current source capability. Diodes are included to avoid overheating of cells in case of partial shading. Since cell heating reduces the operating efficiency it is desirable to minimize the heating. Very few modules incorporate any design features to decrease temperature; however installers try to provide good ventilation behind the module. New designs of module include concentrator modules in which the light is concentrated by an array of lenses or mirrors onto an array of small cells. This allows the use of cells with a very high-cost per unit area (such as gallium arsenide) in a cost-competitive way. Depending on construction the photovoltaic can cover a range of frequencies of light and can produce electricity from them, but sometimes cannot cover the entire solar spectrum (specifically, ultraviolet, infrared and low or diffused light). Hence much of incident sunlight energy is wasted when used for solar panels, although they can give far higher efficiencies if illuminated with monochromatic light. Another design concept is to split the light into different wavelength ranges and direct the beams onto different cells tuned to the appropriate wavelength ranges. This is projected to raise efficiency by 50%. Also, the use of infrared photovoltaic cells can increase the efficiencies, producing power at night. Sunlight conversion rates (module efficiencies) can vary from 5-18% in commercial production (solar panels) that can be lower than cell conversion.(See Exhibit 3) A group of researchers at MIT has recently developed a process to improve the efficiency of luminescent solar concentrator (LSC) technology, which redirects light along a translucent material to PV-modules located along its edge. The researchers have suggested that efficiency may be improved by a factor of 10 over the old design in as little as three years (it has been estimated that this will provide a conversion rate of 30%). Three of the researchers involved have now started their own company, called Covalent Solar, to manufacture and sell their innovation in PV-modules. The current market leader in efficient solar energy modules is SunPower, whose solar panels have a conversion ratio of 19.3%. However, a whole range of other companies (HoloSun, Gamma Solar, NanoHorizons) are emerging which are also offering new innovations in photovoltaic modules, with a conversion ratio of around 18%. These new innovations include power generation on the front and back sides and increased outputs; however, most of these companies have not yet produced working systems from their design plans, and are mostly still actively improving the technology. As of January 14, 2009 a world record efficiency level of 41.1% has been reached. The solar panels that are 1500W are rated at $902.6. There are also expected future technologies such as: Electroactive polymers (EAPs) have been proposed for harvesting energy. These polymers have a large strain, elastic energy density, and high-energy conversion efficiency. The total weight of systems based on EAPs is proposed to be significantly lower than those based on piezoelectric materials. Nanogenerators, such as the one made by Georgia Tech, could provide a new way for powering devices without batteries. Although at present (2008) it only generates some dozen nanowatts, which is too low for any application. Also there is a new technology, which is at the stage of being tested. The technology is producing energy from trees: Voltree has developed a method for harvesting energy from trees. These energy harvesters are being used to power remote sensors and mesh networks as the basis for a long-term deployment system to monitor forest fires and weather in the forest. Their website says that the useful life of such a device should be limited only by the lifetime of the tree to which it is attached. They recently deployed a small test network in a US National Park forest. Active Steps could be a competitor in different sectors such as the photocell lamps (photo diode lamps) used widely in many buildings as well as in the flats. Those photocell lamps are sensitive to light and motion, and their basic working principle are to provide light when there is motion and darkness. It helps the users to have light in dark environment when they move, i.e. show their presence in the environment. A photo diode lamp includes lamp head, receiving body, outer shell, cover and photo sensor. There are projections and indents provided on the inner circumference of the receiving body, which receives base and circuit block. The lamp-tube is fixed on the base, its circumference provides screw thread and wire opening. The photo sensor is provided from the end of the wire, the respective projections are provided at lower end of its screw thread. The base of the circuit block is the circuit of the energy-saving type lamps and lanterns, the photocell is provided thereon through an IC. The end with larger diameter of the outer shell provides inner screw thread. Between the outer shell and the cover is clipping connection. The circuit is controlled by means of photo sensor responding to the brightness of outer circumference the lamps and lanterns can be automatically in switch-on/switch-off state. CompetitiveAdvantage: The advantages of Active Steps with regard to photo diode cells can be considered as following: * Photo diode cells require electricity and it is reflected on the electricty bills. However ActiveSteps generates its own electricity and therefore is economically more beneficial. * Since Active Steps does not use the main electricity of the house, it is also environmentally friendly. * When there is an electricity cut, photo diode lamps will not function however Active Steps can be used, as it is activated by the kinetic energy provided by the user. * The product will also contribute to design and aestetic of the environment. 4 MARKETING STRATEGIES After investigating the general and distinc economic environment and the competitive advantages with the company goals it is best to define the strategy of the firm in marketing. Setting a marketing strategy is vital to marketing success. It helps the organization to be focused about how to market, to whom should the firm market and how should the firm position itself in the market place. 4.1 Segmentation Segmentation is very important for the delivery of the product to the right customers. It is the process of identifiying the subsets of buyers who share similar needs and behaviours. Our main customers will be architects both interior and exterior as well as constructors and stores selling lightening products and design goods. We have segmented the market thinking that our customers can both be business and individuals. According to all things said above, we have made two segment categories and tried to find our potential customers( for all types of customers) by integrating these two segments. * Geographic Region: By geographically segmenting the market we can easily decide on which geographic regions are beneficial for the sales of the products, what parts of Turkey are best for increasing the brand awareness of the product and in what regions the product will be accepted easily. So this segment will help us define the places of businesses to target. o Big Cities: This segment represents the largest cities in Turkey. They have the largest population, education rate and economic activities.(Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir for Turkey) o Smaller Cities: This segment represents the cities other than the major ones with people having more modest lifestyles, lower population and education rate. o Suburbs: This segment represents the lowest level of population, education in Turkey. Suburbs mainly have a more traditional lifestyle ruled mostly by cultural motives. * Income level Innovativeness: This segment is the group of businesses that are categorized both their income levels of both business and their attitude towards innovative products. o High income level traditional o High income level innovative o Intermediate income level traditional o Intermediate income level innovative o Low income level traditional o High income level traditional 4.2 Targeting Targeting is the second stage of segmentation. Now we need to define which segment or segments to target our single product. Since we have a single product we do not have the opportunity to target all segments with different products yet, we need to choose couple of segments to target to which we think our product will perform best in terms of sales volume. For the geographical region segmentations we decided to target the segment of big cities in Turkey. Our rationale for targeting this segment is that the fact that technological and innovative products attract more customers in bigger cities. Also the environmental concerns arousing are most common in big cities which may also construct an opportunity. Lastly design products which are far from traditional are more than welcomed by the citizens of bigger cities. For the second type of segmentation we had done to divide the market further- the income level and innovativeness segmentation, we decided it would be best for us to target couple of segments. Since our product is a quite costly product, it will not be easy for all firms to afford it. So we will definetely target the segment of high and intermidiate income level of businesses and individuals. Moreover our product is an unusual product with many technological and innovative attributes which may not appeal to traditional users. Thus firms and individuals interested in innovative designs are targeted by our company. Hence our definate target market is individuals or businesses living in big cities who have high intermediate income and who are open to innovative designs. 4.3 Positioning After targeting, the next step we took was to position our product in our customers minds relative to competitive products. In order to take a position in the market we identified and high lighted our competitive advantages. We wanted our customers to think of innovation and technological advancement, environment protection and aestethic design when they hear ActiveSteps. But we need to make a pick from all these qualifications of the product and make it a simpler positioning phrase for the sake of being easily identified. So our positioning mat be A high class innovative design illuminating system that is environment friendly . So we want to reckoned in the market by an unsusal, quality product that also helps the environment. To gain this kind of positioning we do not think one product that we launch may be enough. We believe through our Research and Development activities we will constantly renovate ourelves and products and remain an innovative and a high class brand in the market place. 4.4 Marketing Mix 4.4.1 Product Defining the product is vital before any marketing efforts are initialized. The market should have a clear understanding of the product. Since ActiveSteps is a technologically enhanced good, we need to define the technological aspects of the product. First let us explain the features of the product as a regular person will understand it. ActiveSteps is a product that creates light without using electricity. Basically when you step on the stairs the machanism starts to run and saves the energy the system generated from the person stapping on the plate and saves it if there is enough light in the environment or lights its bulbs if there is not enough lightening. The product is attractive in many ways that are listed below: * Aestetic and creative design * Quality product * Environment Friendly * Technologicaly innovative * Innovative in design * Easy to implement * Can be implemented to not only newly constructed buildings but also for existing ones. 4.4.2 Pricing 4.4.2.1 Factors that affect Pricing Decisions i-)Internal Factors * Our marketing objectives- desired market share-target group, segments * Cost of production- in cost analysis part we will explain costing concepts detailed. ii-)External Factors * Market analysis -size of market- desired market share-possible growth * Demand analysis that we will mention detailed in sales forecasting * Price elasticity * Competitors costs, prices and offers * Macroeconomic factors 4.4.2.2 Pricing Strategy Our product has many unique features. First of all we think that technology always draws attention and ActiveSteps bears many technological and innovative features. Besides being technological and having innovative features another attribute of the product is that it is an environment friendly which we believe will increase the attention for the product that we are expecting. A third attribute of the product will be that it is a luxury product with exceptional quality and has the element of an innovative design in it. So we will start with the method of premium pricing and set a high price consedering the characteristics that ActiveSteps carries. Moreover there are no direct competitors to compare the price and the quality of the good. The quality of the product will be improved further in the later years and the price will increase accordingly. Also as the product awareness increases with more usage of the product, another product will be produced and launched to match with another segment of buyers of middle-low income levels. So mainly two types of products will be in production, one will be referring to high class segment whereas the second type will be suitable for the middle class as the product will become more user friendly, comfortable to use. Also middle segment product will be produced and marketed with penetration pricing. To implement this method we will tighten the cost as much as we can. This product will be produced as explained before if the first product becomes a success and gains a market approval, becomes a reknown product in the middle income level segment. 4.4.3 Place 4.4.3.1 Distribution Strategies As for the distribution strategy we will use both the direct and indirect channels. 4.4.3.1.1 Direct Distribution Strategy The product will be sold through our office directly to the customer. Some previously determined customers(most probably architects-both interior and exterior and constructors) will be visited at the convinience of their offices for the sales of the product.(door to door sales). We will mostly target architects(exterior and interior) and constructors to sell our products for implementation of ActiveSteps at the buildings/houses they constract /design. When the customer makes a purchase of the product, the delivery costs are on the customer. If customer wants the product to be delivered, it is required to pay fort he delivery expenses. The product will be installed by our own trained, electricians. 4.4.3.1.2 Indirect Distribution Strategy * MinorRetailers(ex: Showlights Design): We will use minor retailers that are interested in innovative, design products. Retailers are channels which already has a relation with the customer and customers are exposed to several kinds of brands. Retailers give the final price to the product. Since retailers already have a certain level of communication with the customers they are a good way to reach the end customers. Retailers are the main selling point for the individuals that are willing to buy the product for their own purposes. * Internet: We believe that Internet may be very useful for the fact that it can facilitate a geographically dispersed market reach. We will sell the product on our very on website. Of course there will be no chance for customers to view the product first hand if not seen from a customer who is using the product. The customers will be charged when the purchase is made including the shipping costs. 4.4.4 Promotion Strategy Promotion is essential for communication with the market place. It is planned to use couple of promotion strategies: * Personal Selling: At least 2 sales person that will promote the product on behalf of the organization. 2 or 3 sales person is projected to be enough since it is a high price product, will need high sales efford. So until we attain brand and product knowledge in the market we plan on staying with 2 sales people * Direct Mail: We will implement a promotional strategy of mailing the potential customers of our product(architects, constructers etc.) and explain the features of our product and catch their attention via e-mailing. * Advertising: We will draw an aggressive advertising method giving adds to top design magazines. The detailed advertising plan is explained at the Start Up Costs section as well as the Fixed and Variable Cost Analysis section of the business plan. After we define basic features of the product we can explain how the mechanism works in detail. 5 SYSTEM DESCRIPTION BLOCK DIAGRAM ActiveSteps is a power harvesting system that will convert the kinetical energy that exists during the motion of the stepper plate into electrical energy. This energy will in turn be used in lighting the stairs (see Exhibit 4). 5.1.1 Specifications 5.1.1.1 Software Specification Operating Environment: Use the supplied code to program the Atmel Atmega328 microcontroller. Well be using and Arduino Duemilanove, which provides useful development interfaces for the Atmega368 microcontroller. Function of the Software: The software will monitor external conditions such as the level of illumination on the stairs and whether somone is currently on the stairs or not. Itll be responsible for interpreting the data from the sensors. Itll also enable/disable the lights when necessary. 5.1.1.2 Interface Specifications Sensors Photoconductive Cell Well be using a CdS GL5528 photoconductive cell. Its resistance changes with the lux in the following fashion: * 0 lux = 1M * 10 lux = 8 20k * Maximum power dissipation should not exceed 100mW. IR Range Sensor Well be using a Sharp GP2Y0A02YK0F long range infrared sensor. Measuring distance is between 20cm to 150cm. It needs 5V to operate and draws approximately 33mA. Output voltage varies between -0.3V to 5.3V for a 5V input voltage. Battery Well be using a capacitor array consisting of 8 Suntan TS-128R 10F 2.5V capacitors. Well be connecting 4 of them in series and the other 4 in parallel to these, obtaining a 5F 10V capacitor array. Microcontroller An Arduino Duemilanove development board will be used. It features an Atmel Atmega328 microcontroller. It should require no interaction other than loading our software. It needs 1.8V to operate and will draw between 0.75A and 0.2mA depending on the state. Stepper Plate The plate should have the same dimensions as the stair surface. It should be mounted on the surface with the front end mounted and the rear end is placed 1.5cm above the surface with the help of the spring assembly. Spring Assembly The spring assembly consists of 3 seperate torsion springs placed beneath the stepper plate with equal spacing. Placing the springs in this fashion will prevent the plate from bending, hence avoiding possible discomfort for the user. Gear Assembly A gear ratio of approximately 27:1 is needed. 6 gears in series is used to obtain the above ratio. A one-way clutch and an inertial wheel are mounted at the end of the assembly which is connected to the stepper plate. The other end is connected to the DC motor. DC Motor A 7700 RPM DC motor will be used in the system. The motor is rated at 6V and outputs a current of 0.5A at around 50% efficiency. The battery system is designed to handle higher voltages even if the motor voltage exceeds 6V. 5.1.2 Physical Dimensions and Mounting Instructions Physical dimensions of the stepper plate vary greatly with the stairs that the system is applied. The rest of the system is contained inside a box with dimensions not exceeding 30x40x20cm. The system box should be mounted at a position that is easy to access if maintanence is required. Everything else regarding mounting details will vary with the stairs. 6 PRODUCT TREE See exhibit 5 for the product tree. 7 Start Up Costs 7.1.1 Capital Spendings To decide what are startup costs will be and to act according based on these costs, plan the steps ahead that we may take. So below, the startup costs that we will incur before initiating our operations are listed. A note should be made that all costs have pillar values for unexpected increases in price or unexpected extra costs. 7.1.2 Office The extention of a marketing plan and business strategy is determining the place of which the organization will settle to reach its costumers. The concept of our product can be defined by luxury, aestethic, design, technology, innovativeness and environment friendly. So it is safe to say that ActiveSteps is a product that is suitable for metropolises. As the administrative unit we have decided yo set our headquarters at Istanbul. It is decided that one Office will be enough for the start since we will reach our customers by advertising, by door step selling techniques and by our websites and the deals we make with the DesignLightening product stores. It is unneccessary to start off with many offices before the brand obtains a recognition on the larger scale. Since our target market is the upper class in terms of income level, we think that it is best for us to obtain an office building in Nianta or Etiler. These two districts of Istanbul are probably the best representor of innovativ eness, technology and design in whole stanbul. It is agreed that the office will be enough to carry all the following three main activities: executive, developmental and sales activities. As information on rents in offices of these both districts-Nianta and Etiler is around 2,000TL to 3, 000 TL per month for an average area of 120m2 to 200m2.[1] We decided on particular office of 200m2 and the costs are the following( as of 2nd of December 2009): Office City District Cost(monthly) Cost(annually) stanbul Niantan 2,900TL 34.800,00 TL 7.1.3 Office Layout There is only a sinle office that require an office fitting. As company we decided to prepare a budget of 45,000 TL fort he office layout. 1 Conference room layout 1.570,00 TL 1 Kitchen 14.750,00 TL 1 Restroom 9.750,00 TL 1 RD Fully Equiped Room 21.750,00 TL total 47.820,00 TL 7.1.4 Office Fittings There is only a single office that require an office fitting. As the company we decided to prepare a budget of 40,000 TL (rounding 36.630,00 TL )for the fitting. To decide on office fitting we must also decide on the type and number of employees that we plan on hiring in the office. Following table shows the employees and the office fitting accordingly. List of Employees working within the office Fixture Needed Price CEO, Inside Sales Lead, Operations Manager Engineering Managers(2) 5Executive Table 1.250,00 TL 1 Designer 1 Design Table 300,00 TL 2 Sales Person 2 Personnel Table 200,00 TL 2 RD Team 2 Personnel Table 200,00 TL 1 Office Boy 1 Conference Table 320,00 TL 30 Chairs 2.500,00 TL 10 Computers 20.000,00 TL 1 Kitchen Table 160,00 TL 12 Dining Chairs 150,00 TL Kitchen Supplies 2.000,00 TL Total 27.080,00 TL 7.1.5 Office Equipments The office equipments refer to the equipments such as stapler, faz machines, copy machines, pencils, papers etc. We expect these equipments to cost around 3000TL maximum. We have set a higher price then usual for the sake of having a pillar cost for unexpected office equipment costs. 7.1.6 Research and Development Equipment The RD room is mainly going to be located in the manufacturing room and the equipment costs and materials listed under office layout are the costs of materials that might differ from the manufacturing equipment. 7.1.7 Vehicles It is decided to buy 2 vehicles since sales people will visit the customers and perform door step selling approach. We also foresee many transportation needs which also validates the vehicle need. We have decided for cost cutting puposes to obtain second hand cars which will be more than enough to cover the needs. Two second hand cars costs 45,000TL in total. 7.1.8 Legal/professional fees We will probably need the assistance of a lawyer in drawing up the proper documents and filing them with the state since we are forming a legal entity. Part of the professional fees you need to budget include the accountants fees. It is estimated that the legal fees will cost 1,000 TL. This number is not a complete estimation. We have interviewed some consultants and found out that the consultancy and accounting fees add up to at most 1,000TL for a business like ours. 7.1.9 LicensePermits This cost includes all fees charged by the local, state and federal agencies. The fees for our industry generally adds up to 300 TL. 7.1.10 Advertising and Promotion Expenses This cost includes the advertising spaces on the 5 top design magazines that are issued in Turkey. This cost will be incurred only once before starting the business, to be recognized in the market. 1. Interior Design Magazine : whole page advertisement for the magazine is 600 TL. 2. Architectural Review Magazine : whole page advertisement for the magazine is 750 TL. 3. Azure Architecture Magazine : whole page advertisement for the magazine is 1,000 TL 4. Design Build Magazine : whole page advertisement for the magazine is 800 TL. 5. Environmental Design and Constraction Magazine : whole page advertisement for the magazine is 700 TL Also 1,000TL will be spent on the extra advertisement. This extra advertisement will consist of brochures, flyers etc. 7.1.11 Utility Deposit In Turkey there is law of paying a deposit for electricty before starting your business. After consulting to our accountant we found out that our deposit costs 200 TL maximum. 7.1.12 Insurance For the insurance we have made fort he RD equipments and cars we have, we have made an insurance deal with Gne Sigorta and had to pay a downpayment of 1,800 TL. So the start up costs can be summarized with the table given below: Startup Costs Price Business Fixture and Equipment 27.080,00 TL Decoration 47.820,00 TL Starting Inventory cost 15.000,00 TL Office Supply 3.000,00 TL Utility Deposit 200,00 TL Legal/professional fees 1.000,00 TL LicensePermits 300,00 TL Insurance 1.800,00 TL Advertisement for opening 4.150,00 TL 2 Vehicles 45.000,00 TL Petty Cash 5.000,00 TL total 150.350,00 TL 8 SALES FORECAST First of all to determine the sales forecast, we should list our potential customers in a different way than we did for our marketing purposes. We have based our sales forecasts according to the existing constructions and new costructions that will be made. ActiveSteps is a product that can easily be implemented to an existing building so it is reasonable to take existing buildings as one of our potential customer base. Both existing buildings and to be constracted building can be divided into two categories that our product may target. Apartment buildings and private houses. Apartment buildings may be built for any kind of usage. They can be residential buildings or they can be buildings used for business purposes. Private houses are most probably villas that pretty luxirious. Both types of constructions are aimed for high and high middle income level purchasers. As Activelect Co. we think that as most aparment buildings has many floors thus an elevator. They may not be willing to spend extra cash on stair design. So it is a viable conclusion that ActiveSteps will be purchased by private house owners who want a unique design at their houses that is environment friendly. Also as ActiveSteps we target stores that sell design products for decoration purposes and stores selling lightening products. We have contacted with Showlights Design which is a store located in stanbul and talked to the owner Yurdaer Keser and she really liked the idea of our product and said that she would be willing to purchase 50 units of such product with the condition that she can return 25% of the purchase if she failes to sell them within a year. For the sake of calculations we have assumed that apartment buildings on average has 5,2 floors(DIE, Constraction Count,2000) and has an average of 15 stairs. Moreover we assumed that private houses have 2,1 floors(DIE, Constraction Count,2000) and an average of 10 stairs per house. To make sales forecasts for years 2011 and 2012(years 2 and 3) we have evaluated the growth potential of Turkish Economy. According to the reasearches made on ntvmsnbc.com, we have observed that Turkish economy will once again start to grow starting from 2010 and on 2011 a growth of 5,5% is expected whereas this number is 5,8% for 2012. We have calculated the sales forecasts for 3 states of economic conditions that our company and sector may perform. For the fist state we have made the assumption that we might perform better than the overall Turkish economy. So the for the sales growth of first year to second is expected to be 6% and from second to third year it is expected to be 6,5%. Second state is if we perform as good as the Turkish economy. So the first year growth rate is set at 5,5% and the second year is 5,8%. Third is if we underperform and we have set the percentages for fist year as 4,2% and for second year as 5%. Moreover we have made a more realistic assumption as the fourth forecast. As the product is a quality and high price product with environment friendly characteristics, the brand recognition may be hard to attain although we will be very aggraseive about our advertisement policies. That is because ActiveSteps is a product with features that are hard to digest before its quality and usefulness is proven. So for the second year we do not expect a very high brand recognition thus increase in sales as 2011 will be the recovery year from the crises. However we expect a great increase in sales on the third year since environmental concerns will sit at the center of many discussions and the economy will be nearly fully recovered from the crises. To sum it up we expect an poor performance on the first year, expecting a growth rate of 5% and for the second year we expect to outperform the Turkish economy with the products innovative design and environmental properties and expect a growth rate of 6%. Sales s for all there possible scenarios are listed below: SALES(YEAR 1-optimal) potential customers numbers of units number of stairs(estimate) unit price total sales existing constructions aparment buildings 4 78 650,00 TL 202.800,00 TL private houses 3 21 650,00 TL 40.950,00 TL new constructions aparment buildings 4 78 650,00 TL 202.800,00 TL private houses 5 21 650,00 TL 68.250,00 TL LigtheningDesign stores 60 650,00 TL 39.000,00 TL TOTAL 852 553.800,00 TL SALES(YEAR 1-optimistic) potential customers numbers of units number of stairs(estimate) unit price total sales existing constructions aparment buildings 4 78 650,00 TL 202.800,00 TL private houses 6 21 650,00 TL 81.900,00 TL new constructions aparment buildings 5 78 650,00 TL 253.500,00 TL private houses 7 21 650,00 TL 95.550,00 TL LigtheningDesign stores 80 650,00 TL 52.000,00 TL TOTAL 1055 685.750,00 TL SALES(YEAR 1-pessimistic) potential customers numbers of units number of stairs(estimate) unit price total sales existing constructions aparment buildings 1 78 650,00 TL 50.700,00 TL private houses 2 21 650,00 TL 27.300,00 TL new constructions aparment buildings 2 78 650,00 TL 101.400,00 TL private houses 3 21 650,00 TL 40.950,00 TL LigtheningDesign stores 30 650,00 TL 19.500,00 TL TOTAL 369 239.850,00 TL Sales forecasts for 4 kinds of scenarios are listed below: SALES FORECAST(3 YEARS- normal) year 1 year 2 year 3 potential customers existing constructions aparment buildings 202.800,00 TL 213.954,00 TL 226.363,33 TL private houses 40.950,00 TL 43.202,25 TL 45.707,98 TL new constructions aparment buildings 202.800,00 TL 213.954,00 TL 226.363,33 TL private houses 68.250,00 TL 72.003,75 TL 76.179,97 TL LigtheningDesign stores 39.000,00 TL 41.145,00 TL 43.531,41 TL TOTAL 553.800,00 TL 584.259,00 TL 618.146,02 TL Units Sold(total) 852 898,86 950,99388 SALES FORECAST(3 YEARS-optimistic) year 1 year 2 year 3 potential customers existing constructions aparment buildings 202.800,00 TL 214.968,00 TL 228.940,92 TL private houses 81.900,00 TL 86.814,00 TL 92.456,91 TL new constructions aparment buildings 253.500,00 TL 268.710,00 TL 286.176,15 TL private houses 95.550,00 TL 101.283,00 TL 107.866,40 TL LigtheningDesign stores 52.000,00 TL 55.120,00 TL 58.702,80 TL TOTAL 685.750,00 TL 726.895,00 TL 774.143,18 TL Units Sold(total) 1055 1118,3 1190,9895 SALES FORECAST(3 YEARS-pessimistic) year 1 year 2 year 3 potential customers existing constructions aparment buildings 50.700,00 TL 52.829,40 TL 55.470,87 TL private houses 27.300,00 TL 28.446,60 TL 29.868,93 TL new constructions aparment buildings 101.400,00 TL 105.658,80 TL 110.941,74 TL private houses 40.950,00 TL 42.669,90 TL 44.803,40 TL LigtheningDesign stores 19.500,00 TL 20.319,00 TL 21.334,95 TL TOTAL 239.850,00 TL 249.923,70 TL 262.419,89 TL Units Sold(total) 369 384,498 403,7229 SALES FORECAST(3 YEARS-optimum) year 1 year 2 year 3 potential customers existing constructions aparment buildings 202.800,00 TL 212.940,00 TL 225.716,40 TL private houses 40.950,00 TL 42.997,50 TL 45.577,35 TL new constructions aparment buildings 202.800,00 TL 212.940,00 TL 225.716,40 TL private houses 68.250,00 TL 71.662,50 TL 75.962,25 TL LigtheningDesign stores 39.000,00 TL 40.950,00 TL 43.407,00 TL TOTAL 553.800,00 TL 581.490,00 TL 616.379,40 TL Units Sold(total) 852 894,6 948,276 The bar chart for sale forecast of the most expected situation is given below: 9 INVENTORY STOCKING After forecasts for sales has been made, we have drawn a projection for stocking up the inventory. Units of inventory is determined according to the sales forecasts we have made. We decided to keep the invetory stock low, not higher than the sales forecast amount since the product is easy to constract thus it can be produced in a short notice. Even the approach of producing after an order is received may be taken. The projections of inventory account is listed below: Projections Sales Unit Inventory (unit) Cost of Inventory year 1 852,00 900 256.185,00 TL year 2 894,60 1000 284.650,00 TL year 3 948,28 1000 284.650,00 TL 10 FIXED AND VARIABLE COST ANALYSIS 10.1 Utilities i-)Electricity: The unit cost of electricity is 15 kr/KWh. Electricity is the most costly utility in order to perform R D activities. We estimated to use 20 KWh electricity for the RD researchs conducted by our RD team and engineers. Also electricity can be a fixed cost utility for computer usage, for lightening, for white appliances etc. We estimate to use 1000 KWh in a month in ordinary use and it costs for our company around 150 TL ii-) Natural Gas is used in heating system. It is again a fixed cost with unit cost of 0,56 kr/m3 for business establishments and we estimate to use 500 m3 on average( the natural gas usage projection has been made considering the winter and summer effects). So the cost of natural gas will be around 280 YTL per month.. iii-) Water: Water is not foreseen to be a lot of expense for the company. The unit cost of water is 50 kr/m3 and we estimate to use around 100 m3 in a month with a fixed cost of 50 TL iv-) Telephone and Internet Expense is also a fixed cost and estimated as 100 TL in a month. Utility type Cost of the Utility(per month) Electricty 150TL Natural Gas 280TL Water 50TL Internet and Telephone Services 100TL Total(per month) 580TL 10.2 Salary Expense Salary costs are only fixed behavior because they do not fluctuate with the production level. Below our workers are listed. Type of Employee and Employer # of workers Average Salary (net) Total Expense (Monthly) Total Expense (Yearly) CEO 1 3.000,00 TL 3.000,00 TL 36.000,00 TL Inside Sales Lead 1 2.000,00 TL 2.000,00 TL 24.000,00 TL Engineering Managers 2 2.000,00 TL 4.000,00 TL 48.000,00 TL Designer 1 1.600,00 TL 1.600,00 TL 19.200,00 TL Sales Person 2 1.000,00 TL 2.000,00 TL 24.000,00 TL RD Team 2 1.000,00 TL 2.000,00 TL 24.000,00 TL Accountant 1 1.700,00 TL 1.700,00 TL 20.400,00 TL Electritians 2 750,00 TL 1.500,00 TL 18.000,00 TL Office Boy 1 770,00 TL 770,00 TL 9.240,00 TL TOTAL 13 13.820,00 TL 18.570,00 TL 222.840,00 TL 10.3 Variable Costs On top of raw material expense there is one more expense that is a variable cost for us. According the deals we made with the manufacturer, we agreed that the manufacturing firm will demand 50 TL for the unit they produce. The delivery of raw materials will be provided by the stores we purchase these materials from. Since we will be buying in lump sum amounts suppliers have offered us a discount on the price. So the raw material prices also cover the delivery charges on products. Name of Material unit costs cost per product microcontroller(1) 29,95 TL 29,95 TL photoactive cells(2) 1,50 TL 3,00 TL capacitors(3) 20,60 TL 61,80 TL LED(4) 7,60 TL 30,40 TL IR Sensors(5) 19,90 TL 99,50 TL DC Motor 10,00 TL 10,00 TL Cost of production 50,00 TL 50,00 TL total 284,65 TL 10.4 Selling Expense Selling expenses generally constitute of advertising and marketing expenses. Some of selling and administrative cost is variable and some of them is fixed. We do not expect to make an advertisement per product so we consider the whole selling expenses as a fixed expense. It is decided that mostly we will focus on giving ads to design and architecure magazines. We do not intend to rent advertising spaces on magazines not every month but generally every other month. We believe our sales on winter will increase due to the time spent on indoor activities will increase as well as the duration of light consumption will increase. So we plan on giving more ads in winters. Below shows the average selling expenses alocated to 12 months. month 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 total advertising expense 500 450 400 400 300 300 200 200 200 300 350 400 4.000 TL 10.5 Insurance Insurance is a fixed expense and the only insurance we have is for our furnitures and RD equipments in the office. We estimate the utilities will cost 200 TL monthly, 2.400 TL yearly according to the deals we made with Gne Insurance Comapny. 10.6 Research and Development Research and Development is a fixed cost and highly important cost for our company. Because we are an innovative and creative company, we have a high budget and cost of Research Development. Estimated cost on average 1.700 TL per month, 3,400TL per year. 10.7 Deprecation For the sake of calculating the fized costs we need to consider the depreciation expense. There are only a few asset that are depreciable. Below is the deprecable assets and their costs are listed. Name of the Asset Depretiable amount Salvage Value Useful Life Depreciation Expense(yearly) Depreciation Expense (monthly) Office Funiture 27.080 TL 4.080,00 TL 15 1.533,33 TL 127,78 TL Office Computers 20.000 TL 5.000,00 TL 16 937,50 TL 78,13 TL Company Cars 45.000 TL 10.000,00 TL 10 3.500,00 TL 291,67 TL RD Equipment 21.750 TL 9.750,00 TL 10 1.200,00 TL 100,00 TL 10.8 Other Fixed Expenses Office Supply is required to maintain ordinary works in office processing such as paper, pen, pencil etc. and categorized as a fixed expense of 150 YTL per month. Car, delivery and travel expense is for the sales of sales people since they will be visiting the customers, demonstrating the features of our product by conducting a door-step selling approach. Since we will not be delivering the product to customers, there is no delivery expense foreseen by the company. If the client requires a delivery an extra charge may be applied but it is not possible to identify related costs for such circumstances. This fixed expense is expected to be 200TL per month, 2,400TL per year. 10.9 Interest Expense We have obtained a 100,000 TL loan from Akbank and from the amortization table(See. Appendix 1) it can be clearly seen that monthly payment for the loan is 1.732,73 TL for 5 years. 10.10 Tax Expense The only fixed tax expense is the expense from payroll taxes since there is no real estate ownings, tax requiring belongings etc. that may require a fixed tax payment. The payroll tax expense is 6% per year. 11 BREAK-EVEN ANALYSIS Break even analysis is an important factor to test the return of our investment. The break-even point is calculated to see if ActiveSteps would be profitable to sell. For finding our break even point we need to list the fixed costs (monthly): Expenses(monthly) Salary expenses 18.570,00 TL Depreciation 597,57 TL Office Supply 150,00 TL Insurance 200,00 TL Research and Development Expenses 1.700,00 TL Car, delivery and travel 200,00 TL Rent 2.900,00 TL Utilities 580,00 TL Advertising Expenses 500,00 TL Payroll taxes 1.114,20 TL Principle and Interest expense 1.732,73 TL TOTAL 28.244,50 TL Contribution of a single unit of ActiveSteps= price variable cost = 650 TL 284,65 TL = 365,35 TL Break Even Point (output) = 28.244,50 TL / 365,35 TL = 77,31 units So to break even we need to sell 77,31 units ( the number is rounded to 77 units) per month. This amount of sales per month may be hard to attain in couple of the first 3 years but after the first year we expect a sales of more than 77 for each month. So after the first 3 years we expect to pass the break even point each month and achieve profit. The main reason for not breaking off for first couple of months is the huge interest expense we need to pay for the loan each month. 12 FINANCIAL STATEMENTS Financial statements are important indicators to analyze companys situation both yearly and specific time. We will prepare three main financial statements to serve our shareholders and SPK (Sermaye Piyasas Kurulu). The balance sheet, income statement and cash flow table are significant sources to evaluate companys performance. The financial statements are in the annex, however we will give brief information for each statement. For forecasting the financial statements the following assumption were made; GENERAL ASSUMPTIONS year 1 year 2 year 3 Plan Month 1 2 3 Current Interest Rate 10% 10% 10% Long Term Interest Rate 10% 10% 10% Tax Rate 24% 24% 24% Inflation 5,30% 4,90% 4,80% [1] https://www.a-zemlak.com.tr/?m=3s=0k=3varLang=Tvarmoney= https://www.hurriyetemlak.com/real_estate/shop/list.php?cid=350201020000lcs%5B%5D=110806290132_att4=Ofisnew_search=1

Personal Experience Applying for a GLC Scholarship

In my life, there was always three things certain in my mind. Firstly, family is always first, secondly that your academics allow you to reach new heights and lastly, that one should always help those in need. The Bible tells us that humans are called to do justice, love, kindness and walk humbly with God. What is justice? There are many forms of justice including the justice pertaining to law and the justice towards others. For me, justice is defined as caring for those who cannot care for themselves and helping those in need. I exercise this definition of justice both in school as well as in my community with the elderly as well as with my classmates. I will continue to use this definition of justice in university in order to better myself and those around me. My definition of justice is expressed through my actions with the elderly in my community. I believe that one should be help those who are unable to help themselves. I was raised with this mentality from a young age and so I express it through my care of the elderly. Although it isnt an official organization through which I do justice but I help my community nonetheless. Every Friday, I pack a small bag of my necessities in order to care an elderly man throughout the weekend until Sunday afternoon with my mother. While she cares for him by bathing him and changing his clothes, I do other chores that he is unable to do by himself too. I wash the dishes, prepare his pills for the morning, afternoon and beforeShow MoreRelatedCase 29 Panera Bread Company: Rising Fortunes?25159 Words   |  101 Pagesvission of Maxis Berhad is : To bring the future to our customers’ lives and businesses, in a manner that is simple, personalised and enriching, by efficiently and creatively harnessing leading-edge technology and delivering a brand of service experience that is reliable and enchanting. Objective An end that can be reasonably achieved within an expected timeframe and with available resources. In general, an objective is broader in scope than a goal, and may consist of several individual goals

Disadvantages of ERP, CRM and BPM Systems Free Essays

In recent years, there has been an increase in the use of technology in conducting corporate functions such as human resources, knowledge management and customer management. Identify any 3 of such systems (KM, CRM e.t. We will write a custom essay sample on Disadvantages of ERP, CRM and BPM Systems or any similar topic only for you Order Now c) and critically analyze the DISADVANTAGES of each of these systems against traditional archaic methods. Abstract The use of Information technology and information systems to support corporate functions have increased recently. IT/IS systems have substituted archaic methods in order to increase effectiveness and efficiency. Such systems attract substantial investment and are associated with significant problems. Using different examples the disadvantages in the use of these systems is provided with a view to overcoming the issues encountered. Introduction During the past 40 years IT expenditure and consumption have increased significantly (Gartner, 2000). This has been accompanied by a decrease in IT prices and a dramatic increase in IT functionality. As a result IT systems conducting corporate functions such as human resources, financial planning, knowledge management and customer management have proliferated. Today, many organisations have come to rely on such systems for effective management of their corporate functions. Since 2001, however, the contribution by IT to growth has been declining. Impediments to progress and the disadvantages associated with systems currently in place are increasingly raised as a concern (Zukis, B. et al., 2008). A number of disadvantages associated with current systems have been identified and are evident in systems such as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Business Process Management (BPM). (Bingi, P. et al, 2001; Kellen, V., 2003). Disadvantages of ERP, CRM and BPM Systems ERP systems integrate management information across an entire organisation and embrace finance/accounting, manufacturing, sales and service functions. Such systems run on a variety of configurations and, typically, employ a database as a repository of information (Khosrow–Puor,M., 2006) Compared with traditional more archaic methods current ERP systems several disadvantages have been identified (Smaizys Vasilecas 2009; PricewaterhouseCoopers, 2008): – It is difficult to incorporate changes and customizations required as business processes change. The systems encodes process definitions in proprietary source code. Changing this code is difficult, risky, expensive, and therefore rarely done. As a result most organisations forego opportunities to optimize their processes; – The systems focus on what organisations have in common and not on processes where real value is created for individual customers. This is due to ERP systems being developed for horizontal operational processes in the value chain but unable to effectively support or automate the many vertical specific business processes where real value is created; – Inability to grow or work with other systems. Current systems do not integrate well with other feeder systems from third party suppliers. This makes the initial deployment difficult since certain aspects cannot be easily and cheaply integrated and subsequently upgraded without soaring deployments costs. As a result of the above, traditional approaches can stand out as more flexible for companies to adapt and re-engineer processes to achieve competitive advantage. CRM systems are used for managing company’s interactions with customers, clients and sales prospects. They can be part of ERP systems or stand alone. The disadvantages with these systems tend to be in the overly complex tools and workflows requiring extensive training and business contextualisation training. The systems are difficult to use which leads to low usability, attention to detail and, consequently, data quality issues (Reid Catterall, 2005). Security concerns in CRM systems have also been raised (Turban et al., 2008). BPM systems capture and disseminate strategic information and outcome measurement (Kellen, 2003). A good example of BPM systems is the generation of the Balanced Scorecard (BSC) report. This is a strategic performance management tool used to present a mixture of financial and non-financial measures (Parmenter, 2010). Similarly to ERP/CRM systems, there are also a number of disadvantages in the use of BPM systems when compared to traditional approaches. For example, BPM systems need to be easily changed and they need to be understandable and not overly complex. Often they are not. BPM systems are often seen as irrelevant to most employees throughout the organization. Decisions on the build of such systems are often left to consultant analysts and external developers. This leads to many BPM systems being inconsistent and unable to enhance the organisation’s learning and knowledge management environment. Data integration, latency and data quality is also an unacceptable issue in BPM systems. This leaves managers having to revert to ‘intuition’ in decision making and to more traditional methods of performance measurement (Kellen, 2003). Despite the disadvantages outlined above it is unlikely that organizations will go back to traditional and more archaic methods of corporate management. Instead these disadvantages are likely to be dealt with through technical, organisational and Individual changes. Technologically, service oriented architecture (SOA) and engineering approaches have been proposed and may provide greater flexibility and less complexity (Bell, 2008) – particularly if delivered via Software as a service (SaaS) (Schneider 2007). Organisational issues include the creation of a business culture based on metrics, knowledge sharing and learning; better and more effective leadership, streamlined processes, and better strategic control and intent. In terms of Individual roles CEOs need to understand the IT implications of their strategies. CFOs and CIOs should collaborate to explain the business case for eliminating systems and hardware that some business units may have come to depend on but which are overly complex and underused. COOs must demand IT architecture that drives value to internal and external customers. Conclusion Despite rising IT spending most Industries are currently unable to focus their IT budgets on truly innovative value-adding systems and processes. This is creating a situation of diminishing returns from IT and an IT cost crisis increasingly difficult to justify.. Current ERP, CRM and BPM systems have a number of significant disadvantages compared to traditional archaic methods of managing corporate functions. These disadvantages are likely to continue unless significant shifts in Technical, Organisational and Individual approaches take place. References Bell, M. (2008). Service-Oriented Modeling: Service Analysis, Design, and Architecture. Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley Sons, Inc., pp. 3. Bingi, P. et al (2001). Critical issues affecting an ERP implementation. In: Myerson, J.M. (ed.) Enterprise Systems Integration, 2nd ed. Boca Raton, Florida: Auerbach, pp. 425-438. Gartner Inc. (2000). IT Spending: Its History and Future [WWW] Gartner Inc. Available from:http://www.gartner.com/4_decision_tools/measurement/measure_it_articles/july01/mit_spending_history1.html [Accessed 21/10/11). Kellen, V. (2003). Business Performance Measurement [WWW] DePaul University. Available from : http://www.kellen.net/bpm.htm [Accessed 22/10/11). Khosrow–Puor, Mehdi. (2006). Emerging trends and challenges in information technology management. Idea Group, Inc. p. 865. Parmenter, D. (2010). Key Performance Indicators (KPI): Developing, Implementing, and Using Winning KPIs. Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley Sons, Inc., pp. 16–18. Reid, A. and Catterall, M. (2005). Invisible data quality issues in a CRM implementation. Journal of Database Marketing Customer Strategy Management, 12 (4), pp. 305–4314 Schneider, R.D. (2007). SaaS, Composite Applications, and SOA: Understanding their Differences and Making Them Work Together [WWW] The SOA Magazine Available from: http://www.soamag.com/I9/0707-2.php [Accessed 22/10/11). Smaizys, A. and Vasilecas, O. (2009). Business Rules Based Agile ERP Systems Development. Informatica, 20 (3), pp. 439–460 Turban, E. et al. (2008). Information Technology for Management, Transforming Organizations in the Digital Economy. Massachusetts: John Wiley Sons, Inc., pp. 300–343. Zukis, B. et al. (2008). Why Isn’t IT Spending Creating More Value [WWW] PwC. Available from : http://www.pwc.com/us/en/increasing-it-effectiveness/it-spending-and-value-creation.jhtml [Accessed 21/10/11). How to cite Disadvantages of ERP, CRM and BPM Systems, Essay examples

Article Critique Up on Downloading free essay sample

This should be a great resource to market and sell music. The music industry should not have any t yep of money problems. The industry needs to use their resources more creatively and effectively in order to get the most out of it. In Professor Charles Mesons model Speed Bumps, he proposes making legal downloading of music cheap and attractive and diminishing the quality of i Illegal downloaded music (Macrame 1). I agree with Professor Mesons, think if the music was cheaper to download that more people would pay for their mum sic instead of doing it illegally.There are many ways to make music affordable for DOD unloading Berger 2 while allowing the music industry to make a profit as well. People love to get baa origins or even better get things for free. If the music industry remembers that they will get out of there money crisis easily. I think if Tunes ran monthly specials like my current grocery store they would get more sales and loyal customers. We will write a custom essay sample on Article Critique: Up on Downloading or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page For example if they ha ad buy one and get one free sale on songs or even reduced prices for older or not as popular songs they would earn more revenue.In this essay, Strain anticipates a situation where people are paying money o n a bulk subscription model (Macrame 1). Tunes could have different levels of subscriptions such as you can be one of the first ones to get new releases first downloaded so many songs a month for one low price. I dont understand w why the music industry hasnt done anything like this yet. There are many successful ex ample in other industries that do this such as cell phone compassionateness subscripts ins, Entitled and cable companies.This is a very successful concept and dont understand why the music industry isnt capitalizing on what has been already done. Do believe that musicians should make money off of their music. A musicians puts many hours of time and effort into making their music. Musicians should d not expect to make all their money from Tunes or CD sales. The industry has changed s Musicians need to change as well. Remember the old saying not to put all you our eggs in one basket. Well, musicians need to remember that and become diversified They Berger 3 can go our tour and sell their merchandise at concerts .Music is used in a lot Of commercials and TV shows. A musicians can also become a producer for other people music. So to me it doesnt seem like the music industry is in as bad of a crisis that they are saying they are in. Is it ethically wrong to download music without paying for its? Think it depend ads on who you ask. Music used to be so simple. You listened to it on the radio of r free . You bought a CD or a tape when you wanted a copy of your favorite music. T hose of us who grew up without Tunes,Youth and without the internet paid for our m sic.I did and I feel like it is steal when you download music without paying for it. Those who have grew up with getting their music off the internet may not fee I that its wrong to illegally download music since they have been doing it all their live sees. There are so many sites where you can stream music for free such as Spottily, Reaps odd, Pandora and Jingo. Believe that music industry needs to come to terms with changing technology and change their way of doing business. They will not be successful till they u technology to their advantage.

Two Gentlemen in Verona free essay sample

The Abasement of The Upper Class Most people have a predetermined idea of the levels of a social hierarchy. They presume that the upper class is noble, proper and educated while the lower class is of the opposite; the lower class work for the upper class and thus cannot possibly exceed the caliber of the upper class. Shakespeare upends this predetermined notion by utilizing the characters to convey a strong sense of role reversal throughout The Two Gentlemen of Verona. This role reversal upsets the stereotypical social hierarchy and strongly suggests that the upper class may not be as highly esteemed as they are perceived to be. Loyalty is an underlying theme throughout the play. Symbols of loyalty prompt the reader to not only compare the loyalty of a servant’s relationship with an upperclassman’s relationship but also conclude that this comparison often leads to the degradation of the upper class characters. We will write a custom essay sample on Two Gentlemen in Verona or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Proteus refers to himself as â€Å"spaniel-like† (4. 2. 4) in Act 4; however his actions show that he is the direct opposite of what a spaniel, or a dog, should be like. Judging from his fickle actions of suddenly falling in love with Silvia after swearing to remain faithful to Julia, Proteus is unable to have nearly as much loyalty as a spaniel should have. Thus one can conclude that Proteus is not nearly as loyal as a dog. His condemnable actions lead to an abasement of the upper class and gives way to the idea that the aristocratic aren’t as respectable as they seem to be. The relationship between Lance and Crab can be compared to Proteus and Julia. Lance, the servant has an unusually loyal and selfless relationship with his dog, Crab. It is interesting to note that Lance seems to be more loyal or devoted to Crab, than his dog is to him. In fact, Lance even takes the blame and beating for his dog when Crab his caught â€Å"a pissing† (4. 4. 1) under the table. This loyalty can be compared to Proteus and Julia in that Lance’s selflessly devoted relationship with Crab is a parody of the despicably unfaithful relationship Proteus has with Julia. The â€Å"reversed† relationship between Lance and Crab also gives way to a new and important idea for the rest of the play. Upon closer inspection, one can see that the master, in this case Lance resembles the characteristics of a loyal servant, which should be the role played by Lance’s dog, Crab. The unusual reversal of roles that this master and its dog should have, gives way to a recurring idea – prominent throughout the rest of the play, that the characteristics of the lower class and upper class are interchanged. Speed and Lance are two servants who happen to be servants of two deeply in-love masters. In Act 3 Scene 1, Lance claims that he too, is in love and reveals a list of which he has written down the merits of his lady. Typically, one should assume that this list – coming from an uneducated servant, should not exhibit a great amount of depth or critical thinking; however this list surprises the reader in its logicality and wittiness, and in addition, reinforces the idea of the switching of hierarchal roles. Items on Lance’s list exhibit great practicality such as â€Å"She can sew† (3. . 298) and â€Å"She can wash and scour† (3. 1. 329). Lance also cleverly transforms flaws into virtues when he describes that â€Å"She hath more hair than wit,† or that she is younger than she is intelligent and â€Å"more fault than hairs,† or more flaws than she is young and â€Å"more wealth than faults† (3. 3. 3) which amalgamates to that she is wealt hier than flawed since â€Å"that word (wealth) makes the faults gracious† because Lance understands that in real life, level of wealth is a highly influential, and possibly ultimate deciding factor in marriage or a relationship. The realistic and practical nature of the list shows the maturity and intelligence of Lance, which begs to question the nature of the picturesque but fickle and unsustainable nature of the love affairs of the masters, Valentine and Proteus. This once again reiterates the role reversal of social hierarchy and through the sensibleness of Lance and shows that the upper class may not be as intellectual as they are perceived to be. There are also other smaller remarks in scenes that support the notion that a role reversal suggests the idea that aristocrats may not be as intellectual as them seem to be. For example, in Act 2 Scene 1, when Valentine is reunited with his love, Silvia – Speed provides several asides in which he mockingly says â€Å"a million of manners! † (2. 1. 95) in response to Valentine greeting Silvia with â€Å"a thousand good morrows† (2. 1. 93-4). In this series of asides, the audience can see that the servant is sensibly belittling the absurdity of his master’s love for Silvia. An encounter in Act 3 Scene 1 between the Duke and Valentine also pokes at a role reversal when the Duke, perhaps the character with the highest social class throughout the novel, seeks advice on how to â€Å"court† (3. . 85) his lover, from Valentine: a relatively subordinate character. It is arguable that the Duke only asked Valentine for advice as a part of his scheme to figure out how Valentine has been courting his own daughter, Silvia. However, if one looks at the scene and context secluded from the ulterior intentions, the mere act of a superior asking an inferior for advice heavily suggests that the role reversal of characters in The Two Gentlemen of Verona and ultimately, that the aristocratic, or Duke, is not as almighty and wise as he is assumed to be. Finally, perhaps the most prominent manifestation of role reversal and the abasement of aristocrats lies in the exchange between Valentine and Speed. Throughout the beginning half of the play, Valentine disapproves Proteus’s love for Julia and claims that by staying at home with Julia, Proteus will have â€Å"homely wits† (1. 1. 2) and wear out his â€Å"youth with shapeless idleness† (1. 1. 8). However during Act 2 Scene 1, Valentine is criticized by Speed, for the negative effects that he has brought upon himself as a result of his love for Silvia. Speed not only brings attention to the fact that only recently did Valentine â€Å"chid[e] at Sir Proteus for going ungartered† (2. 1. 70) but also has somewhat become blinded by love. During Speed’s observation of Valentine’s state in Act 2 Scene 1, Speed condemns Valentine who now â€Å"walk[s] alone like one that had the pestilence† (2. 1. 21) as a result of being in love with Silvia, when Valentine used to â€Å"walk like one of the lions† (2. 1. 27). As a result of being â€Å"metamorphosed with a mistress† (2. 1. 29-30), when Speed â€Å"look on you [Valentine], I [Speed] can hardly think you my master† (2. . 30-1). This exchange radiates the idea that Speed sees things that Valentine is unable to as well as the idea that Speed is wiser and more intellectual than his superior, Valentine. The latter part of the scene where Speed claims that Valentine’s lover, Silvia, is actually â€Å"not so fair†(2. 1. 51) accentuat es both Speed’s expert and knowledgeable as well as Valentine’s increasingly dull and inferior characters. When Valentine questions Speed’s observation of Silvia’s beauty, Speed cleverly notes that â€Å"Because Love is blind† (2. 1. 8), Valentine is unable to see the ugliness of Silvia. In this brief exchange, Valentine and Speed play instead, the inferior and superior roles respectively as Speed lectures Valentine on this love-blind issue. Valentine’s aristocratic character is degraded as Speed didactically enlightens Valentine on the effects of love that he is unable to see. It is questionable that because a big portion of Shakespeare’s audience was of middle and lower class, he conveyed a sense of abasement of the upper class in The Two Gentlemen of Verona. Thus it can be argued that he utilized this theme as a way to provide pleasure for the audience of his work. Nonetheless, through the various exchanges between master and servant, and servant to servant, one can see that the stereotypical roles of the characters are not congruent with their actual characteristics. Lance’s relationship with his dog both parodies Proteus and Julia and allows the theme of role reversal to manifest itself in their unusual relationship. Lance’s practical list of merits provides a sense of integrity and high intellectual capability for other members of the lower class. The Duke and Valentine suggests a role reversal and finally, Speed’s didactic observation of Valentine’s chronic â€Å"love blindness† allows the audience to see the dullness of the upper class and quick wit of lower class. All these examples amalgamate to a reinforced idea that the roles of the upper class and lower class may be reversed and that the upper class are not nearly as intelligent and esteemed as they are perceived to be.

Is Ghost Blogging Unethical

Is Ghost Blogging Unethical You didnt write that post, but you put your name on it. You hired a ghost blogger. Ghost blogging: one person writes the blog posts, but another person gets the credit, with or without disclosure that the blog uses ghost written posts. Does that seem wrong to you? Unethical? Some say thats an easy yes, but others, particularly in the public relations industry, say no. It depends on how you see your content, and how comfortable you are with a lie. 1. Ghost Blogging Ruins The Relationship Social media and blog content–its all about the relationship now, isnt that right? Were talking, were conversing, were engaging. Its all inbound marketing and in order for that to work, we have to be transparent and open and above all else, be concerned with connecting personally to our readers. In this strict definition, ghost blogging seems like a home-wrecker in our relationship with our audience. Blogger Dave Fleet has written an article about the  ethics of ghost writing  in social media, stating outright that it is unethical if it is undisclosed because it harms the relationship. Unlike ghost-written speeches, where the spokesperson lends their name and approval to the writing by actually saying the words, ghost-written blogs can be published without the named person ever seeing them. Fleet later wrote an article addressing ghost blogging directly, stating that it was wrong. Writing blog posts was part of relationship-building. When did outsourcing your relationships become  okay? Dave Fleet Maybe the question isnt whether ghost blogging is ethical or not, but instead, whether your blog is about relationships or information. Not All Blogs Are Relationships To play devils advocate, let me suggest that not all blogging is relationship building.   Some blogs are purely for information. Just as a writer publishes a book (paper or ebook), you buy it, you read it, you dont assume the author wants to start a transparent relationship with you. The information was the thing. Consider the many reasons people create blogs: Create and cultivate relationships. Develop their image and platform. Frame and speak on issues that affect them or their brand (self PR). Show themselves as thought leaders. Media catching (journalists contact them because of what they found on their blog) for attention. Communicate with the rest of the organization, or shareholders. A pure love of writing. Earning money from ads, sales, affiliates, etc. Attract search engines to their website where their business and products are found. Do all of these reasons really have to be considered relationships?  I know we are trained to think that way now,  but is it the only route? The trend and best practices youll hear now is that all content is framed in a relational and social approach. To be the devils advocate for a moment, I would suggest that it is also possible that you are only interested in relaying information and arent looking for a relationship (ask any seriously introverted writer about this). While you might see significantly different results than someone who views their content as relational, you are, at least, getting content on your site. If its good, youll still be found by search engines. Maybe thats enough for you.

Facquier Gas Company Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Facquier Gas Company - Case Study Example These specifications are designed to accommodate the gas flow which should start flowing in September. Thus, in this case there are two variables for consideration and require the company to act fast so that it completes the installation of the pipes before September. Additionally, due to the increase in demand, the thickness of the pipe, which determines the volume of gas passing per unit time, has to be increased as well. There are two problems with reference to the case of Facquier Gas Company. Firstly, in order to reflect the desired changes that will lead the company to acquiring more sales and supply to more customers, the company, through Mr. Murphy is burdened with the task of accommodating major lead times. This means that the supply of the required products will foreseeably experience some delays related to the fact that Facquier Gas Company’s orders would not be fitted in the schedules of suppliers. Additionally, from Mr. Murphy’s understanding, the company has formerly used different specifications for the pipes such as 3/8 inch while the current design uses 3/7 inch thickness. The length of the pipe in former specifications has been 35-45 feet in length. Eventually, the consideration of order the products within a short schedule is also faced with a constraint of lead time. This is the case with the wrapper and coal tar as one company supplying the coal tar s located at Phila delphia while he one to supply the wrappers is located in Atlanta. a. To adapt the new design specifications as they are in order to meet the current demand and at the same time offset the time wastage the 3/8-inch pipes contribute for attracting regular standards’ inspections (Cowen, 2014). b. The company should consider acquiring the products with the new specifications but consider choosing a different logistics channel offering quicker delivery packages. Although the quicker delivery will increase costs, it will ensure that

Poor nutrition; food poverty; food deserts in Nigeria Essay

Poor nutrition; food poverty; food deserts in Nigeria - Essay Example Just like the rest of the world, most African countries suffer from poor nutrition, food poverty, and food deserts. In West Africa, Nigeria turns out to be one of the most affected countries, and such conditions mostly trickles down to pregnant women. While the role of proper nutrition and food security in pregnant women in African needs efficient management, it is also essential to apply concepts of food economics in the management of the outlined issues (Yamin & Norheim, 2014). This report will aim to analyse poor nutrition issues in pregnant women living in Africa, while relating to specific countries, as well as the influence these issues have on health promotion. Furthermore, the report will examine questions concerned with the control of prevalent diseases in pregnant women. One of the main issues affecting Sub-Saharan Africa in terms of poor nutrition is the rise of migration patterns in recent years, especially to the Western world. Currently, among all African countries, Nigeria takes the lead in representing the continent, claiming the most predominant immigrant residents in a number of first world nations (Shrimpton, 2006). On the other hand, if at all there are any impacts of immigration on their nutritional status and the results of pregnancy of women in their native countries, many studies have not captured such data comprehensively. Thus, it is currently unidentified, to some extent, about the dietary insufficiencies as well as pregnancy complications not only in Nigeria, but also in the entire Sub-Saharan Africa. These discrepancies have led to unexploited opportunities focused on the most suitable antenatal care aimed towards the reversing the likely high risks in different groups of women during pregnancy. According to Shrimpton (2006), poor nutrition in pregnancy among Sub-Saharan women, with in-depth focus on Nigeria, leads to the most common

HOSPITAL READMISSION REDUCTION PROGRAM Research Paper

HOSPITAL READMISSION REDUCTION PROGRAM - Research Paper Example This did not emerge as a significant issue for quality of inpatient care; although, patients were discharged untimely, which might hypothetically raise the threat of readmissions that are expensive to payers. In a Congressional Report of 2007 (Hackbarth, Reischauer & Miller, 2007), the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) categorized several hospital readmissions as probably preventable. On August1 2011, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) published its inpatient Prospective Payment System (IPPS) finale law. Incorporated in the early structure for Hospital Readmission Reduction Program (HRRP) that is intended to begin operation in the FY 2013. The HRRP was incorporated in the Affordable Care Act by the Congress. The HRRP policy is concerned with the reduction of Medicare disbursements to hospitals with a higher number of rehospitalizations for ‘appropriate conditions’ over a particular period. The policy is only appropriate to medical states chosen by the Health and Human Service (HHS) Secretary. The policy directs the Secretary to choose situations that are expensive or widespread and where there are readmissions approaches that are authorized by the body with a treaty under section 1890(a) that is the National Quality Forum (NQF). The HRRP is applicable to all hospital organizations except those offering chiefly psychiatric, rehabilit ative or long-standing care, critical admission hospitals, children’s hospitals, and some cancer or research centers. Hospitals organizations engaging in a Medicare payment demonstration scheme are subject to this program, although, can be exempted from engagement provided that their state presents a yearly report explaining the state’s plans to decrease expenses and develop outcomes and the HHS Secretary approves. Understanding the technicalities of the HRRP entails one to consider the conditions and political background adjoining the endorsement of its parent

A case study on a domestic violence intervention

A case study on a domestic violence intervention Working with Individuals AGENCY PROFILE The student social worker is placed with Bharatiya Mahila Federation (BMF). Bharatiya Mahila Federation (BMF) is an all-India organization women’s mass organization, working with the victims of Domestic Violence. BMF was established by many leaders including Aruna Asaf Ali. Mahila Samasya Nivaaran Kendras (Family Counseling Centers for Women) are located in Thane, Kalyan, and Bhiwandi. In the purview of socially relevant issues, it also takes care of the education of the slum children through a non-formal approach towards education, under the name of ‘Disha Classes’. BMF has vigorously campaigned against female foeticide. It is also working in tandem with Malati Vaidya Trust to start a Resource Center in Ganeshwadi, Badlapur. The student works with the Family Counselling Center in Thane. The center is run by para-professionals, some of whom were themselves victims at some point in time. CASE For the purpose of explanation of the various aspects of working with individuals, the student will like to mention the case of a 30 year old women named Sanaa (name changed). Sanaa is Muslim by religion and was married off at the age of 26 as her husband’s second wife. He remarried after giving divorce to his first wife. Sanaa is residing with her parents, brother and sister-in-law in Mumbra. She has four children. The first two are twin daughters and one of them named Aalia(name changed) is intellectually challenged because of the injuries inflicted on Sanaa during pregnancy. The other daughter named Nazia was forcefully taken away by her father Khalid with him since unlike the first daughter she is normal. Clearly, the father has left the entire responsibility of the child who is intellectually- challenged on the mother, without giving any maintenance from his side. The third child, who is a boy, Naseer (name changed), is physically challenged and can’t walk normally . The fourth child, Ali, is 7 months and is chronically ill has been hospitalized many times. Sanaa approached the agency’s Family Counselling Centre. She complained of being beaten up by her husband, brother-in-law and sister-in-law and the atrocities committed against her at the time of her pregnancy. Due to the injuries, she had a miscarriage the first time she got pregnant. The agency wanted the trainee to do a home-visit and verify the facts. The home visit revealed that the client is staying in a chawl in unhygienic conditions. The trainee interviewed the client and her mother. Her husband has refused to accept her and the children back and wants a divorce, but Sanaa wants to stay with him. Her husband has put a condition that he will let her come back only if she and her family give in writing that they will not file a police complaint against him and will not approach any NGO/agency for further help as they did earlier. Sanaa wants to be with him despite all the physical and mental tortures that her husband makes her go through. She does not wish to burden her parents with her and her children’s responsibility. As far as her education his concerned, she has obtained education till the secondary level. Before marriage, she used to teach kids of the primary level. The trainee tried to counsel her that staying with her husband would not change h er conditions. Instead she should file a case on him demanding maintenance for herself and her kids. The trainee also suggested that she takes up a job. Before a case could be filed, the trainee paid a visit to her husband to come for a meeting at the agency but he refused to all efforts of negotiation and said that he will confront her directly in the court. Later on, when the student called her up to know her decision about filing the case, she said she was ready to go ahead with it. Hence, she was asked to come for the meeting with the agency’s advocate on the given date. The advocate asked the trainee to submit Sanaa’s case history so that the petition could be filed in the court. The student social worker also figured out that Sanaa’s case has a lot of scope of medical intervention apart from assistance at the legal level. While the trainee was planning the further course of action for the case, the client took up a teaching job in a neighbourhood school in her locality. This indeed came as a happy news for the trainee as it reflected that mere triggering an idea can actually motivate the client to help herself. The client was also encouraged to further continue her studies. For the medical help for Sanaa’s kids, the trainee decided to take them to a BMC Hospital. After waiting in the queue for two-and-half hours outside the OPD for Skin Diseases, Naseer was diagnosed, medicines were prescribed and the doctor asked to bring him in the coming week for follow-up. The prescribed medicines were not available in the hospital’s pharmacy. So, the medicines were bought from outside. Naseer was also examined for his swollen abdomen. The doctor told that there is a doubt of him suffering from Langerhans cell Histiocytosis (LCH) and hence he needs to be admitted. Sanaa was apprehensive about admitting Naseer, since she would not be able to afford it. The trainee could observe an expression of fear on her face. It was time for the trainee to counsel her about the urgent need to get her son admitted. On the way back home, while talking to the client, the trainee found out that Sanaa’s mother wants her to quit the teaching job since its taking a l ot of her time and it becomes difficult for her mother to handle three kids when Sanaa’s is out for work in the afternoon school. As an alternative, her mother had suggested her to take up tailoring work. For the same, she expressed the need for a sewing machine. So now, there was a need to look for a donor for Naseer’s treatment and for the machine. The supervisor suggested that Sanaa’s case can be referred to another organization who is involved into such kind of work. After brainstorming, the trainee decided to refer Sanaa’s case to MESCO – an organization in Mumbra. The visit to MESCO turned out to be quite fruitful. In the meeting with its representatives, it was planned that the after submitting required documents the financial assistance would be provided for Naseer’s treatment. However, one constraint was that MESCO provides help only on first three days of every month so the trainee had to really pace up the process of arranging all the documents. For Sanaa’s tailoring venture, the representative mentioned that she will have to appear for a skill test after which she would be given a sewing machine. The documentation process can actually kill a lot of time and the trainee already had limited one in hand, since the end of the field work for the year was approaching. After running from post-to-post for one signature from the doctor at the hospital, trainee had a cost certificate in hand which turned out to be of no use since the social worker at the hospital asked to get another one for the total estimated cost of treatment, running around for which was postponed to another week by the doctor. In the meantime, the student was struggling with herself as to find a way to convince the client to get her son admitted. Every week he was falling ill and the medicine for the skin disease seemed to have an effect only in the first week. Follow-ups to the doctor after that did not make much of a difference. This led the trainee to ponder as to why this was happening and the speculation was that it is possible that the skin disease could be a symptom of LCH. After reading up on LCH, the doub t was confirmed. For weeks, Naseer was being treated for the symptom! But now the field work year was over! So what should one do in such a situation? The client cannot be left midway in the helping process. It raises a lot of ethical issues. STAGES IN WORKING WITH INDIVIDUALS 1. Social Study 2. Social Assessment 3. Intervention 4. Termination 5. Evaluation The initial description of the case is clearly a Social Study of Sanaa’s case. Social Study is a systematic study of the client and her/his circumstances in relation to her/his problem Information is collected and organised with regard to the following: Problems (the initially stated problem and associated problems if any), Age, sex, marital status, Educational qualification, Nature of employment, income, Health conditions, Personality features, Home and neighbourhood, Family constellation, Family history (significant events, attitudes,relationships, etc.). Sanaa’s case was constantly assessed for the purpose of necessary intervention. Each course of action had to be simultaneously evaluated to check for loopholes. However, the case cannot be called to have reached the termination. But the intervention done so far has proved to be be fruitful to the extent that Sanaa took up a job on her when encouraged and motivated. The trainee could locate an organization who could p rovide her with a machine for starting tailoring work and fund the treatment of her child. Naseer did receive some OPD treatment, which revealed the need for a long term treatment. The trainee was also able to facilitate the process of providing legal assistance to the client. TOOLS TECHNIQUES Tools can be defined as the ways through which a particular profession, occupation or form of trade is practiced. In social casework, tools are the means of establishing and developing contact with the clients. Through casework tools, one can have access to the information about the client, her concerns, her family, her environment. The student made use of all the five casework tools, namely, Listening, Observation, Relationship, Home-Visit and Interview. According to Grace Mathew, the last three tools mentioned here, are the channels to make the casework techniques operative. Mathew has defined casework techniques as the systematic procedures of helping. These are- Acceptance, Assurance, Facilitation of Expression of Feelings, ,Allaying overpowering feelings, Accrediting and Building Self-Confidence, Encouragement and Reassurance, Being with the Client, Emotional Support, Action-Oriented Support. Then Grace Mathew listed down certain other techniques for the purpose of enhancing res ources. These are – Providing or Procuring Material Help, Change of Physical Environment, Enhancing Information and Knowledge. There are also techniques for changing the internal processes- Counselling techniques (Reflective Discussion, Advice, Motivation, Clarification, and Correcting Perception), Anticipatory Guidance, Modelling, Role Playing, Reality Orientation, Remove Guilt Feelings and using them constructively, Interpretation, Partialisation, Universalisation, Setting Limits, Confrontation, Reaching Out, Renewing Family Links, Improving Communication Patterns, Changing Attitudes. Listening as a tool is effective only if it is active and attentive to understand the client’s emotions and to know what she/he is conveying. Effective listening is facilitated by maintaining an eye contact with the client. Distractions, wool gathering and selective listening obstruct the listening process. Observation is used in casework to note the client’s facial expression, body language and signs of uneasiness in the process of interaction with the client. Relationship between the worker an the client is a professional one and is positive in nature. The positivity of the relationship is manifest in the rapport the caseworker has with the client. Home Visit is an instrument, which enables the social worker to verify the facts of the case being handled. It also conveys a message to the client about the social worker’s interest in his/her welfare. Sometimes home-visits can be be highly revealing and at times, may change the shape of the course. The facts me be turned upside down. Interview facilitates face-to-face interaction between the caseworker and the client. The objectives in such an interaction are to obtain information from the client or to impart some to the client, to study and assess the situation of the client’s problem unique to her/him and to give assistance. Drawing from the above case, first of all the caseworker had to evoke the confidence of the client since the constant victimization to the domestic violence had made her doubt her own capabilities. The client had to be told that she can regain her lost confidence by keeping herself busy and taking up a job. She was encouraged and motivated enough to take up the teaching job again. The caseworker has been working towards making provision for material help for the treatment of kids and for the required equipment so that she can take up tailoring work at home. The caseworker did a lot of advocacy work in Sanaa’s case such as visiting the hospital for procuring the certificate, meeting with the referral organization’s representatives for seeking financial assistance for the client. Many counseling techniques as Correcting Perception, Advice, Removing Guilt Feelings, Universalisation were made use of. In the beginning, when the Home-Visit was made the caseworker advised Sana a on the way to come out of her situation, how the agency would facilitate the process. When her son was taken for treatment, so due to waiting in the long queues and the whole documentation process of OPD treatment, Sanaa started feeling guilty that why did she marry in the first place, had she not married she would not have had to face such problems. In such a situation, she had to be told that marriage was not the fault and she does not need to be guilty about something for which she is not responsible. She was married off to a man, the background and other details of whom were not at all confirmed by her family. As it came to the caseworker’s amazement while talking to the client’s mother, the latter used to see a girl frequently in the locality and got acquainted with her and on her proposal, married off her daughter to her brother. When the caseworker asked the client to get an income proof from her school, without which she would not have received financial assistance from the referral organization, she did not do so for weeks despite repeated reminders. The social worker had to then step in and find out what the matter was and what came out was that she had a misconception about it. The client th ought that if she would submit an income proof, then she would not be provided any help since, according to her, they may think if she is earning then she does not need help. The caseworker then had to correct her perception that the income proof is a formality and because her income is meager to afford the treatment of her son she would definitely be provided with financial assistance. Once the client was very thwarted with herself. At that time, the caseworker brought to light the examples of many other woman who have been and who are in worse situation than hers. THEORETICAL APPROACHES USED The student trainee made use of the Empowerment and Advocacy Approach. It has been said that empowerment seeks to help clients gain power of decision and action over their own lives by reducing the effect of social or personal blocks to existing power, by increasing capacity and self-confidence to use power and by transferring power from the environment to clients. Advocacy seeks to represent the interests of the powerless clients to powerful individuals and structures. For Furlong, empowerment is an essential objective of casework because it avoids a crude polarization of social action and individualized perspectives, placing work with individuals and families in a context of concern for social objectives. In 1994, Anderson et al, presented a model of empowerment for social development in Africa concerned with the five dimensions of practice: personal, social, educational, economic and political. These dimensions are intertwined with each other and looking at them so allows people t o meet individual needs (personal power), improve their capacity to influence others (interpersonal power), which in turn creates an ability to influence the power distribution more widely (political power). Rees came up with a set of ideas with regard to empowerment, viz., a) biography b) power c) Political understanding d) Skills e) Interdependence of Policy and Practice. For Rees, the basic aim of empowerment is social justice, greater security, political and social equality to people, through mutual support and shared learning. Kondrat emphasized upon the value of local knowledge, specifically the one coming from the clients. One intricacy of advocacy lies in the duality of its interrelated meanings of ‘representation’. The representation in advocacy is in term of the acting and arguing for the interests of the clients. However, for Phillip (1979), advocacy entails ‘representation’ in terms of interpreting and displaying the value of clients to the powe rful groups in the society. Advocacy, in part, is said to be an aspect of empowerment, since it can be used to argue for resources, or change the interpretation which powerful groups make of clients. Anderson’s model of empowerment was crucial for application in Sanaa’s case, since socio-economic, personal and educational aspects were focused upon at the level of assessment as well as intervention. The caseworker also made use of Rees’s understanding of empowerment in terms of the Skill enhancement. The client’s tailoring skills was tapped on to enable her choose a suitable livelihood option. Advocacy work was also done by initiating the process of legal assistance and facilitating the process of financial assistance by MESCO. CHALLENGES, DILEMMAS RESISTANCE One of the challenges encountered was that not all three kids could be taken for consultation together since no one from the client’s family could accompany her to the hospital. So there was a lack in terms of human resources. Social Case Work Practice is a huge responsibility, especially when any form of medical intervention is involved, especially, when one’s target system involves infants. Another challenge was the unavailability of the prescribed medicines in municipal hospital’s pharmacy. Those who cannot afford to buy the expensive medicines from outside are not even able to start the treatment. At the macro level, this remains a big loophole in the health care sector of the country. It is an obstacle for the low-income group in accessing health care services. This also paralyses the government health care sector at a very basic level. Looking for a donor or an organisation where Sanaa’s case could be referred for another challenge. The biggest ethical dilemma was about the leaving the treatment process midway. The follow-up in the case is being planned to overcome the dilemma. The client has been very resistant to the idea of admitting the child in the hospital despite repeated reassurance that the financial assistance would be taken care of.