Hands-on Learning
With the New Venture Project students face the realities of launching a new business
“The big takeaway for me is that we can do it, and it’s not a thousand years away.” That’s Will Mann, MBA ’12 candidate, talking about his experience with the Ivey New Venture Project (NVP). The NVP is a team-based field project that takes students through the process of developing and refining an idea for a new venture, researching the opportunity, writing a compelling business plan, and presenting the plan to a panel of experts. An alternative to the Ivey Consulting Field Project, the NVP is increasingly popular, with 89 per cent of the MBA class choosing it.
Mann’s team came together around an idea developed by classmate David Mravyan. Building on some of his previous work, Mravyan envisioned a product that would help prevent pressure ulcers for patients confined to bed. Pressure ulcers, often called bed sores, cost the North American health-care industry more than $14 billion a year. His idea was to use wireless sensor technology to create a mattress cover capable of measuring pressure, temperature and moisture and alerting caregivers when and how a patient needs to be repositioned. For him the NVP was a perfect opportunity to refine and test his business idea.
Mravyan approached Mann, president of the Health Sector club at Ivey, with the idea. Together they sought team members, mostly from the Health Sector stream, who were interested in the project and might even want to work on it after graduation. Each team member brought something valuable to the project. Jasher Carating had a strong background in finance. Allyson Tighe and Brent Stead had extensive experience in health care. Mann understood the regulatory issues. Jatinder Gill brought his consulting experience, and Mryavan contributed his engineering expertise and the idea itself.
In addition to a formal classroom component led by Ron Close, Director of NVP, the team was assigned Steve Gunn, CEO and co-founder of Sleep Country Canada, as its Executive-in-Residence.
“He gave us his idea of what the competition would look like, and some really good feedback on what information we needed to get funding,” says Mann.
The team also consulted with Ivey Professor Greg Zaric, the Canada Research Chair in Health Care Management, and Dr. Janet Martin, Director of the High Impact Technology Evaluation Centre at London Health Sciences Centre. The team divided up the work, and then met every two or three weeks to monitor progress. The team entered and won an elevator pitch contest, with the prize of presenting to Kevin O’Leary of Dragons’ Den fame. O’Leary approved of the idea and gave the team members valuable tips on refining their plan.
Once the plan was complete, Gill designed a sophisticated PowerPoint presentation and each team member took a section. They rehearsed carefully to ensure they could cover everything in the 20 minutes allotted. There was an opportunity to practice at the IBK Business Plan competition, where their team was the only Ivey team to reach the finals. Then, in early February, they presented their “pitch” to an external panel of investment professionals.
Each team member found NVP to be a valuable learning experience. Mravyan says it was good for him to hear the perspectives of the review panel members.
“Presenting to them was a chance to get into the minds of real investors, and figure out exactly what concerns they have,” he says.
Stead was struck by the sheer complexity of putting together a business plan. “I was amazed at how much detail it takes, how granular we had to get for this to be valuable to a potential investor,” he says.
Carating learned that asking for help from experienced people like Gunn and Martin is part of the process of entrepreneurship.
Tighe says the NVP experience opened her up to the possibility of entrepreneurship as a career.
“I had never really thought about being an entrepreneur, because it didn’t seem to fit my risk profile. But the more you do it, the more you realize that it’s calculated, intelligent risk,” she says.
The team members will be participating in two additional business plan competitions and are planning to pursue their idea after graduation. They are actively seeking funding and already have a hospital ready to test the prototypes.
“If we can get the funding, there’s a significant role for each of us in the development and launch of this product,” says Mravyan.