5-week Online Internship: Self-Exploring Markets of a Research IP

Overview

‘Researchers, Prospective Startup Founders, Research Support and Knowledge Exchange Staffs’ intending to ‘evaluate relevant customer-market segments for an innovative technology/product’ often miss to conduct appropriate due-diligence exercises on ‘how to identify which specific customer value is of most relevance to the chosen market segment or customer profile’ and ‘how to crosscheck pros & cons of existing solutions of other companies in the market, so as to incorporate the market inputs for proposing a minimum viable product (MVP) acceptable to the target audiences’.

This situation may have been because of the following scenarios:

1. Attending training courses (from a training provider) on ‘market research and industry analysis courses’ do provide knowledge on these topics. However, the trainee/innovator could not or do not know (of own will) on how to apply the knowledge learnt through the training courses onto their specific real research project or startup idea.
2. Innovators often set aside responsibility and decision-making role on ‘the identification of market opportunity aspect around the innovative idea/product’ with the hired external market research consultant. However, the role of market research consultant is usually limited to collecting the market intelligence info as sought by the Trainee/Innovator (or/and the requirement info as assumed relevant by the external Consultant).

The usual Market Research (MR) report prepared by an external consultant merely lists ‘the names of competing companies or products similar to the product/solution offered by the Client’ and ‘some market statistics showing how large the market size is’. Such MR reports do not directly correlate to the question of ‘why the chosen customer group would prefer your product over existing products in the market and how to arrive a Target Addressable Market (TAM) number instead of quoting how large the industry’s existing market size (of existing companies) is‘.

All available MR reports can still be considered as helpful resources of info-purpose only, but those info are often not directly consumable/adoptable towards product/solution planning by the innovator to create a market acceptable product (as a commercial proposition, instead of still being a R&D product for use in Lab conditions).

Undertaking this Online Internship will enable the Trainee to experience how to take full control of commercialising the innovation/product on the aspect of product-market alignment, as well as, help the Trainee to decide which specific missing market intelligence related info ought to be availed through ‘seeking additional support from others’. This Online Internship is meant to empower the Trainee on the market numbers aspect of new product/technology idea (for consideration of a potential licensing or startup company formation opportunity).

Hands-on learning approach through this Online Internship will be mainly useful to innovators/researchers, spinout/startup founders and Knowledge Exchange (KE) Professionals who wish to conduct a hands-on exploratory exercise of analysing the existing products/companies providing similar/alternative solutions and understanding the relevant Target Addressable Market (TAM) to make a viable commercial product for the chosen customer segment.

The unique difference of this 5-week Online Internship to the usual MR report prepared by various MR consultancy companies is the emphasis on ‘detailed diagnosis of the projected market segments and customer groups currently assumed by the innovator’ for subsequent alignment to ‘a likely business model of a similar product in the market’. This Online Internship may be considered as a hands-on training exercise of the Trainee on the market analysis aspect, instead of a merely obtaining a MR report around the new product/technology.

Note: The Online Course titled “2.5hr Course: Masterclass on Market-Customer Identification & Spinout Business Case” offered by IP2Impact Ltd covers most of the conceptual aspects used in this Online Internship.

What You’ll Learn & Achieve From This Online Internship

• Task-1-Output: Analysing value propositions and customer segments (with Business Model Canvas) – Inward Looking
• Task-2-Output: Identifying the most appropriate industry’s landscape and stakeholder ecosystem – Outward Looking
• Task-3-Output: Identifying few tradeshows (UK/non-UK) to meet target customers, partner organisations and (with online search and LinkedIn search) – Outward Looking
• Task-4-Output: Compiling a list of UK/non-UK sources of grant funding and investment (with online search) – Outward Looking

Certification

All attendees will be provided an acknowledgement certificate (PDF copy) of having completed this Online Internship.

Pre-Internship Kick-Off Meeting

2 hr max (17:30-19:30)

Weekly Catch up Meeting [for 5-weeks]

2 hr max (17:30-19:30)

Additional Info

A real ‘upcoming/ongoing’ new product/idea can be proposed for this Online Internship by the Trainee (esp. Researcher or Prospective Academic Founder or Research Support Staff or Knowledge Exchange Professional). A confidentiality agreement can be signed (if sought by the Trainee) prior to initiating this Online Internship between IP2Impact Ltd and the Trainee/Innovator, for maintaining confidentiality of the Trainee’s proprietary trade secrets during and beyond the Online Internship tenure period. The Outputs from this internship will comprise a summarised report DOC/PDF on ‘the Product-Market Fit exploration exercise’, and an excel file on ‘comparable companies/products, trade events for attendance/exploration, and investors/grant-funding sources’. With the insights and skills acquired through this internship tenure, the Trainee/Innovator can easily improve/adapt the market-analysis files to suit the needs of various versions of ‘Product Proposition concepts’.