Managing the Financial Future - Essay Example

These are international standardized test used by various schools and universities of US, Australia and UK to select students for various courses. The education sector in general is experiencing a healthy growth rate and on an average 110,000 individuals sit in the tests that will be catered to by Prepgenie. Prepgenie provides the aspirants with test preparatory tools like practice exercises, test papers and online interactive gaming sessions. As a strategy Prepgenie outsources content creation to low cost destinations like Asian countries.

Its development centers in India and Vietnam have a pool of English educated, highly qualified yet low cost professionals who create content. It helps Prepgenie in minimizing cost and yet provides quality products. As a unique strategy, Prepgenie also uses multiple platforms to deliver the preparatory and learning tools in order to reduce cost and increase customer retention and interactivity. The online proprietary interactive platform provides better learning experience for the aspirant and also allows Prepgenie to capture crucial data about individual learning preferences learning style.

Prepgenie also uses its LMS to create a vibrant online community of test takers. However, an offline mode of content delivery is important - more so for overseas customers where access to the Internet is limited, or is expensive. However, this medium is expensive as it involves publication, stock maintenance and delivery. Digital download is by far the most inexpensive for Prepgenie, thereby enabling it to offer more volume of content. However, this mode suffers from three major disadvantages - possible piracy, higher cost of ownership for the user if s/he intends to print these documents and no interactivity with the company.

A combination all three platforms helps Prepgenie to maximize profit, minimize cost and increase interactivity. PrepGenie aims to cater to 1000 students in its first years of operations. Over the next 3 years, it aims to expand its student base to about 5000 students across Australia, UK and US and increase its average revenue per student from the present USD 450 to USD 1000. As on Jan, 2009, Prepgenie has a small team of 17 team members. It plans to increase its team size to about 30 by year end and to 45 by the end of the 3rd year.

Prepgenie plans to introduce low cost products as a market penetration strategy. However, within the 2nd year of its operations, it plans to introduce comprehensive, multimedia based preparatory tools that will let PrepGenie charge premium prices. On a long term basis, PrepGenie aims to be the most innovative test prep solutions provider for a range of tests. Question 2Describe how finances are managed within your department or project, including the nature and use of budgets and how these are established.

Explain how your financial management processes fit into the overall strategic and operational planning