Venture Concept No. 2

1. Opportunity:

Healthcare in the U.S. is an unmet or undermet need for the vast majority of people. And even those that have nothing to fear in terms of healthcare could still benefit from a cheaper option. It is also important to note that the elderly, even with the benefit of Medicare, are facing mounting healthcare problems as the system fails to adapt to new realities. As such the potential customers are all Americans, even the wealthiest or those on medicare/medicaid. Some potential customers will need this more than others, but the customer base can only be restricted artificially so long as the service proves more cost effective than its competitors.

This opportunity primarily exists, not as a result of changes in the market, but because there are no sufficient changes in the market. Those that are particularly vulnerable live in poorer areas, especially rural and in the more conservative states. Also vulnerable ae the elderly because of the increasing inadequacy of medicare to provide for their needs. Currently most customers either have no insurance or have whichever insurance their employer or the government provides. As a result there is no real customer loyalty to existing insurers, corporations will provide the most cost effective service they have access to and if a truly superior alternative to current government provided healthcare came along it is likely that both parties will be more than happy to accept it.

This opportunity is, again, only constrained by possible government policy. So long as policies cannot be sold across state lines then the opportunity is limited to each state. If this policy ever changes then the opportunity can be considered to have expanded to the entire nation except those states that implement a single payer system. Government policy also affect the window of opportunity on this venture. If the government were to implement a single payer system, like Canada or England, then the opportunity could be considered closed. The window of opportunity can also be closed if government policy places excessive barriers in the way of this venture.

As an aside, it is possible with the advent of the internet to sell services effectively to anyone, anywhere. This means that marketing specifically to niche markets is now very profitable. And while there are many basic healthcare requirements that everyone needs, some specific needs can be marketed to separately. For instance; everyone needs regular checkups and preventative care, not everyone needs constant care for dementia or cancer. Marketing specific add ons to specific customer groups will allow for a more targeted approach that provides the most useful services for the lowest price that will generate profits.

Innovation and Venture Concept:

The innovation, in the case, is no more than implementing a proven system into a new environment. The co op model has worked very well in agriculture and banking, my own experience with a credit union has been substantially better than what I ever got from the major for profit banks. The single payer systems so common around the world today are also, ultimately, nothing more than a nationwide co op for healthcare. The advantages are clear in theory; because it is a nonprofit all proceeds are reinvested into providing a better and/or cheaper service. Increasing the customer pool will, as such lower prices and improve service, creating a snowballing effect of better service bringing in more customers which in turn makes the service even better.

Once enough people are brought in it will be possible to negotiate with hospitals, doctors and pharmaceuticals from a position of overwhelming strength, further lowering costs. In the long term, as long as government stays out of the way, traditional insurers will be unable to keep up. My own, personal income, would amount to no more than what the company can accept without risking bringing our services into parity with our competitors. The whole point is that the co op model does the same job, but much cheaper.

There will, of course, be stiff competition from the established insurers and those in government that profit from the current state of affairs. This leads to the first and most significant hurdle, government policy. The right policy can open the door for this venture, the wrong one will lock it shut. The next hurdle will be in getting the initial customers to buy in. If these two hurdles can be gotten over then it should be relatively smooth sailing from there. Essential to overcoming these issues will be how the venture is marketed. The focus there will be on suggesting that this is a viable alternative to single payer that provides most of the benefits but that is still part of the free market, thus making it palatable to conservatives. Marketing as a nonpartisan solution to healthcare and pointing to the success of credit unions as proof of concept will be the corps of marketing strategy.

The Minor elements:

The single greatest advantage this venture could have is in long term planning. Focusing on long term growth and sustainability as opposed to short term profits will prove indispensable to the ultimate success of the venture's success. This must also be coupled with being first on the scene, the whole point of this venture is its capacity to snowball once it gets going. Past a certain point it will be impossible for anyone to catch up. In this way, the lack of wall street investors constantly looking for higher profits is in fact a great advantage as it frees the venture to focus on long term growth and sustainability, which always win out over short term thinking.

Once the venture gets going the next step, for me, is to eventually make it a utility. This would secure the continued dominance of the venture once it has eclipsed all rivals. By becoming a utility the venture can effectively be made a government sanctioned and regulated monopoly. This would ensure that the venture will never break from the established path under new and less scrupulous leadership and will continue to look to the long term rather than be seduced by short term profits. My primary goal here is to make people's lives better much more so than to directly improve my own. And it is essential to that goal that this venture continue to focus on people rather than profits even long after I am gone. If all goes well, the next step for me would be to leave the venture and move onto something else, confident in the knowledge that it will continue to pursue my vision once I am gone.

2. I did not, in fact, receive any feedback for my original venture concept.

3. I added some things I learned from other assignments. Namely I used the information I learned in the most recent book review. Ultimately there is no need to adapt to anything outside of a turn towards single payer, if this venture works as well as intended then there will be no more need for a turn towards strictly single payer healthcare. Also, there is not purely government provided healthcare system in the post industrial world so it is likely that as long as other private healthcare systems are not superior this venture should remain successful indefinitely.

Hopefully this isn't gonna be copyrighted a decade from now, because it is too cool not to use.