The Disruptive Potential Of Solar Power System

Benefits of the idea to solve the Problem

Discuss about the Disruptive Potential of Solar Power System.

In the present day dynamic world of business activities, there are continuous and recurring problems that show up which needs to be solved by innovative solutions. There are various business models that can be used in order to solve the problems that show up.

Solar Power Australia is one of the largest solar power companies in Australia. It offers tailor made solar power solutions to the people who wants to install a complete solar power generating self-sufficient system in their homes (Solarpoweraustralia.com.au., 2018). The company also offers complete solar power solution to commercial, industrial and community bodies. There are electrical and mechanical engineers working for full time in the company in order o provide complete solution to the customers.

Lately it is seen that there is a reduction in the overall sales and profit of the company which has prompted the management to consider innovation to solve the problem.

The solar power industry in Australia is a growing industry. Because of targeted awareness programs and a number of companies working in the field providing cheap pocket friendly solutions, greater number individuals and many industrial bodies are now opting for solar power. The country has been producing almost 8000 megawatt of solar power through solar panels (Council, 2015). In many of the Australian government buildings and public institutions like the Parliament, Art gallery, Adelaide airport and many schools and colleges there are solar panels fitted (Hinkley et al., 2013).

Apart from that the houses and community buildings which opted for solar panel installation was provided with rebates and discounts by the government under the “Solar homes and communities plan” (Effendi & Courvisanos, 2012).

In spite of the promising prospectus and potential of the market there are some problems that have cropped up which needs to solved. The company called “solar power Australia” have been engaged in various activities that helps the client to install the total solar power system starting from scratch. The emergence of new companies of smaller and bigger scale in the same field is increasing competition to a level that the sustainability of the existing businesses are at stake. The new companies are selling lesser quality solar panels at unbelievable rates (Winter, Sizmann & Vant-Hull, 2012). This is posing a problem for the companies that give good quality products. Apart from that people who buy these low quality products face issues with the panels, and they lose trust and they are not anymore ready to use solar panels as the energy source.

Business Model: Osterwalder and Pigneur

Increasing competition is the main problem in the sector. The problem is that the competition is coming from the companies that are supplying the customers with low quality products which is leading to customer loss from the whole industry (Aanesen, Heck & Pinner, 2017).

The first innovation that can be introduced to solve this problem is to separate the identity of Solar Power Australia from all other Australian solar power companies. This can be done by placing the brand at the top of the customer’s mind in the industry. There are typical examples of similar situations, when Cadbury has placed itself in the top of customers mind in chocolate industry, or Xerox has become synonymous with the word photocopying.

The possible actions that can be taken by the business in order to place the brand in the desired place is by designing an intelligent marketing mix and promotional offers that others cannot match. One promotional offer to get back customer trust in the industry and stop them from buying products from less reputed companies can be by providing the offer of free installation and easy EMI’s and the starting of EMI instalments after 2 months of installation when the customer is sure about the quality of the product.

The marketing plan must be a combined one consisting of TV advertisements, newspaper and social media campaigns. The objective will be to target the maximisation of brand awareness and increasing retention capacity about the company in the customers mind. The smaller companies do not have access to such large-scale advertisement campaigns because of budgetary constraints. The people at large must be made aware about the situation so that they do not buy from unknown companies and prefer to buy from the larger companies.

The first is the promotional offer of free installation, EMI options, and EMI starting from 2 months later. The installation charge can be included in the servicing charge, which is a recurring charge. The installed systems must be serviced at regular intervals to keep the system in a good condition. The service charge of the company is presently too low. That can be increased to a little extent which will help the company in providing the installation for free. EMI option is feasible as the company already has EMI options. The “pay after 2 months” will be provided only after proper paper work.

The next feasibility test is about the advertisement campaigns and promotional mix. Solar power has immense potential in growing over the coming years (Frankel, Ostrowski & Pinner, 2014). The company being one of Australia’s largest solar power solution company presently has enough funds to support the advertisement campaign that will be bigger than other companies in the industry.

The critical success factors which are needed to ensure that the strategies which are devised become successful in the timeframe that is set. The first factor is winning back the faith and trust of the customers who are leaving the industry. The second factor is to include new customers every week by advertisements campaigns. The third factor is keeping the brand awareness of the company in the top of the customers mind. The critical success factors of the company must be measurable and result oriented. The critical success factors will be measured through KPI’s. The KPI or the Key Performance indicators will be made keeping in view the targets set for the company for its monthly sales.

Conclusion

Solar Power Industry is one of the fastest growing industries in the country. It is one of the fastest growing industries in all the developed countries of the world as well. The company Solar Power Australia is a reputed company in the industry. Though there have been some problems regarding the growth of new companies which are not taking care of quality, the proposed innovative changes will solve the problem and help the company in growing firther.

Reference

Aanesen, K., Heck, S., & Pinner, D. (2017). Solar power: Darkest before dawn.

Council, C. E. (2015). Clean energy Australia report 2014.

Effendi, P., & Courvisanos, J. (2012). Political aspects of innovation: Examining renewable energy in Australia. Renewable Energy, 38(1), 245-252.

Frankel, D., Ostrowski, K., & Pinner, D. (2014). The disruptive potential of solar power. McKinsey Quarterly, 2, 50-55.

Hinkley, J. T., Hayward, J. A., Curtin, B., Wonhas, A., Boyd, R., Grima, C., ... & Naicker, K. (2013). An analysis of the costs and opportunities for concentrating solar power in Australia. Renewable energy, 57, 653-661.

Palmer, G. (2014). Energy in Australia: Peak Oil, Solar Power, and Asia's Economic Growth. New York, NY: Springer.

Solarpoweraustralia.com.au. (2018). Solar Power Australia. Retrieved from https://www.solarpoweraustralia.com.au/about-us

Winter, C. J., Sizmann, R. L., & Vant-Hull, L. L. (Eds.). (2012). Solar power plants: fundamentals, technology, systems, economics. Springer Science & Business Media.