1.
Driving Enthusiast’s App; This would be an app
based off of other navigation applications such as Google Maps, Apple Maps,
Waze, etc but instead of the purpose being navigation from A to B, the purpose
of this app is to guide the driver to great driving roads. The user would open
the application and choose the parameters of conditions that they would like to
drive on (e.g. winding mountain road, easy mountain road, suburban,
country-side, sunny, rainy, snow, temperature ranges, traffic density, etc.)
and the application would make a recommendation. The cost effectiveness of this
is relatively high due to its low start up cost and low cost to maintain. The
intention would be for the app to be free with advertisements and an optional
“pay to remove ads” in order to gain money from users and sponsors. The return
on investment of this idea is potentially fair to good. I would not expect to
make any significant amount of money off this application, however I would
expect to easily cover costs to maintain as well as have some profit; enough
profit to help, but not enough so that I could retire in a year. I do not
predict a direct benefit to the standard of living from this application. I do,
however, expect a benefit to society on a small scale in that I will give driving
enthusiasts a solution to a common problem that many enthusiasts face; “I wish
I knew of other really good roads to drive on in my area.”
2.
Grocery Store Guide App; This app would be
similar to other navigation apps, however it would be applicable to the inside
of stores such as Wal-Mart and Target, etc. It would combine a shopping list
app with an app that helps you get your shopping done faster. Through a
partnership with grocery stores to be able to live monitor their stock count,
we would give customers the luxury of an application that plots their route
through the grocery store aisles for them, in the most efficient manner based
on current store stocks & their shopping list. This would remove customers
having to re-trace their steps through aisles multiple times. The cost
effectiveness of this application is mixed, in my prediction. While it is an
app that a large majority of the population (in the US) would benefit from,
there would be tedious negotiations with large volume grocery stores in order
to reach an agreement where this application could access, in real-time, their
stock count. Due to the fact that this app would require a lot of partnership
by large corporations, I leave the cost effectiveness of producing and
implementing this strategy at mixed; potential for failure or success. The
return on investment is also mixed at this point. If negotiations with
corporations work out positively for both parties, the return on investment
could be exponentially high. However, this would depend on the corporations
willingness to partner; if they would chose not to partner or to take a large
majority of the profits from the application, the ROI declines significantly.
On the other hand, the benefits to standard of living as well as society and
humanity are significant. This application would reduce time spent in grocery
stores by a large margin which would increase customer satisfaction (they can
find their groceries on their own), efficiency and allow these customers to
have more free time available to them by reducing the amount of time spent on
this one chore.
3.
Back Seat Headrest; This would be a headrest
that is in the backseat of vehicles, in my example a 5 seat, 5 door sedan, like
a Toyota Camry. During long road trips, the backseat passengers are tasked with
the challenge of finding a comfortable position to rest their heads to sleep.
Often the solution to this is bunching up a pillow against your head and the
passenger window and leaning on the door. My idea removes the inconveniences of
not having something to rest your head on already introduced into the vehicle.
The headrest would be a cushion that is located behind the rear passengers’
head, in between the headrest and the D pillar of the vehicle. When the
passenger wants to go to sleep, they could reach behind them (or in higher
model sedans, press a button), extend the headrest so it comes over their
shoulder and adjust the height and positioning as they see fit. Because this
headrest would be anchored by an adjustable arm extending from the rear of the
vehicle, it would be able to stay firm and give the passengers comfort on
longer car trips. The cost effectiveness of this idea would be high because it
would be involved in automobiles and marketed as a “feature” which would likely
lead to a large difference between cost to produce and price for consumer. I
would grade the cost effectiveness as potentially good. The return on
investment would be minimal. In order to put this idea into practice, it would
require partnership with an automobile manufacturer who would probably just buy
out the rights to the idea to implement into their current models. Due to this
being a one-time settlement agreement and not a long-term investment I grade
the ROI as minimal. The benefit this would have to the standard of living would
be a significant benefit to a small customer base. We would be targeting only new
models of medium to luxury class sedans, the customers for which are a small
portion of the population. The benefit to society and humanity would be minimal
as this is a very niche idea that would not touch upon people in a large scale.
