Friday, October 11, 2013

Understanding Megatrends means you never snooze

When a corporate looks to innovate it is important to look at the bigger picture. This is called a megatrend and thanks to my buddy Klaus I believe that megatrends are important to be aware of. Things like technology or nanotechnology or health and obesity as well as ageing are all megatrends. So when you look for new ideas it is vital you look at megatrends as well to guide a possible new idea.
So one of these trends is people are getting older and older. This means that logically all investment products should be sold at birth. Thus an insurance policy or a retirement fund should be sold at birth. Once a baby is born a parent should be purchasing all these products so when a kid reaches university age they can afford it. And when people reach other milestones in their life they can afford that too. Too often people struggle when they get old but if they use the system such as compound interest or long term investment then they should be very wealthy.
The same applies to banks. Most banks and the systems they follow are geared towards" Older" persons but when will someone start a bank "only" for people between the ages of 5-16. Something unique and creative that caters for their needs in every way not just an after-thought from a large institution.
In South African culture most black men need to pay a dowry called a LOBOLA. This dowry can be as high as R100,000 or more. However no financial institution has instituted a system of savings for this niche group of "men" who if they dont have the lobola they cannot marry, often living and having children but not being able to marry even if they wish.
The lesson here is that entrepreneurs can find niche products and services either within corporates or they can develop products and services that they can later sell to larger corporates, as corporates are often quite slow to innovate. This provides some great opportunities.