Background
The UAE unsuccessfully forwarded its bid to host Olympic Games since it does not participate in many of the games, which are competed for during the Olympics games. Based on this decision, the Fawz Olympic Academy seeks to principally train athletes who would meet standard thresholds, which would make sure that the UAE people develop their talents so that the country can have incredible presentations in games in the future. The goal for the academy is to produce athletes who will be able to increase the number of Olympic medals from one (the only medal won by the UAE in the Olympics). The realization of this goal will ensure that the chances for selection of the UAE to host the 2016 Olympic Games would increase. The objective of the academy is to incubate young talents in athletes and/or give opportunities for talents to grow through the support of coaches who are garnered from across the world. This objective is driven by the belief that the reason why the UAE has minimal participation in the Olympic Games is that there lacks enthusiasm to engage in sporting activities with many talents going unnoticed.
The mission of the Fawz Olympic Academy is to mobilize people to develop a perception and appreciate the fact that sports is an incredible source of livelihood tantamount to engaging to other business ventures especially as the UAE continues to grow to become a major business hub. This attempt will develop sporting cultures among the UAE people. Apart from considering sports as a direct source of livelihood through the awards given after emerging winners in the Olympics games, sporting culture is also an indirect source of employment. In fact, within the sporting facilities such as Fawz Olympic Academy, many job opportunities can be created to help raise employment levels of the UAE people. Engaging the UAE people with a global culture is also likely to be realized through bringing together people from different parts of the world in sporting talent incubation centers such as the Fawz Olympic Academy when scalability is considered in the future. This move has the noble impact of accelerating the process of globalization, which fosters global integration of worldwide diversities.
Fawz Olympic Academy considers putting in place mechanisms of ensuring that its line of business is sustainable. It is recognized that maintaining such a sporting facility requires heavy commitment of funds in the form of capital and good will of all participants who are considered crucial in helping to build the business ventures’ brand. Worth noting is that the Fawz Olympic Academy does not consider issues such as construction of stadiums as a great challenge since it seeks to partner with the government so that it can make use of various world standard stadiums already completed and others, which will be completed within the next three years. However, the business venture considers delivery of value as a magnificent determinant of sustainability of its business.
Description of the Venture
Products/services
Fawz Olympic Academy targets sports men and sports women who hold the UAE passports. This means that, for successful enrollment in the membership at the business venture, one must be a UAE citizen without consideration of the state from where one comes. The product on offer is the production of sportsmen and sportswomen who are able to meet the standards required for selection in the Olympics games. Fawz Olympic Academy also provides various supplemental services to various athlete students. The main business of the organizations is not only to offer opportunities to men and women seeking to fully commit their lives in sporting activities but also inspiring persons especially teenage student athletes. This effort is aimed at preparing athletes of the future to develop skills that would enable them to succeed magnificently in the performance of athletic activities in the future international competitions. However, getting the best of talents especially for teenagers is deemed an immense challenge. Consequently, the organization seeks to employ personnel, which will be in charge of the best talent recruitments program. This program is implemented through conducting school recruitments by funding athletic competitions within the UAE schools through seeking strategic partnerships with various organizations via their social corporate programs.
Scope of Business
The scope of business of the Fawz Olympic Academy is to provide training together with offering athletics as a sporting activity as a means of entertainment in the quests to attract revenue from the UAE citizens. This means that the business venture does not intend to reach for global potential clients. As posited in the previous section, training will be done through actual physical coaching and videotape analysis. Fawz Olympic Academy‘s video analysis coaching approach is obtained from various videographers who have the license to record Olympic games together with the provision of expert analysis of the best mechanisms of enhancing success in the athletics games. The aim is to acquit students at the training facilities of the Fawz Olympic Academy on the best mechanism of avoiding the mistakes made by past participants in the Olympic Games. Videotape analysis is also done on various events in which the UAE athletes have participated in other competitions apart from Olympics without or with success. The goal is to help students to develop full awareness of how local and international competitions compare and, if possible, to develop a perception of the missing gaps in the UAE-established standards in athletics games. In this regard, sports motion software is crucial in helping to provide ample understanding of athletics at a theoretical level.
Revenue collection through ticketing at all stadiums will solely be conducted by authorized appointed agents of Fawz Olympic Academy. Recruitments of the agents to conduct this task is found as good strategic decisions since it is not on a daily basis that the organization would be utilizing all stadiums for games. Hence, it saves the organization immense financial resources that would have gone into the payment of regular incomes to permanent officials issuing tickets. The significance of this approach of revenue collection is linked with the objectives of ensuring that the organization remains competitive and hence sustainable in the long term through cost saving strategies.
Background of the Entrepreneurs
Five highly qualified managerial staffs will run Fawz Olympic Academy. They are also the entrepreneurs behind the establishments of the venture. The five persons form the board of directors, one of whom is appointed as the chairperson of the board. The chairperson has a broad experience in event organization and management gained from working in a variety of recreational organizations across the UAE. The remaining four persons serve as strategic planning director, Fawz Olympic Academy projects, and operations director, head of human resource director, and the finance director.
The human resource director is well acquitted with the process and procedures of workforce management after having worked as human resource director in several UAE-based hotel industry organizations. He is particularly accredited for having set benchmarks on how employees in the hotel industry can be managed to ensure that they collectively foster the realization of organizational goals and objectives through the creation of organizational culture that fosters accountability and delegation of responsibilities. Fawz Olympic Academy believes that it will bring this experience into the organization to ensure that all workers can learn and deploy its established benchmarks to enhance overall success of the business venture. This anticipation is based on the belief that people are some of the important organizational resources available to any organization that seeks to establish sustainable business both in the short-run and in the end.
The director in charge of the project and operations is highly experienced in the project managements and project analysis for feasibility. She has worked in numerous massive projects that have been completed within the UAE including business centers and sporting facilities. The finance director is a fresh graduate with a masters’ degree in financial management. She is anticipated to bring into the organization her experience in financial feasibility assessment skills, which are pivotal in ensuring that Fawz Olympic Academy remains financially risk-free. Where risks are encountered, appropriate strategies are deployed to counter the impacts of the risks on the sustainability of the business venture.
Industry Analysis
The success of any business establishment in any industry is dependent on the ability of a new business to withstand various operation environment dynamics. Consequently, before financial resources and other resources are committed for the operation of the business, it is important for an analysis of the operational environment to be conducted (Kallman 2011). For the case of the Fawz Olympic Academy, this section presents the industry’s forecast, with central concerns on its outlook and trends, as revealed by Porter’s 5-Forces analysis coupled with conducting an intensive overview of the industry’s trend, which is supported by hard data analysis.
Industry Forecast
Athletics is one of the sporting activities that are likely to attract large numbers of potential participants within the UAE. Dubai has undergone massive infrastructural developments. This implies that the recent economic developments in infrastructure would be an immense contributing factor for Dubai to win the bid to host the 2016 Olympic Games. Such developments include the construction of five-star hotels including Burj al-Arab and the Dubai sports city. The presence of such infrastructure, especially the Dubai sports city, implies that more UAE residents have a constant drive to engage in sporting activities to make sure that they utilize the facilities that are available within their reach. It is probable that new business ventures including the one proposed by this business plan have not existed before due to limitations associated with hefty initial capital required to construct excellent sporting infrastructures. Such constructions would make it possible to train persons who meet international standards in terms of expertise as a noble bargaining factor for qualification in the Olympic Games. Now, it is forecasted that, in the future, the sporting industry in the UAE will grow by double digits on successful completion of various sporting facilities by the government. This means that, although there is no athletic business venture currently that is similar to the one proposed here, it is possible that, in the next ten years, some may emerges as more entrepreneurs endeavor to have a market share on the industry’s potential customers.
Being a new business venture, it is also likely that the proposed business venture will experience some gaps in its operation. Consequently, more entrepreneurs are likely to follow up the operations of the business venture to establish theirs with the intention of providing services and products, which ensure that the Fawz Olympic Academy loopholes are sealed. Hence, it is forecasted in the next 20 years of operation of Fawz Olympic Academy that the dynamics of market competitions are likely to change. Therefore, the profitability margins of the business venture are also probably going to change as more entrepreneurs venture in the industry. However, for the Fawz Olympic Academy, reengineering of products on offer and addition of services in the line of business of the organization will help the business venture to counter these negative implications on the profitability. This move is important especially by considering that, being the first business venture of its kind, Fawz Olympic Academy will have built a strong brand before other brands, which have lesser consumer loyalty, are established in the time span of between 10 to 20 years of operation of the Fawz Olympic Academy.
Porter’s 5 Forces analysis
Several forces shape an industry’s competition. The figure below shows some these forces.
Forces that shape the competition of an industry
Fawz Olympic Academy has low threat of new entrants because the business venture is the only one of its kind in the UAE. Starting up such a business venture is an expensive affair, which calls for funding by the government to meet some of the business expenses such as the payment of high-caliber coaches and even establishment of stadiums. Working capital is also required to take all losses that are encountered within a short period of operation before the venture attracts a large number of students and even spectators who would help the organization to generate revenue. All these factors make the business industry unattractive for new entrants.
The Fawz Olympic Academy’s bargaining power in relation to the suppliers is moderate. The business venture anticipates procuring immense sports facilities and other support amenities. Consequently, Fawz Olympic Academy’s deal means quite a lot to suppliers who can indeed benefit immensely from it. On the other hand, the suppliers of various services including first aid services have a significant impact on the company’s operations. This means that service suppliers have central roles to play. Hence, they affect the competitiveness and development of brand confidence by the students.
The bargaining power of Fawz Olympic Academy clients is moderate. By utilizing the weapon of uniqueness of the facility within the UAE since it is the only facility of its kind, the business venture can be able to prevent its clients from seeking alterative service providers. In the economic sense, since there is the absence of providers of similar services offered by the business venture, it implies the Fawz Olympic Academy would absorb all demands.
Fawz Olympic Academy’s threat from substitutes is very low. Firstly, although tennis and swimming sports may provide alternative sporting activities, which are included in the Olympics, the fact that there is no any other business venture offering similar products and services such as the Fawz Olympic Academy means that all clients who are interested in athletics will seek the services from the venture. Fawz Olympic Academy faces a small extent of competitive rivalry. This competitive advantage is owed to the fact that no any other facility within the UAE offers similar services.
PESTLE Analysis
Several factors influence the decisions of managers of any organization. From the PESTEL organizational analysis approach, these factors are political, economic, social, technological, environmental, and legal factors (Gerry, Kevan & Whittington 2005, 105). For Fawz Olympic Academy, the political environment affects the operations of the company via taxing policies since the organization will have to pay charges in the form of taxes levied on the organization’s profits. The management must also comply with environmental regulations, tariffs, employment laws established within UAE, and/or to comply with business operations restriction policies. From the perspective of economic factors, the operational economic environment of the Fawz Olympic Academy is characterized by a rapid growth in the support infrastructures such as the hotel industry.
Social factors act as immense success factors of the Fawz Olympic Academy. Customers, mainly students’ athletes, are promised compliance to safety standards while in the field and within other facilities of the business venture. Hence, enhancing the security of all the students’ athletes assists in retaining and attracting new clients since people having a first-time experience with the Fawz Olympic Academy will always send an impressive message to other potential clients.
In terms of technology, the business venture will deploy the internet to accomplish tasks such as the issuing of tickets and registration of members. Fawz Olympic Academy is also incredibly concerned about its environmental impacts. It is expected that people who will be using the facilities of the organization will be carrying with them disposable items such as wrapping of food items and packaging materials for energy drinks and other soft drinks. The manner in which these wastes are disposed is of concern to the organization especially considering the legal restrictions governing environmental disposal of wastes especially non-biodegradable materials in the UAE. The UAE remains one of the cleanest nations in the Gulf region. Hence, it is the intention of the Fawz Olympic Academy to retain this status through compliance with the legal provisions on environmental disposal of wastes.
Overview of Industry Trends
The UAE athletics industry is in the infancy stage. This means that very little data exist on the performance of the industry. However, in terms of performance at the Olympics games, the UAE has had very little participation. The nation has not won any other medal since the 2004 Olympics games held in Athens. Ahmad Mohammad won this medal for the double trap shooting. Hence, the UAE has never won any medal in athletics. During the summer of 2012 Olympics held in London, the UAE was presented in athletics by Mohammad Abbas in the men’s category and Betlhem Desalegn in the women’s category. Mohammad Abbas was ranked 24th while Betlhem Desalegn was ranked 14th. The two athletes did not advance. These results show that women stand good opportunities to participate successfully in the Olympic Games in the future should more talents be developed and nurtured. However, to accomplish this goal, cultural profiling that women should not engage in some sports should be dealt with proactively to encourage more talented women to engage with the Fawz Olympic Academy.
Every new business venture needs to evaluate trends and/or conduct forecasts of the likelihoods of success in the future. Indeed, the probability of an industry’s growth in terms of profitability is vital in case of Fawz Olympic Academy because no entrepreneur should consider investing in an industry where he or she would lose business in the near future. Consequently, for feasibility of the Fawz Olympic Academy business venture, it is important for sporting business across the globe to shift towards the Middle East, in particular to the UAE. This necessity is accounted for by the fact that, in case the business dwindles by virtue of focusing on the local people, Fawz Olympic Academy should look for alterative mechanism of survival through increasing profitability. Some of such mechanisms include expanding into the global markets. Hence, the Fawz Olympic Academy business should be scalable.
From the above arguments, analysis of global performance of the sports industry is important. In fact, there is no need of establishing a business venture, which has minimal opportunities for survival should the business begin experiencing challenges. The question that remains is whether the Fawz Olympic Academy can have an opportunity to tap from the global pool of potential customers in the future.
Statistical findings show that sports business is rapidly growing within the EMEA regions (Europe, the Middle East, and Africa). For instance, according to Changing the Game (2011), “EMEA is the second largest region with US $42.8 billion sports consumption value” (12). The growth in the sports market of this region is further estimated by Changing the Game (2011) to be 2.9 percent through 2015. In the region, the revenues collected at the gates are also the highest in the world, standing at 38.6 percent. Additionally, in the EMEA region, the growth of sports market is the highest in North Africa and Middle East. Changing the Game (2011) puts this growth at 6.8percent besides anticipating that this growth will continue until 2015. With the rapid sporting infrastructural development in the UAE, it is then plausible to forecast that, within this period, the UAE can gain immensely by offering sports training facilities such as the Fawz Olympic Academy.
Sports consumption in the Middle East is diverse across the entire region. Football is perhaps the most popular sport. According to O’ Connor (2011), Egypt ranks the highest in terms of popularity of football (56.53 percent) followed by Bahrain (52.37 percent) (79). On the other hand, the UAE and Kuwait leads in terms of popularity of cricket. Although athletics does not appear here, it is possible to utilize success factors in others sports as benchmarks for making athletics as a sport to flourish in the UAE. Nevertheless, other important factors must also be considered such as the timing of events due to naturally high temperatures in the Middle East nations including the UAE.
Analysis of the Competitors
The Fawz Olympic Academy is not anticipated to face any competition from other organizations offering similar services and products. However, the organization anticipates using the sporting facilities developed by governments to conduct her business such as the Dubai sports city. This being world state of art sports centre, it is expected to host a myriad of sporting activities. Hence, competition is anticipated in terms of reservations. For instance, the Gulf region is well renowned for having an interest in football. With the establishment of the facility, it means that young talents in soccer are likely to be incubated through the aid of this sporting facility. While noting that this is not the only the sporting activity that is expected to be hosted at the facility, it implies that the stadium will have to operate under strict reservations.
Analysis of competition for the sporting activities in the UAE is perhaps well accomplished through conducting an analysis of the preferences of various sports within the UAE. As evidenced by table 1 below, football tops the list followed by cricket, swimming, basketball, car racing boxing, aerobics, and then athletics. The percentages show the percent of the population that prefers a given sporting activity out of a sample of 100 percent.
Table 1: Sports consumption in the UAE
Source: (O’ Connor 2011, 79)
From the percentages shown in the above table, it implies that most of the UAE people would want to participate in the Olympic Games in the most popular sports. This is an immense challenge to the Fawz Olympic Academy since the business venture must work hard to prepare mentally the potential students at the academy to develop the faith that athletes could also emerge as top preference sport, which they can excel in the Olympics competitions. Therefore, the Fawz Olympic Academy must ensure that it offsets the competitive advantage established by other sports activities within the UAE. The Fawz Olympic Academy has to convince the personnel in charge of management of the sporting facilities that athletics should also be given preference when it comes to reservation of the facilities by practically showing that it could also be a big source of direct and indirect income earner among the UAE citizens.
Market Segmentation
While attempting to introduce new products into any market, it is important for an organization to segment its market. Market segmentation refers to the “aggregation of prospective buyers into groups (segments) that have common needs willing to respond similarly to a marketing action” (Kotler & Keller, 2009). Segmentation is done from different dimensions including geographical and demographic segmentation. In the context of the Fawz Olympic Academy, segmentation of the markets in terms of geography is accomplished through restricting the operations of the Fawz Olympic Academy to the UAE. The services delivered by the organization are only limited to persons holding the UAE passports. Nevertheless, this does not mean that persons outside the states forming the UAE are not eligible to be registered as members of the organization nor should students be derived from the international community should a need for scaling the organization emerge in the future.
Demographically, although the focus of the Fawz Olympic Academy is to prepare sports men and women to such standards that they are able to compete in the international competitions such as the Olympics Games, the organization is also indebted to ensure that young talents are developed and nurtured. This implies that the Fawz Olympic Academy will only recruit teenage students and persons fitting in the age limit for participation in the Olympics. All adults exceeding this age limit would only access the facilities as spectators. In the UAE, the participation of women in sports has also been an issue that has attracted different views. The UAE is evolving out of cultural profiling of certain gender-based and segregated roles in society. This perhaps explains why there has been limited participation of the UAE women in local and international sporting activities. The Fawz Olympic Academy aims at changing these cultural trends. For this reason, the academy endeavors not to segregate its markets based on gender or sex. Rather, women are encouraged to enroll.
Marketing Plan
Market plan is essential for success of any business. It entails “the process of analyzing one or more potentially interesting market places to determine how a business can compete optimally in them” (Menon et al. 1999, 18). The development of a marketing plan leads to the advancement of a successful marketing strategy. Such a strategy is deployed at the Fawz Olympic Academy to enhance sales of the product on offer. The principle function of a market plan is to lay down mechanisms of enhancing acceptability of the brand of an organization by the consumer segments that are targeted by the marketing campaigns deployed by an organization. The Fawz Olympic Academy chooses to focus on marketing mix to draw attention of potential customers to the products and services.
Marketing mix embraces the various choices that organizations make to ensure that their products or services are availed to the market (place) at the right price and using the appropriate promotional strategies (Menon et al. 1999, 19). At the Fawz Olympic Academy, the products on offer include training in sporting activities with the principal concentration being on athletics. The justification for success of this product is anchored on the need to increase the capacity of the UAE to engage in athletics as a sporting activity in the Olympics. Based on the history of low participation of the country in athletics, it is anticipated that offering training in sporting activities will attract intense interests among the UAE citizens.
For Fawz Olympic Academy, marketing mix for the product (athletics training) encompasses four mains aspects. These are place, price, promotion, and the product. Introducing training in athletics especially among young people is instrumental in enhancing the success of the Fawz Olympic Academy. The place of sale of the product is in all states of the UAE. This place is justified by the fact that, in all the states, there is a rising trend of embracement of sports as both recreational activity and as a source of livelihood.
In most instances, the UAE people receive information about the fun that comes with sports through traditional media such as radio, newspapers, and television. However, the internet and social media is also becoming a major tool for communicating and entertaining people through sports. Consequently, they form some of the promotional media to which the Fawz Olympic Academy gives first consideration. In fact, through these techniques, it is also possible to reach a large number of people across all states in the UAE. This case prevails especially for social media since customers themselves share the promotional information. Point of sale promotion is also an additional cost effective promotional technique. In case of price, the Fawz Olympic Academy will utilize the government-established sporting facilities, which can handle a sitting capacity of a large number of spectators. This means that it can take advantage of economies of scale to pursue the low cost strategy. Therefore, the Fawz Olympic Academy will be able to attract people from different demographic characteristics due to the affordability of the services. In fact, this strategy is considered a major one for the development of the brand loyalty among potential customers of the organization.
Operational Plan
The project and operations director is in charge of taking control of the operations plan of the Fawz Olympic Academy. At the organizational level, an operations plan is considered the “process of linking strategic goals and objectives to tactical goals and objectives” (Shteyn & Shtein, 2013, 107). The operation plan of the Fawz Olympic Academy is meant to provide a detailed explanation of various milestones, the conditions that are required to enhance the success of the organization, and to provide an account of various strategic plans that will be implemented over next three years.
As part of an operation plan, the Fawz Olympic Academy plans to collaborate with schools within the UAE through recruitments drives in athletics. This activity is scheduled to take place within the first year. Since the focus is to develop the best talents at the academy, the Fawz Olympic Academy plans to recruit personnel who would take part in inter-school competitions at national levels to identify the best performers in the athletics. Top three performers in every state will be given scholarships to participate in the training programs of the Fawz Olympic Academy. The management of the organization believes that this strategy will be a major milestone towards setting the organizational standards in training by displaying to the potential clients that it handles and incubates the best talents within the states that make up the UAE.
After recruiting top performers in the inter-school competitions, the other activity will involve calling upon the past participants in the international athletics games to come in to motivate and inspire the fresh recruits on the potential of athletics in becoming a source of livelihood. This will be done in the form of motivational talks delivered through seminars and one-on-one engagement with students. Once this goal is accomplished, the time will have come to introduce coaches who are hired within the period of the same one year so that they will assume fully their training duties in the beginning of the second year.
It is also important to note that the Fawz Olympic Academy operates also as an academic institution having a national school status. This makes it possible to accommodate all the recruited students in the pre-secondary level. However, the selection criterion is not principally based on the academic performance. Rather, it is based on performance in the athletics. This means that the culture of passing exams as the main criteria for selection to join a national school would be challenged. The overall impact of this on the pre-secondary students is that they will begin to see sports as an alternative talent, which would make them study in some of the most prestigious schools. Hence, they will normalize sports as an actual source of livelihood. They will find it vital to pursue athletics as a career rather than just an extra-curricular activity. The Fawz Olympic Academy hopes to achieve this goal within three years of its operation.
Within three months upon acceptance of this business plan, the Fawz Olympic Academy also anticipates to have settled the necessary agreement with the government in matters of payments of coaches. Before realizing this aim, the selection criteria are determined and reviewed by all directors of f the organizations. For those seeking to have permanent membership to the academy, membership cards will be prepared and issued after three months of operation of the business venture. Before opening the Fawz Olympic Academy, the business venture will write to the government expressing its interest in using the sporting facilities established by the government for the development and incubation of athletics sport talents within the UAE. This will be done in the form of submission of a business proposal so that the government can evaluate the feasibility of the business venture to give recommendations where appropriate. There are also issues to do with ethics in matters of selection for students to join the academy on scholarships because schools would like to own persons who are considered the best performers and may be reluctant to give them out to the Fawz Olympic Academy. Hence, within the next four months, mechanism of dealing with such ethical concerns will be developed.
The business venture is planned to be operational in one-year time. Hence, this time is not adequate to acquire the land anticipated to be provided by the government to put up appropriate structures. Consequently, the Fawz Olympic Academy is resolving to rent a building where it can house its offices and other amenities until such a time when its own structures will be developed. Where training is to be provided, it has to be done on government-owned and running sporting facilities excluding where video motions analysis is to be used as a form of training during theoretical classes.
The progress of the plans of the organization will be measured based on the ability to meet the fixed timelines set out for achievement of specific activities as explained in this operation plan. However, for progress of activities of the business venture to be considered successful, the desired achievements must be accomplished within the time lines. Finally, actual results are an important aspect of measuring the success of the business venture. Based on this argument, the Fawz Olympic Academy will consider itself successful in the achievement of its missions, goals, and objectives once it manages to take persons trained within its facilities to the 2016 Olympics games.
Assessments of risks
New business ventures are prone to a myriad of risks, thus prompting for risk analysis to be conducted in the effort to look for means of resolution of the likely risks. Risk analysis refers to the identification, responding, and analyzing of risks that would be encountered during normal functioning of the business venture or even during its establishment phase (Alexander & Sheedy 2005, 124 :). The main objective is to “maximize the probability and consequences of positive events besides minimizing the probability and consequences of adverse events to business establishments’ objectives” (Kallman 2011, 123). In case of the Fawz Olympic Academy, the government and the business venture must assume various risks.
The definition of risk gives rise to a number of risks such as “site risks, scope risks, designing, constructing and commissioning risks, operational risks, industrial relations, law alterations risks, asset risks, and finance, and sponsor risks” (Kallman 2011, 123) among others, which must be addressed by the Fawz Olympic Academy. Since the UAE government will provide land, it will assume site risks, risks of key approval, natives’ claims, and land acquisition risks. On the other hand, the Fawz Olympic Academy assumes environmental impacts and site condition risks. Scope risks are the province of the Fawz Olympic Academy. Additionally, the Fawz Olympic Academy will assume the risks of delays of completion dates coupled with hiked construction costs accruing from major events and State’s risk items among them being court decisions that are meant to prevent proceedings of the Fawz Olympic Academy construction projects. Lastly, the business establishment will also assume and take care of risks of design and construction of systems and their support facilities.
Financial Plan
The table 2 below shows financial requirements of the Fawz Olympic Academy over the next three fiscal years. All the indicated amounts are in the US dollars unless otherwise stated.
Innovation Scalability
Successful innovations need to be scalable. This means that such innovations need to “handle a growing amount of work in a capable manner or its ability to be enlarged to accommodate growth” (Shteyn & Shtein 2013, 31). From the context of establishment of a new business venture, it implies that new establishments must have the capacity to expand in terms of size and profitability as more resources are committed to enhancing the growth of a given business venture. The Fawz Olympic Academy is a unique organization within the UAE. This means that opportunities exist for the business venture to grow through the opening of new regional branches as people become aware and develop loyalty to the brand equity of the organization.
It is probable that other organizations offering similar services and products will be established following the success Fawz Olympic Academy. However, the fact that the UAE government will fund the Fawz Olympic Academy in terms of provision of land and payments of coaches means that entrepreneurs have an advantage that they can commit other funds such as owners’ equity to create regional branches. In this extent, the Fawz Olympic Academy is scalable. However, it is arguable that the organization can only take advantages associated with its monopolistic nature only for the period it is going to operate as the only organization within the UAE offering both academic and athletic sporting training. Hence, when competing business ventures are established, it implies that the government will have to set priorities in resource allocations. Consequently, the degree of scalability of the organization will be affected. However, since the Fawz Olympic Academy will have operated over a longer period compared to its competitors, it will have accumulated enough pool of financial resources that will take up the vacuum left by the reduction of funding by the government.
Reference List
Alexander, Charles, and Elvis Sheedy. The Professional Risk Managers’ Handbook: A Comprehensive Guide to Current Theory and Best Practices. New Jersey: PRMIA Publications, 2005.
Changing The Game. “Outlook for the Global Sports Market To 2015.”. Web.
Gerry, Jackson, Stephen Kevan, and Richard Whittington. Exploring corporate strategy: text and cases. London: Prentice Hall, 2005.
Kallman, Johnston. “Risk management processes.” Journal of risk management 2, no. 3 (2011): 121-125.
Kotler, Philip, and Kevin Keller. Marketing Management. New Jersey, Prentice Hall, 2009.
Menon, Alron. et al. “Antecedents and Consequences of Marketing Strategy Making.” Journal of Marketing 63, no. 2 (1999): 18–40.
O’ Connor, Sean. “Sports Consumers In Middle East.” SMIJ 7, no. 1 (2011): 77- 94.
Porter, Martin. “The five forces that shape strategy.” Harvard business review 3, no. 1 (2008): 56-63.
Shteyn, Eugene, and Max Shtein. Scalable Innovation: A Guide for Inventors, Entrepreneurs, and IP Professionals. New York: CRC Press, 2013.