Venture Creation

At the end of this course, students, through case study and practical approaches, should be able to: 1. describe the key steps in venture creation; 2. spot opportunities in problems and in high potential sectors, regardless of geographical location; 3. state how original products, ideas and concepts are developed; 4. develop a business concept for further incubation or pitching for funding; 5. identify key sources of entrepreneurial finance; 6. implement the requirements for establishing and managing micro and small enterprises; 7. conduct entrepreneurial marketing and e-commerce; 8. apply a wide variety of emerging technological solutions to entrepreneurship; and 9. appreciate why ventures fail due to lack of planning and poor implementation.

Opportunity identification (sources of business opportunities in Nigeria, environmental scanning, demand and supply gap/unmet needs/market gaps/market research, unutilised resources, social and climate conditions and technology adoption gap). New business development (business planning, market research). Entrepreneurial finance (venture capital, equity finance, micro-finance, personal savings, small business investment organizations and business plan competition). Entrepreneurial marketing and e-commerce (principles of marketing, customer acquisition & retention, B2B, C2C and B2C models of e-commerce, First Mover Advantage, E-commerce business models and successful e-commerce companies). Small business management/family business: Leadership & Management, basic book keeping, nature of family business and family business growth model. Negotiation and business communication (strategy and tactics of negotiation/bargaining, traditional and modern business communication methods). Opportunity discovery demonstrations (business idea generation presentations, business idea contest, brainstorming sessions, idea pitching). Technological solutions (The concept of market/customer solution, customer solution and emerging technologies, business applications of new technologies - artificial intelligence (AI), virtual/mixed reality (VR), Internet of things (IoTs), blockchain, cloud computing, renewable energy. Digital business and e-commerce strategies).