Currency Consultation Firm - Entrepreneurship Idea Essay

Introduction to the entrepreneurship idea

Question:

Discuss about the Business Idea And Its Components.

Entrepreneurship involves the procedure of starting a business and the one who starts the business is called an entrepreneur. It is an extremely wide subject. At the very core of it, Entrepreneurship is a way of thinking, it is a mindset of solving problems and creating value (Business News Daily, 2017). Entrepreneurship is crucial for any economy as it feeds on innovation which eventually leads to growth. This is the reason why governments are extensively working to support and promote businesses in the form of subsidies, grants and aids.

My idea revolves around the foundation of a ‘currency consultation’ firm. In the current economic scenario it has been observed that there are immense fluctuations in the Australian Dollar against the US dollar. In the last three years alone, it has been noted that the currency has touched a low of 0.6863 and a high of 1.0509 (XE, 2017). Of course, such movements in the currency will not have a direct impact on individuals, But there are various businesses including but not limited to exports and imports where the such fluctuations tend to have a major influence (ABC News, 2015). The very aim of this currency consultation firm is to help clients trace, scrutinize, control, work at decreasing the effect as well as take advantage of these movements.

The backbone for the success of any business is to recognize a need gap in the society and work towards fulfilling that need with the business offerings. Before starting any business, it is important to identify the right customer as that forms the backbone of the company (Harvard Business Review, 2014). The trade barometer in Australia is consistently on a rise and the upcoming forecast for the same is upward looking (Reuters, 2017). This is evidenced by the fact that Australia exported AUD 31.07bn and imported AUD 30.61bn worth of goods and services in the month of July this year (Trading Economic, 2017).

Predominantly Australian trade transactions are conducted with US dollars being the currency of exchange. Therefore, it intensely and often adversely influences several export and import businesses mainly because they are incompetent to predict these currency vicissitudes beforehand. This firm aims to mend that bridge by offering consultation and advisory services wherein financial experts track the currency market and guide the clients upon various details of their business like time of booking orders, tools for hedging¹ their currency from risk and also guide them on their respective banking charges².

The need for currency consultation

Phillip Kotler defines target market as a set of well-defined set of customers whose needs the organization plans to satisfy (Creighton University, 2002). The company’s target market would ideally be businesses importing to Australia. Most of Australian imports include Iron ores, petroleum, gold, wheat and coal. Firms that are exporting from Australia will especially natural gas, minerals, wool and agricultural products will also be targeted. Geographically, The firm will begin operations in Sydney as the city is a home for tremendous number of exporters and importers, however clienteles would be targeted throughout the country.

The positioning of the firm would be done as a niche, targeting exporters and importers with an annual turnover of more than AUD 20 million. The organization will gain competitive advantage by hiring top executives who are subject matter experts and have a solid grasp in the field of currency trading. The knowledge industry is on a rise and while selling this knowledge it is the human resource of the organization that matters the most (Forbes, 2011).

Services offered are niche and hence targeted clients would be businesses with an export/import turnover of over AUD 20 million. Most of the firms today make a lot of pricing mistakes as they fail to understand that no single pricing strategy can work for all the clients (Forbes, 2015). Hence we will be offering two different business models to our clients to choose from.

Fixed Fee: In this model, services will be charged in the form of annual consultation fee which will be different for every client depending on their turnover. The payment structure would include paying the fees in two parts. A part of the remuneration would be made in advance and a part after initial 6 months of service. The advance fee will help us cover the cost for getting the clients on board. Also, this model brings an element of trust among the clients specifically when they are given an option to pay half of the fees after six months.

Profit Sharing: In this model, clients can choose to share their profits monthly or quarterly, depending on their business cycles, based on our advice. This is done as the time between getting an order and actually delivering the good can range between one month and six months. Systems would be appropriately placed in order to track when and how much have the clients benefitted from the guidance of the experts. And a daily updated portfolio management sheet would be sent to clients regarding the same.

The target market and trade barometer in Australia

Key Partners	Key activities	Value Proposition	Customer relations	Customer segments
Two key personnel. ·         Head of sales ·         Head of consulting	·         Customer relationship management ·         Research ·         Market analysis ·         Selling ·         Customer profiling ·         Marketing and PR ·         After sale and pre sale service	·         Awareness of currency markets ·         Reduced risk due to currency movement ·         Rise in profit margin	·         Every Day advisory and market update ·         Fortnightly meetings ·         Dedicated CRM personnel to every client ·         Customer portfolio managers	·         Export businesses ·         Import businesses ·         Banks ·         Financial institutes ·         Institutional investors ·         Day traders
	Key Resources		Channels
	·         Financial analysts ·         Bloomberg/ Reuters terminal ·         Library of Research reports ·         Data team ·         Human resources		·         Events ·         One on one meetings ·         Cold calling by data team ·         References by existing clients ·         Marketing and PR Activities
Cost Structure		Revenue Structure
Fixed cost ·         Employee salaries ·         Land and building expenses – lease payments and rent ·         Bloomberg/ Reuters terminal Variable Cost: ·         Office utilities ·         Travelling expense		·         Consultation fees paid by clients ·         Monthly fees for live screen ·         Bonuses shared on profits made by clients

Chief Service provided by the organization will be currency consultation. Wherein a team of financial analysts will study the past and predict the future movements in AUD with respect to other currencies after a rigorous fundamental and technical analysis. This forecast will be disclosed to our clients in the form of personal telephonic advisory on every FX transaction they incur.

We would have a separate team to do this analysis and track the market. Fundamental analysis includes scrutinizing the data of a country and understanding its impact on the currency. These data collected include unemployment rates, inflation, GDP growth rate, interest rate fluctuation and minutes of RBA meetings etc. (Forex Factory, 2017). Whereas technical analysis involves study of the historic movements in the currency and mathematically forecasting the future trends. This is achieved by use of Bloomberg and Reuters terminals as currently they are the most effective tools of financial analysis (Financial Times, 2017)

An Ancillary assistance offered would be a Bloomberg or Reuter linked live screen where clients will be able to monitor the live movement of AUD against all other currencies as and when it happens. Most of the websites and news channels show slightly lagged rate and it becomes difficult to negotiate with the banks as they do not consider these as efficient tools. Only Reuters and Bloomberg terminals provide exact rates and these are really expensive terminals. This is where the need gap comes, and this is filled by creating live screens that are Bloomberg linked. They are not as accurate as Reuters or Bloomberg but far more effective than new channels. Once the clients have this screen, they are in a better position to negotiate with the bank and get a better exchange rate.

This can be explained better with an example: Consider a company ABC exports sells its goods to USA and charges the importing company USD 1 million. Upon completing the order, client makes a payment and this USD 1 million reach ABC exporter’s bank. Now bank will decide at what rate the exchange should be made. If the bank offers AUD 1.10 per dollar instead of AUD 1.25, ABC exports makes a direct loss of AUD 150000. This is where live screens come into picture as many banks today are taking advantage of the lack of available tools in the market and cheating clients by offering a lower interest rate. In fact research shows that it is the big banks who offer make the most money and most expensive way to buy or sell foreign currency (Herald, 2017).   

Services offered and business model

Upon getting the client on board, our analysts work on designing customized hedging strategies for clients and provide guidance on how they can be protected from currency fluctuations. Currency hedging requires deep understanding of various tools and our team of experts have extensive and detailed knowledge of these. Therefore, at any point of time they will assist the client with the most appropriate tool. Due to the rising Australian dollar, currency hedging is again gaining ground with investors (The Australian, 2017).

Today there are various ways of hedging the currency and gaining protection from avoidable risks. Different tools work well in different scenarios. Most of the times, the clients are unaware of these tools and hence end up making losses. The team of experts at our firm will ensure that every client has a customized strategy. And these may depend on the size of the order, the country counterpart, macro-economic outlook of both the countries, cost of the tools and expected trends of both the currencies.

One of the additional services provided to the clients would be an unlimited access to research reports. These reports would be available on the company website and the clients would be given an ID and password to access the same. Other individuals or firms who wish to access these reports will be charged. This service is provided for clients to have a written validation of the views of our company and for the company to have a bank of data which will be valuable as the years pass by.

Organizational structure basically elaborates on how various subunits are divided and how well are they coordinated for task completion (Organization development and change, 2013). It is very important that every entrepreneur pays attention to the kind of organization structure that must be in place.

Like every other organization the role of the CEO would be to be at the top of the things. In a startup structure, the CEO would be responsible for getting investors and ensuring the business goes as planned. It is important that the CEO puts his best foot forward at all times as he or she is the face of the organization. CEO becomes a brand and it is imperative that the brand must be preserved by their behavior (Forbes, 2012). CEO is involved at the strategic level of the business and any new policies or structural changes are approved by the CEO.

Key Partners, activities and resources

Head of consultation must ensure that the researchers are doing their job efficiently. He or she is responsible for ensuring that the entire firm holds the same view on the currency. Because it is a knowledge center, sometimes financial experts can get biased by their personal opinions on the matter. It is the responsibility of the head of consultation department to supervise and approve every report published by the firms and every strategy sent to the clients.

The aim of these researchers is to analyze fundamental and technical data as per their expertise and offer a view on the currency. They must understand how to club both of the data together and bring out the best forecast as different kind of analysis are better suited for different currencies (DailyFX, 2012). They also need to write research and release reports to the clients and formulate strategies for them as and when required. This team must be hired with excruciating detail as their research eventually forms basis of the company’s success.

These client servicing advisors would be the client contact. Every personnel will handle not more than 10 clients at a time. They must be well versed with their views on the market and possess excellent communication and crisis management skills They must be available to clients at all times and be able to maintain positive relationships with them.

Sales head would be the face of the company at all times. He or she would be the first person that the client will come in contact with. It is the responsibility of the sales head to ensure that the sales team meets its targets. The four biggest qualities that a sales must have include patience, tolerance, and outgoing personality and assertiveness (Inman, 2017). They will do cold calling, attend and organize event and get referral from clients. Sales head will ensure that the entire procedure from the first point of contact till the client comes on board is smooth.

This team will ensure that the sales team is prepared every time they go for a meeting. They will make presentations for the sales team, inform them if there are any upcoming events and basically make the sales procedure smooth for the sales team.

CRM is a very critical function in any organization today. A strong connect with customers help build long term relationships with them (Fox Business, 2012). Client relationship management team will ensure that clients are satisfied with the services. They will be responsible for taking feedback from clients, organizing events for them. A CRM contact will also be assigned to every client once they are on board and the client can contact that person in case of any issues, queries or grievances.

Value Proposition, customer relations and segments

Human resource head has to make sure the human resources of the firm are in place. In order to survive the competition, it becomes imperative to increase the efficiency of organization’s resources with the help of HRD (Harvard Business Review, 2008).The responsibilities of the HR head fall under the spectrum of recruiting, training & development, team building, exit interviews, compensations and any other issues faced by the employees.

HR head would be leading a team of employees actively involved in HR functions. Along with this, an Admin would also be in place in order to ensure the everyday functioning in the office remains smooth. Bringing in office supplies, ensuring communication within the office, maintaining files and fulfilling other office needs as and when they arise are functions of the admin.

References:

ABC News, 2015, ‘Falling dollar, rising fortune’ https://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-08-05/jericho-a-falling-dollar,-a-rising-fortune/6673074, viewed on 19 September, 2017.

Business News Daily, 2017, ‘What is entrepreneurship’, https://www.businessnewsdaily.com/2642-entrepreneurship.html, viewed on 20 September, 2017.

Cummings, T. G., & Worley, C. G. (2014). Organization development and change. Cengage learning.

Daily FX, 2012, ‘Fundamental and Technical analysis’, https://www.dailyfx.com/forex/education/trading_tips/daily_trading_lesson/2012/01/20/Technical_Versus_Fundamental_Analysis_in_Forex.html, viewed on 20 September, 2017.

Financial Times, 2017, ‘Bloomberg suffers rare drop’, https://www.ft.com/content/6b547cb8-1396-11e7-80f4-13e067d5072c, viewed on 19 September, 2017.

Forbes, 2011, ‘The rise of the knowledge market’, https://www.forbes.com/sites/jenniferhicks/2011/06/27/the-rise-of-the-knowledge-market/#548711e61721, viewed on 19 September, 2017.

Forbes, 2012, ‘As CEO are you putting your best foot forward’, https://www.forbes.com/sites/theyec/2012/08/08/as-ceo-are-you-putting-your-best-face-forward/#6bb4e4016df2, viewed on 20 September, 2017.

Forbes, 2015, ‘The biggest mistake you can make while pricing services’, https://www.forbes.com/sites/ianaltman/2015/12/22/the-biggest-mistake-you-can-make-pricing-services/#d5ca15da38a8, viewed on 19 September, 2017.

Forex Factory, 2017, ‘Economic calendar’, https://www.forexfactory.com/calendar.php, viewed on 19 September, 2017.

Fox Business, 2012, ‘Building a strong relationship with your customer’, https://www.foxbusiness.com/features/2012/01/27/building-strong-relationship-with-your-customers.html, viewed on 20 September, 2017.

Harvard Business Review, (2008), ‘Connecting HR with Competitive Advantage’, https://hbr.org/2008/06/connecting-hr-with-competitive, viewed on 20 September, 2017.

Harvard Business Review, 2014, ‘Choosing the right customer’, https://hbr.org/2014/03/choosing-the-right-customer, viewed on 20 September, 2017.

Herald, 2017, ‘Australians are being ripped off on currency exchange’, https://www.theherald.com.au/story/4873088/australians-are-being-ripped-off-on-currency-exchange/?cs=2373, viewed on 19 September, 2017.

Inman, 2017, ‘Four qualities of a sales agent’, < https://www.inman.com/2017/09/18/4-qualities-to-look-for-when-hiring-an-inside-sales-agent/>, viewed on 20 September, 2017.

Kotler, P, 2011, https://people.creighton.edu/~shu02225/nps_c_04.html, viewed on 20 September, 2017.

Reuters, 2017, ‘Australia’s central bank holds fire as economy on the rebound’, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-australia-economy-currentaccount/australias-central-bank-holds-fire-as-economy-on-the-rebound-idUSKCN1BG07D?il=0, viewed on 20 September, 2017.

The Australian, 2017, ‘Rising Aussie dollar puts hedging back on investors’ agendas’, https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/wealth/rising-aussie-dollar-puts-hedging-back-on-investors-agendas/news-story/431f95c162d6811d80b005330d8cd5f6, viewed on 20 September, 2017.

Trading Economics, 2017, ‘Australian Exports’, https://tradingeconomics.com/australia/exports, viewed on 20 September, 2017.

Trading Economics, 2017, ‘Australian Imports’, https://tradingeconomics.com/australia/imports, viewed on 20 September, 2017.

XE, 2017, ‘AUD to USD Chart’, https://www.xe.com/currencycharts/?from=AUD&to=USD&view=5Y, viewed on 20 September, 2017.