Business Plan Clarification

Business Plan Clarification

1.How are we constraining our app to Temple community? We are authenticating users through TUid and password, staffing with Temple students, and affiliating with the University so we are following city, state regulations.

2.We are looking to follow Temple regulations, what is the process for delivering a Temple sponsored application? The Temple venture program or TAP . "Ben Franklin is an effective venture partner that provides not only investment expertise, but mentorship and strategic advice that can enable technologies developed at Temple to benefit society at large." You can send in a form through the website and they will contact you back. Also partnered with Penn and Drexel.

3.Why are Diamond Dollars a competitive advantage? There are tax breaks when receiving diamond dollars, the student population can add money to their account via TUportal. However,we will still provide the option of paying with credit. By providing more options to our consumers we can gain a competitive advantage.

4.How will we manage the supply of drivers to the demand for rides? We will use strong data analytics to ensure staff of drivers is available and meeting demand of customers. By constraining our consumers to the temple community (Academic Staff 3,688/ Students 37,788) by constraining demand we are able to constrain supply. As Uber has prime times, so will Temple, which we can manage through utilizing event calendars. Obviously weekends/ weather conditions also needs to be taken into account.

5.What makes our app unique over Uber and Taxi's? We are constraining our App to the TUCommunity, Temple Student drivers, entertainment options, and limiting the radius to 8 miles, thus conserving funds. Our most unique value proposition is safety. We can provide the safest option for our students by being partnered with the university. Students will be employed by our company and insured by the university.(we will need to pay a percentage of our revenue to the university, however because we are utilizing temple startup programs we will be aided in funding our app, because we will be a temple based service.

6.What should be the pricing model? 5$ for pickup 1.50$ per mile. After researching supply and demand we will not be using Uber’s dynamic pricing model( prices will always remain the same). While we will be cheap our best new feature is safety. We can also provide a slight discount on the pickup fee for groups or possibly do a flat fee for groups of 3 or more, allowing each student to pay $3.00 no matter where they are going (encouraging reduced demand).

7.What percentage of the ride revenue should go to the driver? Driver will get 75%.

8.What would be the cost of operating our service? Let’s really push for the university here to aid us in operating costs, such as insurance. We can also plan to pay off a percentage to the university because we will be affiliated. Our main costs will be paying competitive rates to our drivers (more like $10 an hour, which if you think about it is very feasible, because most rides will only take around 20-25 min altogether and we will be paying out about 75% to student drivers)

9.What will be our marketing strategy? (Which type of venues will we target?) Temple venues mostly, Liacouras center concerts, football games, any sporting events ( 20% off your ride if you are going to a temple event). Possibly even restaurants or clothing stores that offer student discounts?

10.How many rides do we expect for the 1st year, and what is the average revenue per ride? 2000 rides per week x 36 peak weeks = 72000 rides

11.How will we find workers? Do we have enough drivers? We will provide competitive pay and will fully insure our drivers (when working on the clock) through the University affiliation. We can also provide them with free garage parking if they work for our service (an awesome deal, that temple can easily provide)

12.What is our expansion strategy, which markets will we target if successful? We will strictly expand through universities. In order to retain our key safety model we need to partner with universities and constrain our consumers to universities.

13.Why do Temple students need our app? It is the best alternative to public transportation. For all of the students, who are limited by city transportation we will provide them with the safest and most reliable options. We will be better than all transportation competitors(SAFER and cheaper than Uber, SAFER and more reliable than Taxis, less limitations and SAFER than the subway, SAFER and less crowded than the bus)

14.What will differentiate us from Uber/What do we need to include to bolster our business model? REGULATIONS, we will be regulated and insured through the university because we will utilize their partnership (Over the past five years, Temple has created 13 startup companies to assist in developing university-created technologies for the marketplace. The university is expecting to significantly increase that number with the help of Temple Ventures.)

1. We can ensure a partnership through Temple because creating this application will not only benefit Tech-punch, but it will benefit the temple community. Our community will no longer need to worry about the potential safety issues involved in public transportation. They will also receive added benefits of reduced costs, promised reliability, and limitless transportation around the city.