Test de hipótesis en emprendimientos, empresas y en la vida.

Una de las anécdotas que más me gustaron dell curso de Emprending, fue la anécdota sobre test de hipótesis sobre la viabilidad de los emprendimientos. El ejemplo citado para explicarlo fue el siguiente:

Supongamos que queremos montar un negocio de venta de tacos mexicanos a la salida de una cancha de fútbol. Sabemos que la gente le gusta comer esta comida y además que los visitantes a la cancha consumen alimentos a la entrada y/o salida.

He aquí nuestra hipótesis a validar:

¿Pero los asistentes estarán dispuestos a degustar un taco frente a una hamburguesa o un choripán?

Nuestra hipótesis podría ser demostrada por medio de un estudio de mercado, donde se analice un grupo de clientes ideales y sus niveles de consumo. La cual es el primer paso para por lo menos saber si la hipótesis tiene chances de ser viable.

El siguiente paso para asegurar la validación es montar un puesto de venta de tacos mexicanos, llegado este punto es donde comienza la anécdota (la misma utiliza el recurso de la exageración).

Como somos empresarios comenzamos (exageradamente) comprando todas las canchas de la ciudad. Para poder manejar todos los horarios de los partidos, teniendo a disposición a todos los asistentes. Luego de una inmensa inversión, colocamos finalmente un carrito para testear si la gente come nuestros tacos. Entonces solo luego de inmenso gasto , sabríamos si teníamos razón.

Vuelvo a repetir que esta idea suena muy exagerada, pero cuantas veces las empresas comienzan proyectos (enormes, ambiciosos y costosos) para luego darse cuenta que su producto (o hipótesis) no funciona.

Volviendo a nuestros tacos.Hubiese sido mucho más fácil si para validar la hipótesis nos colocábamos a la salida de un partido vendiendo (o hasta regalando tacos). Suena una manera mucho más sencilla y barata de probar nuestra hipótesis de mercado. Además , esta idea nos permite ser mas flexibles con el desarrollo del producto.

La moraleja es que cuando tengamos un proyecto en mente que necesitemos validar, busquemos una solución parecida a la 2°. Donde podamos modificar nuestro producto o idea , antes de realizar grandes inversiones ( tanto de dinero como de tiempo).

Tacos

Saludos,

Federico Femia

Which main market is Kabbage trying to dominate?

Comparto un paper de mi autoría sobre una compañía muy interesante sobre emprendimientos financieros y tecnológicos: 

*Kabbage is a fin-tech Company that focuses on filling in the gap of small businesses whose income is between the amounts of $25,000 to $55,000 which didn´t qualify for a bank loan.

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Kabbage has recognized this niche and has managed to attend their necessities. Customers main complaints were that the process for applying for a bank loan was full of forms and many hours of procedure. Furthermore, they have to wait for days until they get an answer. It was a big waste of time, especially if the loan was not approved.

This issue was solved by Kabbage by using business intelligence with their customers, hence granting the loan in only 7 minutes. They have created an online automated model of evaluation, assessing three factors of the customers: repay capability, financial history and stability of the business.

*Kabbage main competitors are other fin tech companies and banks.

Fintech:

The sum of new fin tech companies has been raising due to tech´s priceslump, financial necessity and recent bank´s regulations.

These companies use algorithms to studytheirs customers, so they approve the loans in minutes as Kabagge does. However despite the algorithms, all the companies have different requirements, rates, fees, and repayingperiods.

The other main difference is their business model, for example Kabbage lends money from their own capital base and takes credit risks themselves. This model is known as balance sheet lenders. On the other hand there exists Lending Club, who facilitates connections between lenders and borrowers but do not take on credit risk .In the middle are hybrid models, as OnDeck, in which the lender can lend a part or the total sum of the loan.The main fintech players in US, which represented almost 60% of new SME loans in 2014 are:

·       OnDeck ($1.2 billion)

·       CAN Capital ($1 billion)

·       Kabbage ($400 million)

·       Merchant Cash & Capital ($277 million)

·       Strategic Funding ($200 million)

Banks:

Even thought Banks have been losing market shares against fintech, they are taking actions to reverse this situation. Mainly they are taking 3 approaches:

First, banks invest in fintech companies so that these can expand their number of active loans.

Second, companies as Kabbage are looking to grow abroad the US market. As banks have wide experience in these foreign markets, their partnership is benefitialfor both.

 Third, Banks are outsourcing their loan approval system with these fin tech companies, so banks can offer a better service.

*According to the report “The Future of FinTech A Paradigm Shift in Small Business Finance” published onOctober 2015, the US had reported $5 billion in new SME lending issued on marketplace platforms in 2014, while a volume of $12 billion was projected for 2015.

Kabbage in 2014 had $400 million in new US SME loans, which represent the 12, 5% of market share.

Assuming that Kabbage maintains its share for 2015 and  taking the projection in consideration , during last year they should have lent $1.5 billion in SME.

Federico Femia