Business & Management
A tool for entrepreneurs and innovators for choosing which markets to play in. Find out where to play by applying the Market Opportunity Navigator - A 3-steps tool for identifying, evaluating and strategizing your market opportunities, to get the most value for your innovation.
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Course Details

Language English
Duration 5 weeks
Effort 3-5 hours / week
Description

As entrepreneur or innovator you are trained to run fast, but…Are you running in the right direction?


Choosing the right market for your innovation is the biggest, and trickiest, question for innovators. Research has shown that all too often entrepreneurs don’t spend enough time identifying and researching their market opportunities – instead they jump at the first opportunity that looks good, and fail to properly evaluate and leverage other opportunities. This common mistake means that you often choose the wrong market or lock yourself into one specific direction.


In this course, you will learn how to set a promising strategy, by using a business tool called the Market Opportunity Navigator.


This tool offers an easy to apply framework to better identify, evaluate and focus on the right market opportunities.


It works in three simple steps, with dedicated worksheets to guide you through the process:



  1. Search broadly - to generate your set of market opportunities

  2. Assess deeply - to evaluate your options and compare their attractiveness

  3. Strategize smartly - to focus on the most attractive opportunity while remaining agile


This structured tool works for entrepreneurs and managers in established companies, when-ever they need to plan or re-plan their strategy.

What you will learn


  • Generate a set of market opportunities stemming from your core strengths

  • Evaluate the attractiveness of market opportunities in a comprehensive manner

  • Make an informed strategic choice, that will increase your chances of focusing on a promising market

  • Balance focus and flexibility- two critical aspects for gaining success

  • Develop a mindset that nourishes open mindedness and receptiveness to adaptation

Prerequisites

none

Plan

This course is divided into 5 main topics, one for each week. 


Here is what we will touch upon in each of these 5 weeks:


Week 1- Introduction


Presenting the challenges of choosing the right target markets for your innovation, and the basic logic behind the Market Opportunity Navigator.


Week 2- How to generate your Market Opportunity Set


Presenting the first step of the Market Opportunity Navigator: how to apply Worksheet 1 to decouple your core abilities and to identify different applications for different sets of customers. The output is your Market Opportunity Set.


Week 3- How to evaluate your market opportunities


Presenting the second step of the Market Opportunity Navigator: how to apply Worksheet 2 to evaluate the Potential of a market opportunity and the Challenge associated with capturing its value. The output is your Attractiveness Map.


Week 4- How to design your Agile Focus Strategy


Presenting the third step of the Market Opportunity Navigator: how to apply Worksheet 3 to design a smart portfolio of Backup and Growth Options around your Primary Market Opportunity. The output is your Agile Focus Strategy.


Week 5- Implications and benefits


Presenting the implications of the Agile Focus Strategy, and the benefits of applying the Market Opportunity Navigator over time, and in concert with other well-known business tools.

Course instructors

Marc Gruber

Marc is a world-leading researcher in the domain of innovation, entrepreneurship and technology commercialization. He is Vice President for Innovation at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL) in Lausanne, Switzerland, where he also heads the Ch…

Sharon Tal

Sharon is one of the co- founders and former executive director of the Entrepreneurship
Center at the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology, and a well-recognized lecturer on
marketing for high-tech start-ups. She gives seminars and workshops on a regula…

École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne

Free online courses from École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne

EPFL is the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne. The past decade has seen EPFL ascend to the very top of European institutions of science and technology: it is ranked #1 in E…

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