The purpose of undertaking this dissertation project, as part of the MSc in Management at the
International Hellenic University, is to synthesize a comprehensive business plan for a new
innovative product idea in order to examine its viability and sustainability as a real-world
business as well as portray potential investment opportunities. The paper, reviews and
evaluates research related to business planning, product innovation, external financing and
venture capital in order to draw the academic methodologies required to structure this paper
accordingly, evaluate the business potential in regards to the market and industry dynamics,
assess the tangible and intangible resources necessary for development and prepare marketing
plans and financial projections for a go-to-market strategy and external fund raising.
The venture under examination is Handshake, a wearable technology product and
cloud service that enables people to create and cultivate social relationships just by shaking
hands. In order to reinforce our estimates related to the market potential, our manufacturing
costs and sales projections as well as the industry micro and macro considerations, we
verbally interview key industry persons from organizations such as Microsoft, Space Hellas,
Oracle, McKinsey and Infinite Informatics.
By synthesizing the first-order data accumulated through the interviews and reports
from market and industry research firms we generated a 2 year business plan from prototype
stage to the point of the first retail sale. This paper, besides serving an academic purpose, also
serves as a foundation for future refinements in order to be used as a vehicle to attract
external investments but also an internal roadmap to help the founding team build a
successful company on top of this innovative idea.
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