What Are Start Ups - 2790 Words

Introduction 1. What are start ups? A start-up can be described as ‘a business or undertaking that has recently begun operation: grew from a tiny start-up to a large corporation’. (Anon., 2014). The key point here is to grow from a tiny business which denotes starting small. Meanwhile Merriam-Webster dictionary makes it more action oriented by describing a start-up as â€Å"the act or an instance of setting in operation or motion† or â€Å"a fledgling business enterprise.† The likes of Neil Blumenthal, cofounder and co-CEO of Warby Parker say â€Å"a start-up is a company working to solve a problem where the solution is not obvious and success is not guaranteed,† (Robehmed, 2013). In other words we should be seeing a start-up as a tiny venture,†¦show more content†¦In the eyes of the entrepreneur or initiator of a start-up, they don’t see problems as problems rather they see them as opportunities. Which brings us to the next phase of the discussion – what are opportunities? Literature review and critical analysis 2. a What are opportunities in the eyes of an entrepreneur? The Ebola epidemic of 2014 is the worst in history (Center for Disease Control, 2014), with 3 countries in Africa ravaged to their limits. However in the midst of this catastrophe, some entrepreneurs recognise this as their Eureka moment. As a result relatively unknown biotechnology companies like Ibio Inc, Lakeland Industries Inc , and Alpha Pro Tech Ltd who manufacture diagnostic products, Hamzat suits and face masks respectively have seen their stocks rise on the new York stock exchange with investors buying up their shares rapidly (Yasmeen Abutaleb, 2014). In the means of all the chaos, entrepreneurs are still able to identify opportunities. 2 C. Identifying opportunities Doug Neal, the Executive Director of the Center for Entrepreneurship, University of Michigan College of Engineering, Ann Arbor attempted to distinguish 6 different techniques through which Entrepreneurs identify opportunities upon which they build their businesses from observing patterns of behaviour and