p r e l i m i n a r y -...

P R E L I M I N A R Y

MKTG-UB.60.01

Designing & Developing New Products

Fall 2018

SYLLABUS Revision 0 • 17 April 2018

Professor

Rajesh Bilimoria [email protected]

Class Hours

Tuesdays and Thursdays 3.30p – 4.45p

Class Location TBD

Teaching Fellow

TBD -

Professor Office Hours By appointment, class meeting days, 2.45p – 3.30p and/or 4.45p – 5.30p

Introduction & Overview

For both startups and established companies, innovation is a critical capability, driving customer satisfaction, competitive advantage and growth. While acknowledging its importance, many companies struggle to execute innovation and product development efforts effectively. This course provides rich, comparative exposure to tools and techniques we can use to identify new opportunities and create new products, services or experiences that address them.

We’ll use a combination of interactive class discussion, real-world case analysis and a team project to explore a holistic approach to innovation and product development, incorporating both quantitative and qualitative perspectives. This exploration will address identifying strategic opportunities, defining target customers, understanding customer needs, generating and evaluating concepts, forecasting demand, designing products and services, developing market entry strategies, and additional topics. As we explore these topics, we’ll consider multiple approaches and their strengths and weaknesses to help students build a thoughtful toolkit and approach.

Topics, products/services and companies we’ll explore in the course include:

• Apple

• Facebook

• Google

• Spotify

• Netflix

• Samsung

• Comcast

• Tesla

• BMW

• Uber

• Airbnb

• CPG: Purell, Coke

• Drybar

• Ford

• Timberland

• Tata Nano

• WeChat

• Supercell

• ‘Jobs to be done’

• Design thinking

• Sharing economy

• Lean startup

• Regulation, Ethics

• Service design

This preliminary syllabus is provided for registration purposes. This document will be updated when the academic calendar and other details are finalized.

Designing & Developing New Products MKTG-UB.60.01 • Fall 2018

Syllabus • Revision 0 (April 2018) PRELIMINARY of 26

Who Should Take This Course?

This course provides good exposure about innovation to students interested in marketing, entrepreneurship, operating company management and consulting. Students who are particularly interested in understanding the areas below will likely find course especially useful:

• What creates value for customers and can be used as the basis for an offering (product or service) and/or company?

• How can we explore potential opportunities, define offerings, test ideas and evolve offerings to improve product/market fit?

• How can we make decisions in the context of changing consumer needs, evolving competitive landscapes and uncertain information?

• How and when should we use methods like design thinking, lean startup/hypothesis-driven entrepreneurship and other new techniques?

• How and why do new products and services (and companies) come to exist?

• Why do some companies succeed where others fail?

Syllabus Revision History

Updates to the syllabus will be noted here with a revision number, date and brief notation of what changed. The revision number is on the front page and in the footer of each page. The current version of the syllabus will always be posted on Classes.

Revision 0 April 2018 – Preliminary document for registration



Contents

Items on this page are hyperlinked; click on an item or page number to go to that page.

Introduction & Overview .................................................................................................. 1

Who Should Take This Course? ..................................................................................... 2

Syllabus Revision History ............................................................................................... 2

Contents ............................................................................................................................ 3

Course Objectives ............................................................................................................ 4

Course Learning Components ....................................................................................... 5

Readings And Materials................................................................................................... 6

Detailed Course Schedule and Reading Assignments ............................................... 8

Course Introduction..................................................................................................................... 8

Opportunity Phase ...................................................................................................................... 8

Exploration Phase ....................................................................................................................... 9

Evaluation Phase ...................................................................................................................... 10

Development Phase (includes Experience Design) ................................................................. 11

Regulation and Launch ............................................................................................................. 12

Integration and Review ............................................................................................................. 12

Presentations and Exam ........................................................................................................... 13

Course Assessment ....................................................................................................... 14

1. Individual Written Case Analysis (20%) ............................................................................... 14

2. Group Project (40%) ............................................................................................................. 15

3. Class Participation (15%) ..................................................................................................... 17

4. Final Examination (25%)....................................................................................................... 18

Guidelines For Group Project Deliverables ................................................................ 19

Course Instructor Bio .................................................................................................... 22

Course Policies ............................................................................................................... 23

Course Faculty Evaluations (CFEs) ............................................................................. 26



Course Objectives

The objective of this course is to enable you to develop an applied understanding of the process we can use to create innovations and develop new products, as well as the related strategic and operational issues that can arise. We’ll focus on the tools and techniques we can use to identify, analyzing and understand market opportunities and how we can create new product or service offerings to address these opportunities.

During the course, you will review and analyze a series of conceptual and managerial issues in each stage of the new product development process. At the conclusion of the course you will be able to:

• Appreciate the strategic need for continuous innovation and new product/service development in a variety of market spaces (digital, manufacturing, etc.) and sectors

• Understand innovation and new product development processes

• Understand how to analyze market needs and opportunities

• Apply processes to generate ideas for new products and services

• Apply the concepts and tools necessary for new product development through case examples and project work

• Appreciate the importance of design and design thinking in the product development process

• Evaluate and test new product concepts

• Develop strategies for marketing new products

• Use the new product development process by conceiving and developing your own new product or service and planning for its launch

The course emphasizes both theoretical and practical approaches in product development and marketing, and builds on a practitioner’s perspective. As such, the course is especially relevant for students who are interested in working on new product innovations, both in entrepreneurial firms and in established companies.

The course is structured around a five-phase innovation and product development process. As we explore each of the phases, we’ll use the four components of the course, discussed in the next section to guide our learning, understand approaches to each phase, and think about challenges we may encounter in innovation and new product development contexts.



Course Learning Components

The course outcomes are very much dependent upon your own inputs. The focus will be on collective learning and sharing and evaluating industry practices, discussing what works, what doesn’t and why. We will use cases to illustrate key issues in real contexts.

To facilitate effective learning, this course uses a combination of:

1. Lectures and interactive discussion

2. Case discussions

3. Group projects

4. Individual analysis

1. Lectures and discussions will introduce new processes, tools, frameworks and concepts that are important to the topic of innovation and new product development. These discussions will be interactive, so you should be prepared to engage frequently, asking and answering questions. I will post slides to NYU Classes some before class, and all after each class.

2. Case discussions will be used extensively in the course and are a required part of the course. A coursepack containing the cases for this course is available via the NYU bookstore. Cases are descriptions of real-world business situations that provide opportunities to define and develop new product strategies. Case analyses will illustrate how new product concepts and tools apply to these complex situations. Analyzing cases promotes your decision-making capabilities by developing a process of thinking. Typically, there is no single “right” answer to a case, but there are many weak answers resulting from inadequate analysis. Case discussions also provide opportunities to develop your communication skills. Your contribution to each case discussion will be evaluated immediately after each class.

3. Group projects provide you with an opportunity to explore the concepts and methods in the course directly. Most students find significant learning in going from the cases and theory to applying methods in the real world. The project work will be delivered and evaluated in a class presentation and written deliverable. More information on the projects and their evaluation criteria is in the Course Assessment and Guidelines for Group Project sections of this document.

4. Individual analysis provides an important complement to the group project, allowing you to explore and develop your individual capabilities. In addition to your case preparations, the individual case analysis paper and the final exam provide opportunities for you to demonstrate your individual abilities and thinking. More information on both individual paper and exam are in the Course Assessment

section of this document, items 1 and 4, respectively.



Readings And Materials

Required Materials

• Coursepack of cases and articles, available via the NYU Bookstore.

o To purchase a key, follow this link.

o To download the coursepack, follow this link. (You’ll need the key you purchased via the above link.)

o Both of these links are available via Classes: UB60 >> Resources >> Coursepack (and supplement) access

• Coursepack supplement (online resources), available via Harvard Business School Publishing: http://cb.hbsp.harvard.edu/cbmp/access/72245210

o This link is also available via Classes: UB60 >> Resources >> Coursepack (and supplement) access

• Publicly available articles linked in the syllabus and/or via Classes.

• There is not a required textbook for this course.

Slides and Other Course Material on NYU Classes

The course page via NYU Classes will be a central material distribution and communication tool during the course. The syllabus, slides from class, and other material will be shared via the Resources tab (see Classes >> Announcements for a link/location). Generally, an announcement will be sent when material is posted.

Optional Additional Material

Throughout the semester, I will post links to relevant articles or podcasts on the course blog (accessible via Classes) after specific sessions. These additional articles are not required reading; they are shared for students who might be especially interested in the subject matter of the course or the topic of a particular class session. Articles will be selected from sources such as the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, The Financial Times, The New Yorker, Bloomberg BusinessWeek and other channels and will generally relate current business events to the concepts taught in class. I also encourage you to share relevant articles with me that you come across. At the conclusion of the course, I’ll also provide a list of books, podcasts, magazines and films that may be of interest for students who wish to explore the topics of the course further.

https://www.bkstr.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/CourseMaterialsResultsView?catalogId=10001&categoryId=9604&storeId=472405&langId=-1&programId=4582&termId=100051316&divisionDisplayName=%20&departmentDisplayName=MKTG-UB&courseDisplayName=60&sectionD

https://coursepacks.xanedu.com/thirdparty?REQ=4958288db27597d5b247d090d08241897d38e688fd9a16a03bd1d5d8093ac5b985d5ec3c64b33da9ad4bdef7b3916c471d888cd5456e06a9e394dd0af05f2540f056a7d1bd7cd0998783da8a20354319aba7ab7f148eebc5&STUDENTID=rb3539

http://cb.hbsp.harvard.edu/cbmp/access/72245210



Optional Books

These books may be useful for process reference, background information or further exploration; you are not expected to buy them. These books are available in Bobst library, except as noted.

• OPTIONAL additional books (You may want to refer to, review and/or consider purchasing some of these relatively inexpensive books, if you have particular interest the topics of this course or find them useful.)

o This is Service Design Thinking: BIS Publishers (2010)

o Business Model Generation: Alexander Osterwalder, Yves Pigneur; Tim Clark. Wiley (2010)

o Value Proposition Design: Alexander Osterwalder, Yves Pigneur, Greg Bernarda, Alan Smith. John Wiley & Sons (2014)

o Designing for Growth: Liedtka, Jeanne, Columbia Business School Publishing (2011)

o Mapping Experiences: James Kalbach, O’Reilly Media (2016) (not in Bobst)

• OPTIONAL Textbooks (For reference only; not recommended for purchase)

o Product Design and Development, 5th ed., by Karl T. Ulrich and Steven D. Eppinger, McGraw-Hill (2012)

o New Products Management, 11th ed., by Merle Crawford and Anthony Di Benedetto, McGraw-Hill (2014)



Detailed Course Schedule and Reading Assignments

Note: All students should read all material designated for each class session. Where designated by GREEN group or ORANGE group, the members of the indicated group will be responsible for driving the in-class discussion and analysis. If no group is indicated, the entire class should be prepared to actively engage in class discussion.

Titles refer to cases in the coursepack (should be in sequential order). Hyperlinks (usually blue underlined text, but may vary with your viewer) connect to web articles.

Date Topic Assignment/Reading (coursepack, except as noted)

Course Introduction

Session 1

Course Overview & Introduction

• ‘Tough Love’ Fast Company article

• Design Thinking: How Thinking Like a Designer Can Create Sustainable Advantage

• Makeover Mania: Inside the 21st-Century Craze for Redesigning Everything by Rob Walker (New York Times Magazine)

Session 2

A Product Development Process

• Submit “Student Background Survey” (Google Form)

• Six Myths of Product Development

Opportunity Phase

Session 3

Opportunity: Business Opportunity & Exploration

• Marketing Myopia

• Taco Bell: The Breakfast Opportunity GREEN group

• Form Project Groups and Submit Rosters

Session 4

Opportunity: Evaluation & Selection

• New York Times review of Duncan Watts' Everything is Obvious ORANGE group

• Marketing Intelligence (online resource via HBS Publishing link) GREEN group and ORANGE group

Session 5

Opportunity Phase Case

• Disruption in Detroit: Ford, Silicon Valley, And Beyond GREEN group

http://www.fastcompany.com/57947/tough-love

https://nyti.ms/2kcIozi

https://nyti.ms/2kcIozi

https://goo.gl/forms/Mc3C7fQUc5bOp7Af2

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/26/books/review/book-review-everything-is-obvious-once-you-know-the-answer-by-duncan-j-watts.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/26/books/review/book-review-everything-is-obvious-once-you-know-the-answer-by-duncan-j-watts.html




Exploration Phase

Session 6

Exploration: Concept Generation

• New York Review of Books review of Levinson’s The Box, about container shipping

• Tesla in 2015 ORANGE group

Session 7

Exploration: Identifying and Solving Customers’ Problems

• Integrating Around the Job to Be Done

• Febreze article (Forbes)

• Optional: Why Platform Disruption is So Much Bigger Than Product Disruption (HBR.org)

Session 8

Exploration: The Customer Experience and Reasons for Buying

• Drybar A & B GREEN group

• The Goldilocks Effect (First Round)

Session 9

Exploration: Challenging Conventions

• Accidents in Innovation

• Hands Across America (The New Yorker via NYU Libraries) (alternate link on newyorker.com) ORANGE group

Session 10

Exploration: Wrap-Up

• Reflect on cases and discussion to prepare three questions for discussion during class

• Optional: How WhatsApp Grew to One Billion Users (HBR.org)

Session 11

Evaluation and Testing

• Introducing New Coke GREEN group

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2006/aug/10/shipping-news/

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2006/aug/10/shipping-news/

http://www.forbes.com/sites/petercohan/2012/02/19/jurassic-park-how-pg-brought-febreze-back-to-life/#2ef0755641b0

https://hbr.org/2016/04/why-platform-disruption-is-so-much-bigger-than-product-disruption

https://hbr.org/2016/04/why-platform-disruption-is-so-much-bigger-than-product-disruption

http://firstround.com/review/the-goldilocks-effect-and-how-to-harness-social-influence/

http://proxy.library.nyu.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=rgm&AN=85990712&site=eds-live

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/03/04/hands-across-america

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/03/04/hands-across-america

https://hbr.org/2016/07/whatsapp-grew-to-one-billion-users-by-focusing-on-product-not-technology

https://hbr.org/2016/07/whatsapp-grew-to-one-billion-users-by-focusing-on-product-not-technology




Evaluation Phase

Session 12

Evaluation and Testing

• Develop two pieces of guidance about evaluation and testing to share with the class

Session 13

Concept Evaluation – Holistic Evaluation

• From Correlation to Causation

12 Mar 2018

16 Mar 2018

Spring Break

Session 14

Evaluation: Sales Forecasting and Financial Analysis;

Capturing Product Intent

• Legal and Profitable? Spotify: The Challenges of an Online Music Service

• Uber Pricing Strategies and Marketing Communications

• The On-Demand Economy

• Adapting to the Sharing Economy

ORANGE group (all material)




Development Phase (includes Experience Design)

Session 15

Development: Experience Design I

• Case Study: Design Thinking and Innovation at Apple GREEN group

• Mossberg: In tech, form trumps function too often (the Verge)

Session 16

Development: Experience Design II

• Joint Case Study Discussion:

o Comcast Corporation, and

o Samsung Electronics: TV in an Era of Convergence

• Individual Case Analyses due

Session 17

Review Session

OR Guest speaker

• Question and answer session about any and all topics to date

• Submit your questions online, as directed in class

Session 18

Development: Innovation & Teams

• Innovation at Timberland: Thinking Outside the Shoe Box ORANGE group

Session 19

Development: Experience Iteration and Integrating Feedback

• Hypothesis-Driven Entrepreneurship: The Lean Startup

• Netflix in 2011 GREEN group

Session 20

Development: Experience Evaluation and Use Testing

• The Tata Nano: What Went Wrong? ORANGE group

http://www.theverge.com/2016/12/7/13863330/walt-mossberg-tech-design-apple-ipod-windows-laptops

http://www.theverge.com/2016/12/7/13863330/walt-mossberg-tech-design-apple-ipod-windows-laptops




Regulation and Launch

Session 21

Launching New Products

• Google Glass ORANGE group

• BMW Z3 GREEN group

Session 22

Regulation, Innovation, Sustainability and Ethics

• Spontaneous Deregulation

• Recent articles to be announced (see NYU Classes for links) for each group GREEN group and ORANGE group

Integration and Review

Session 23

Process Reflection and Global Innovation

• WeChat: A Global Platform? GREEN group

Session 24

Process Reflection and Scaling Innovation

• Supercell ORANGE group

Session 25

Overall Review and Discussion

• Reflect on the cases we’ve studied, our process discussions and your project, and bring two important thoughts to share and discuss in class

• Leading Breakthrough Innovation in Established Companies (online resource via HBS Publishing link)

• Stop Saying Big Companies Can’t Innovate: https://hbr.org/2016/06/stop-saying-big-companies-cant-innovate (HBR.org)

• Can big firms innovate? (HBR.org)

https://hbr.org/2016/06/stop-saying-big-companies-cant-innovate



https://hbr.org/2016/10/when-big-firms-are-most-likely-to-innovate




Presentations and Exam

Session 26

Project Presentations 1

• Group Project Presentations

• All groups’ written submissions due (including all slides)

Session 27



Session 28



• Self-evaluation and feedback on fellow team members due

Exam

Final Exam

• The final exam is open notes and cases. See Course Assessment section: 4. Final Examination (25%)



Course Assessment

Each student’s performance in four areas, described in more detail below, will be used to evaluate your performance in the course. Each of the areas plays a different role in the course, allowing you to demonstrate individual understanding, deep inquiry and analysis, broad knowledge of course material and applied learning of the concepts. The four elements are weighted as noted:

Individual Written Case Analysis: 20% Group Project: 40% Participation: 15% Final Examination: 25%

100%

Specific guidance for the different areas is offered below. Please note that in all areas of the course, thoughtfulness, creativity of analysis, logic and persuasiveness, and thoroughness will be important considerations.

1. Individual Written Case Analysis (20%)

The assigned case provides you with an opportunity to apply what you are learning to a specific problem and context. It will take a few hours to read and study the case, and a few more hours to prepare and write up your analysis. We’ll then discuss the case in class on the due date of the assignment. The emphasis of this assignment is thoughtfulness and depth, not length (i.e., word count).

I will provide discussion questions to help you focus your analysis effort. In preparing your case analysis, assume that you are a manager or outside consultant who has been given responsibility for the situation described in the case. Do not focus on a description of the facts in the case; rather, focus on the following three factors: statement of the problem(s) or decision(s) to be made; description of your decisions or recommendations; supporting logic and analyses. Your recommendations should be based on quantitative and qualitative analysis of case data, as appropriate. Your analysis should anticipate potential objections to your recommendations and illustrate its superiority over alternative recommendations.



2. Group Project (40%)

The goal for the group project is to conceive and develop a new product/service idea. You are to assign yourselves into groups of 5 – 6 members each. Your team is responsible for allocating responsibilities and making sure that everyone contributes in a timely manner. Please do not ask me to become involved in settling any disagreement between team members. You must do this by yourselves.

Each group will explore an opportunity (problem state) and generate an idea for a new product or service to address it. The idea should be one that is feasible and executable, and you will prepare a marketing plan for the offering. You’ll apply concepts and techniques learned in this course in the project, as well as techniques learned in preceding courses like market research methods, statistical analysis and valuation techniques. This project will involve a lot of research and teamwork. Your research will likely involve both primary and secondary data collection as well as analysis of that data. I want you to be as creative as possible in terms of identifying opportunities, generating ideas, developing support for your idea, and preparing a plan for marketing your new product or service.

A written report will be submitted by the group at the end of the course, and each group will also create and deliver a final presentation to the rest of the class. The three graded elements of the group project are:

1. Written Submission and Presentation Document: Opportunity Exploration, Idea Generation and Development, and Supporting Rationales

2. Presentation Delivery: Opportunity, Idea Presentation and Marketing Plan

3. Overall Process Evaluation: Process Discussion Appendix, completion of project updates, meeting with TF regularly to review progress, steady progress throughout semester.

You will not be graded on the content of the interim project updates or meetings with the TF, as these will be an opportunity for you to share your group’s ideas and thought processes and, in turn, to get feedback. However, failure to complete these activities will affect your project grade. Further details and requirements of the Group Project are provided below in the Guidelines For Group Project Deliverables section.



Teamwork and Individual Contribution to Team Outcomes

The greatest cause of disappointing team assignments is the inability to coordinate work effectively. Some ways to prevent this are:

• Choose team members who can meet at times convenient for each other.

• Take notes of your meetings so your decisions and assignments are clear.

• Create and adhere to a workplan, allowing sufficient time to discuss your analyses, make decisions, and prepare the final deliverables.

• Articulate and discuss individual work, collaboration and communication processes early in the project.

In determining the grades for individual members of a group for the Group Project, I will assume that each member has contributed his or her fair share to the work produced. In the event that there is reasonable evidence of free-riding or a member not contributing equitably, the grade awarded to such member may be adjusted accordingly.

The TF and I are available to help resolve team conflicts, but the final responsibility rests with the team members. Teams are entitled to issue a written warning to any student who is not contributing fairly or constructively. This warning should state the problems and list specific steps to resolve these problems. All other members of the group should sign the warning and you should give a copy to me. At the end of the semester, you will have the opportunity to evaluate the relative contribution of your team members. This evaluation shall be submitted to me and will be taken into consideration as input for the grading of the identified team member. Clear communication processes and defined team expectations established at the beginning of the project can help reduce the odds of conflicts arising.

When problems cannot be resolved with a team member, the other team members can expel this member by unanimous vote. If you are expelled from your team, you will need to complete all assignments individually.



3. Class Participation (15%)

The best learning experiences occur when students participate actively, and our class sessions will provide many opportunities. You must be prepared to discuss all assigned readings and cases. Your comments should reflect a depth of understanding indicative of thorough analysis (including quantitative analysis, when appropriate) and most often discussions with other students prior to class. You should be prepared to articulate and defend your position when called on to do so. Active participation of all students is required but quality and frequency of comments is more important than duration of each comment. The ability to speak comfortably to a group is a vital business skill. If you are anxious about public speaking, the only way to get better is to practice. The best way to reduce your anxiety is to be thoroughly prepared.

These are the elements I will consider in evaluating your participation:

• Are you a good listener?

• Do you contribute to the learning environment by sharing your relevant business experiences and those you read about?

• Do your comments demonstrate thorough analysis?

• Do you ask constructive questions of other students that help to deepen everyone’s understanding?

• Do you distinguish between different kinds of data (i.e., facts and opinions, anecdotes and supported conclusions)?

• Are you willing to share ideas and information in a collegial fashion?

• Are you willing to test new ideas, or are all comments intellectually ‘safe’ (e.g., previously articulated themes or case facts without new insights)?

• Are you willing to interact with your classmates to help refine ideas?

• Do your comments advance the discussion or are you repeating earlier comments or raising points that do not fit into the current discussion?

• Do your comments incorporate concepts presented in lectures, readings, and earlier cases?

• Do you make your points succinctly?

Good case discussions involve interactions among students, and the success of our case discussions is largely up to you. Case discussions are based solely on the material presented in each case. Our emphasis will be on the decision-making process at the time of the case rather than on the decision outcome. Since managers must constantly make decisions without all the information they desire, being able to make decisions under these circumstances is a critical skill. Therefore, please do not collect any post-case information (e.g., do not search the internet to ‘find out what happened’), unless explicitly instructed to do so.



In our discussions, the roles of professor and students are crucial, but very different. My role is to facilitate the discussion, rather than to direct the discussion in a predetermined direction. You (collectively) must raise the relevant issues, and I will make sure that many opinions and recommendations have a chance to be raised. Then, I will help the class synthesize the different perspectives and form a framework for decision-making. I may share my views at the end of each case. However, it is important to remember that the purpose of case analysis is not to determine right and wrong answers (except for some of the quantitative analysis, where there will be right and wrong answers). The validity of a recommendation rests on its logic and incorporation of relevant case facts.

Hierarchy of Comments (in increasing order of value to the case discussion)

1. Describing events in the case.

2. Agreeing with or augmenting someone else’s statement.

3. Articulating and crystallizing an understanding of the situation/problem in the case.

4. Explaining events in the case and recommending solutions based on analysis of relevant data.

5. Relating your explanations and recommendations to knowledge developed from readings, lectures, and previous discussions.

6. Advancing the discussion in new directions, with well-supported arguments

Rules of Class Discussion

Denigrating legitimate comments is not acceptable. Everyone’s input, if not repetitious, must be considered valuable and encouraged. Feel free to question or disagree with other students; however, such disagreement must be based on the idea and not the person. Respect for your fellow students is the sine qua non of great discussions and great learning experiences.

4. Final Examination (25%)

Our course includes a final examination that assesses how well students have developed an understanding and knowledge of new product development issues and processes, as well as their ability to apply such knowledge to real-world scenarios. The exam typically includes both multiple choice and essay questions, related to both theory/process and practice/application. As noted in the schedule, the exam is open notes and cases. You may bring any printed material from the course, whether written by you or from the coursepack. Handwritten notes are allowed. No digital/electronic media is permitted. No material may be shared between students during the exam.



Guidelines For Group Project Deliverables

Your report should focus on the development of your idea and the evaluation of its market potential. The topics you address will closely follow the topics covered in the course. Thus, you should review the readings, lectures, and cases to identify those concepts and tools that are most relevant for your project. You should create a motivating argument for your offering, which likely includes the items below; however, you are not limited to the items below. This is not a checklist.

1. The Opportunity and the Market (both report and presentation)

a. Description of potential target consumers, customers and/or segments: needs, benefits sought, usage patterns, importance of attributes, consumer characteristics, size of segment, price sensitivity, etc.

b. Evaluation and selection of your target customers/consumers. You can select more than one segment, but for a project of this type (and duration), you will gain more from in-depth analysis of one segment than a broader discussion of multiple segments.

c. Processes, analytical models and thinking employed to identify your target customers/consumers.

d. Remaining assumptions and uncertainties.

2. The Idea and Experience (both report and presentation)

a. Description of product or service and an articulation of the new experience.

b. Core rationales that motivate the offering recommendations. What customer needs will be satisfied? What’s the link between the needs and the offering attributes, features and/or benefits?

c. Remaining assumptions and uncertainties.

3. Link between the idea and the market (both report and presentation)

a. What is the product’s core benefit proposition for the target segment?

b. Discussion of why the opportunity exists and why addressing it matters to customers.

c. Positioning relative to alternative products/services (competition); discussion of potential substitutes.

d. Processes and analytical models employed to identify and select positioning, e.g., perceptual maps, surveys.

e. Potential marketing/advertising concept to communicate offering, benefits and positioning.

f. Results of offering and/or marketing testing or feedback gathering.



g. Test market plans you would execute as next steps.

h. Estimation of market demand, sales forecasting and/or profitability (or business viability).

i. Enterprise profitability assessments, if applicable.

j. Launch strategy: brief discussion of pricing, promotion, distribution, partnerships, etc., for the product or service.

4. Summary of processes employed and lessons learned (primarily report appendix)

a. Discuss the processes employed and lessons learned during the project and what you would do differently on another new product development project. Put another way, what did you do, how did you do it, why did you do it that way, and how might you do it differently next time? Specificity in terms of sample sizes, duration of interviews, etc., is important.

b. Discuss processes you used to work together effectively as a team.

Submitted Report

Your report should address and coherently package the four main areas above, as noted below. All material must be submitted as a PDF document.

• A clear and motivating discussion of the opportunity, the market, your idea and the connection between these elements. This section should be a maximum of 5,000 words (1.5-spaced, 12-point typeface). This section should address items 1 – 3, above. Actual word count should be clearly noted at the beginning or end of the document. Structure your document clearly. Write concisely and edit.

• Exhibits (up to 10 pages), which should include visual aides, such as perceptual maps, charts or other tools, to help illuminate and explain your analysis and recommendations. Exhibits should focus on the evidence that supports the recommendations, descriptions, and conclusions in the text. The exhibits should address support content for items 1 – 3, above. (Exhibits can be presented inline with text, but please be mindful of observing the aggregate word count.)

• Process documentation of the steps you took in the course of executing your project (up to another 10 pages, including visuals). (This corresponds to item 4, above.) Content in this section should include text, project workplan, research plans, interview or survey questionnaires, a summary of primary research learnings, a summary of secondary research and/or data sources and other material that helps me understand what you did during your project. It can be very useful to document your work as you go, so that this section is built as the team works.



Each report will address the topics above to varying degrees, but you should make sure that (i) your conclusions are based on findings from your primary and secondary research, and (ii) that you have identified and discussed remaining assumptions and uncertainties and thought about ways to resolve these issues. Additionally, make sure that you clearly cite sources for all key data, whether it is generated within the team or gathered from secondary sources.

Presentation

Your presentation should address the opportunity, the idea and the marketing plan for the product or service that your group has defined in a thoughtful and persuasive manner. (You do not need to present your process during your presentation, although you can refer to it as necessary to motivate your recommendations.) Your goal should be to engage support from your audience; you can imagine you are presenting to potential investors or partners, as appropriate to your opportunity and idea. Teams will have approximately 30 minutes for their presentations, and presentation materials should be commensurately thorough. There is no limit on the number of slides you can include in your presentation; however, you should be mindful of what is appropriate for the allotted time and the content you want to share. Clarity and effective visual design will be included in the evaluation considerations. You may present from whatever application you choose, but your submitted presentation must be a PDF document.



Course Instructor Bio

Rajesh Bilimoria, Adjunct Professor Rajesh thrives on the intersection of ideas and is a firm believer in interdisciplinary thinking as a key lever for innovation, and his career has focused on innovation and new product development in several contexts. In both his teaching and consulting work, Rajesh integrates a collaborative spirit with a broad perspective, drawing from his diverse sector experience and interdisciplinary training that spans engineering, design and business strategy. He currently teaches innovation and human-centered design as an adjunct faculty member at NYU’s Stern School of Business and has previously taught at Parsons School of Design (The New School); he’s also delivered guest lectures centered on innovation and product development at Harvard Business School, Columbia Business School and Northwestern University. Rajesh’s research areas are focused on corporate innovation strategy and the intersection of innovation and society. In addition, Rajesh advises both startups and established companies. He is an external advisory board member for Vanguard’s Innovation Studio and a Designer-in-Residence at NYU-Stern’s Berkley Innovation Labs.

Most recently, Rajesh spent eleven years as a leader at Continuum, a global innovation and design consultancy. As a vice president, Rajesh focused on identifying the right opportunities for innovation, working with clients to identify the right questions customers and consumers need us to ask. As a practitioner at Continuum, Rajesh led a range of projects for leading global companies in the hospitality, financial services, media, consumer electronics, pharmaceutical and consumer packaged goods sectors. For each of these clients, Rajesh effectively combined humanistic and business-driven thinking to create market-ready ideas that work to improve people’s lives. In addition, Rajesh led innovation process development projects to help his clients increase their capability and capacity for innovation.

Prior to joining Continuum, Rajesh worked at WPP, where he worked across the firm’s agencies. Previously, Rajesh worked at Ford Motor Company, developing its product strategy for sport utility vehicles. Rajesh earned a BS in Engineering and Applied Science at the California Institute of Technology and an SM in Mechanical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, as well as an MBA with High Distinction from Harvard Business School.



Course Policies

Please Read Carefully

Students often ask about course policies in several areas, such as keeping current with the class, missed exams and quizzes, regrading, and the honor code. These are very important for you to know and observe. Please read the following very carefully. Please also be sure to read the Stern School policies that affect all Stern classes, at http://www.stern.nyu.edu/portal-partners/current-students/undergraduate/resources-policies/academic-policies/index.htm

Attendance

Class attendance is mandatory. Excused absences can be noted by emailing the professor and the TF, preferably in advance of class, if at all possible. Documentation (e.g., a doctor’s note) may be required for absences of more than one class. Please arrive at class in time to get settled, as we will begin promptly at the designated start time for class each day. Attendance or tardiness issues will be reflected in participation grades. Please note that interviews are not considered excused absences, per Stern policy.

Use of Electronic Devices

Use of electronics devices (phones, laptops, etc.) is not permitted during class. Please make sure that your phones and other devices are in ‘do not disturb’ / airplane mode or off during class. This policy is intended to maintain focus on the discussion at hand and enhance each student’s learning experience. (The professor may make exceptions for individual class sessions when laptops or tablets are needed to present material or share analysis. These sessions will be announced in advance.)

Communications

The professor and TF are only reachable via email or NYU Classes messaging for initial communications. (A call may be scheduled, if necessary.) If and when you contact the professor or TF, please email the professor and/or TF from your Stern or NYU email and include your full name (as noted by the registrar/course records) in all communications.

Keeping Current with the Course

The TF and I will generally use two methods, in-class announcements and the course website on Classes, to make announcements regarding syllabus revisions, updates of the lecture slides, updates/details on assignments, assignment grades and other important information. Depending on your settings in Classes, announcements will be sent to your email. Not every announcement will be made both ways. It is your responsibility to check your email and the course website well in advance of each class session. It is also your responsibility to be aware of all announcements made in class. If for some reason you are not able to check your email or miss a class, find out from a classmate whether anything was sent or announced that you need to know.

http://www.stern.nyu.edu/portal-partners/current-students/undergraduate/resources-policies/academic-policies/index.htm




If you are having trouble with email or the class website, read the notes below and/or check first with a consultant at one of the Stern computer labs or call the Stern Computer Help Desk at +1.212.998.0180 or [email protected]. If you do not already have a Stern email address, you should be assigned one upon registering for this Stern course. To set or change your password, simply visit the Simon web site (http://simon.stern.nyu.edu), log in with your Stern ID and password, and click on “Change Password.” If you would prefer to receive email from the course at an address other than your Stern email address, you can have your Stern email forwarded to your preferred address.

Policy on Deadlines and Accepting Late Work

The structure of this course has few deadlines, aside from regular class preparation. These deadlines are noted in the detailed course schedule and course calendar. They include the Individual Case Analysis assignment and the Group Project Deliverables. These deadlines will not be moved. Late work will be accepted for 24 hours after the due date and time, incurring a 10% grade penalty. After 24 hours, late work will not be accepted. Exceptions will only be made in the case of personal emergency (e.g., medical issue) supported by documentation (e.g., doctor’s note).

Grade Policy

At NYU Stern, we strive to create courses that challenge students intellectually and that meet the Stern standards of academic excellence. To ensure fairness and clarity of grading, the Stern faculty have agreed that for elective courses the individual instructor or department is responsible for determining reasonable grading guidelines. See the Course Assessment section for grading guidelines for this course.

Policy for Reconsidering Grades & Regrading Requests

If you believe that a mistake was made in grading your assignment, please give me a written explanation along with the original assignment. Since your grade reflects an overall judgment about the quality of your assignment, I will re-evaluate the entire assignment rather than just re-consider one aspect of it.

In line with Grading Guidelines for the NYU Stern Undergraduate College, the process of assigning of grades is intended be one of unbiased evaluation. This means that students are encouraged to respect the integrity and authority of the professor’s grading system and discouraged from pursuing arbitrary challenges to it. If a student feels that an inadvertent error has been made in the grading of an individual assignment or in assessing an overall course grade, a request to have that the grade be re-evaluated may be submitted. Students should submit such requests in writing to the professor within seven days of receiving the grade, including a brief written statement of why he or she believes that an error in grading has been made.

https://sites.google.com/a/stern.nyu.edu/sternit/home

https://sites.google.com/a/stern.nyu.edu/sternit/home

mailto:[email protected]

http://simon.stern.nyu.edu/

https://sites.google.com/a/stern.nyu.edu/sternit/home/guides/forwarding

https://sites.google.com/a/stern.nyu.edu/sternit/home/guides/forwarding



Academic Integrity

Integrity is critical to the learning process and to all that we do at NYU Stern. As members of our community, all students agree to abide by the NYU Stern Student Code of Conduct, which includes a commitment to:

• Exercise integrity in all aspects of one's academic work including, but not limited to, the preparation and completion of exams, papers and all other course requirements by not engaging in any method or means that provides an unfair advantage.

• Clearly acknowledge the work and efforts of others when submitting written work as one’s own. Ideas, data, direct quotations (which should be designated with quotation marks), paraphrasing, creative expression, or any other incorporation of the work of others should be fully referenced.

• Refrain from behaving in ways that knowingly support, assist, or in any way attempt to enable another person to engage in any violation of the Code of Conduct. Our support also includes reporting any observed violations of this Code of Conduct or other School and University policies that are deemed to adversely affect the NYU Stern community.

The entire Stern Student Code of Conduct applies to all students enrolled in Stern courses and can be found here: www.stern.nyu.edu/uc/codeofconduct

To help ensure the integrity of our learning community, prose assignments you submit will be submitted to Turnitin. Turnitin will compare your submission to a database of prior submissions to Turnitin, current and archived Web pages, periodicals, journals, and publications. Additionally, your document will become part of the Turnitin database.

General Conduct and Behavior

Students are also expected to maintain and abide by the highest standards of professional conduct and behavior. Please familiarize yourself with Stern’s Policy regarding In-Class Behavior & Expectations (http://www.stern.nyu.edu/portal-partners/current-students/undergraduate/resources-policies/academic-policies/index.htm) and the NYU Disruptive Behavior Policy (http://www.nyu.edu/about/policies-guidelines-compliance/policies-and-guidelines/bullying--threatening--and-other-disruptive-behavior-guidelines.html).

Students with Disabilities

If you have a qualified disability and will require academic accommodation of any kind during this course, you must notify me at the beginning of the course and provide a letter from the Moses Center for Students with Disabilities (CSD, 998-4980, www.nyu.edu/csd) verifying your registration and outlining the accommodations they recommend. If you will need to take an exam at the CSD, you must submit a completed Exam Accommodations Form to them at least one week prior to the scheduled exam time to be guaranteed accommodation.

http://www.stern.nyu.edu/uc/codeofconduct




http://www.nyu.edu/about/policies-guidelines-compliance/policies-and-guidelines/bullying--threatening--and-other-disruptive-behavior-guidelines.html

http://www.nyu.edu/about/policies-guidelines-compliance/policies-and-guidelines/bullying--threatening--and-other-disruptive-behavior-guidelines.html

http://www.nyu.edu/csd



Course Faculty Evaluations (CFEs)

Course Faculty Evaluations provide valuable feedback to me and to the school about this course, and I strongly encourage you to complete them. Students before you have offered valuable feedback that help make this course better each year, and you play an important role for the students that will follow you.

Towards the end of the semester, I will allocate some class time to allow you to complete the CFE. Laptop and/or smartphone use will be permitted at this time to enable you to access the CFE. (You can, of course, complete the CFE anytime during the period that they are open, approximately during the last two weeks of the course.)

For your reference, instructions to access the CFE tool are below:

For Stern students:

1. Login to https://sternlife.stern.nyu.edu/academics-undergraduate . Use the same login and password that you use for accessing your Stern email. If you have not activated your Stern account yet, please visit http://start.stern.nyu.edu .

2. Click on the link for the pending CFE you want to submit.

Non-Stern students:

A) If you have already activated your Stern account:

1. Login to http://www.stern.nyu.edu/cfe . Use the same login and password that you use for accessing email.

2. Click on the link for the CFE you want to submit.

B) If you have NOT activated your Stern account:

1. Activate your Stern account at https://w3.stern.nyu.edu/start . You will need to provide your Stern NetID (example: abc2), University ID, and birth

date.

2. Once activated, click on the link for the CFE you want to submit. You will

need to verify your date of birth before submitting your response(s).

Problems? Contact the Helpdesk at (212) 998-0180 or email [email protected].

https://sternlife.stern.nyu.edu/academics-undergraduate

http://start.stern.nyu.edu/

http://www.stern.nyu.edu/cfe

https://w3.stern.nyu.edu/start

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