NITIE and Aditya Birla Finance Ltd

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NET –WORK

In this event the teams need to build strategies to develop an online portal providing financial services.
The prime motive behind this event is to understand what a typical customer using these portals looks
for, what he expects and what additional features should be added to the system to make the experience
more complete and fulfilling. The outcome of this activity would be to come up with specific measures
on what should be done to educate a retail customer and improve online usage for e-commerce so that
the final customer footprint on the online portal increases considerably.
It is a three day event where each day teams have to confront newer challenges touching on different
facets of management. Each round is an elimination round, details of which are given below. The details
of different phases are as follows:

Precursor to the event:

This is a preliminary elimination round before the on-campus three day event. This phase will require
the teams to formulate a questionnaire and conduct a survey on a consumer base of at least 40 people.

The survey should include questions to probe the current online behavior of different customers,
mental blocks for retail consumers to go online. It should also include what-if analysis which shows how
they would react if some of the blocks were removed or added in the existing platform.

A time period of 9 days will be given to the participants to complete the survey and do an analysis of the
data.

Deliverables for Precursor event:

Teams have to prepare a power point Presentation consisting not more than 6 slides (excluding the title
and the reference slide) which will elaborate the following areas:

 The quality and scope of the questionnaire will contain 10% weightage in the judging process.
This should be covered in 1 slide.
 The questionnaire will be judged on the basis of the diversity, segmentation and authenticity of
the data collected in this survey. The parameters here could include demographic profile, SEC
classification, points of access etc. This will fetch you 20% of the marks for this phase. This
should be covered in 2 slides. If a professor from your institute can certify that the
survey was properly conducted, it would result in strengthening your entry.
  Analyse the data gathered, try and understand the consumer behaviour regarding a financial
services online portal. Try and understand what are the factors and determinants which drive
the customer’s psyche, find loop holes and areas of opportunity. This will take up 2 slides.
This accounts for 20% of the total weightage
 At the end of it, teams should know what should be done to make a financial services portal
successful in providing complete customer satisfaction. The recommendations should be
feasible and applicable to real life situation. Accuracy of analysis and feasibility of
recommendations will account for 50% of the marks allotted to this phase. This will be
elaborated in 1 slide.

Rules and Guidelines for Precursor stage

 This stage is an elimination round, where only 10 teams will be shortlisted after judging their
power point presentations based on the above parameters.
 Teams should make sure their entries reach should reach us on or before 14th OCT 23:59. No
late entries will be entertained.
 All entries will have to be submitted in pdf format to abfl-network@prerana2010.com.
 The entries should include the survey questionnaire, the results, the presentation and the mail
from the professor (if any) in pdf form.
 Selected 10 teams will be asked to come to NITIE campus to participate in the successive stages
of the event starting from 28th Oct to 30th Oct, 2010 details of that will be provided accordingly.

DAY1 – Phase 1:

Selected teams should use the survey results and their knowledge of financial services to trace the
evolution of an online retail customer and predict the future in this segment outlining opportunities and
threats. Teams have to come up with ways to show how an online medium can be used to exploit
synergies in the group business to tap customers, cross-sell products etc.
Deliverable for the Day 1:

This would include a presentation consisting of 4 slides which should be focused on the following areas:

 Teams will be required to explain how the customer’s expectations have evolved over the years.
A framework/method has to be developed to depict the evolution comprehensively.
 Explain the future prospects in this sector based on current trends, what are the infrastructural
requirements for this and most importantly how do you quantify growth.
 Elaborate on the roadblocks that any typical existing or a new player will face who are
competing for a larger share of the market.
 The quality of analysis and data model accuracy that the teams come up with will carry 25%
weightage of the total marks.
 Participants should come with recommendations on how to improve the marketability of the
online portal. Come up with viable and feasible solutions on how to mitigate the existing
problems that a typical company in the sector faces. The number, viability and quality of the
recommendations will be judged in this round and carries 75% weightage.
 The participants will be given a time of 15 minutes for presentation followed by 5 minutes of
time for Q&A by the jury and audience.

Following this round, only 7 teams would be shortlisted for Day 2, who will move on to the second
round of the event.

DAY2- Phase 2:

The 7 teams would use one of the recommendations of their choice which they gave in the previous
round and prepare an elaborate business plan to launch an online portal providing financial services
which can be used effectively for cross-sell and up-sell of various product offerings. They would have to
explain the end to end strategy to start this venture, explain the problem areas and ways to mitigate it.
This round will require the participants to prepare a power point presentation of not more than 10
slides covering the following areas.

 Products/Service Concept: Teams have to introduce the product/service offering to the jury.
They have to explain their concept of the product and its features and facilities.
 Financials: This requires details of the customer targets, level of capital and operational
expenditure required. Teams should also explain various revenue streams that can be tapped
into, do a break even analysis as well as determine the IRR.
 Marketing/Sales: Teams have to develop an innovative plan for the service/product
keeping in view the existing hurdles in the process.
 Exit Strategy: Plan your exit strategy providing a suitable time frame and mode of exit.
In this round deliverables will be judged on two parameters:

 Based on the effectiveness and feasibility of the business plan i.e. whether all the
parameters of starting a successful business have been considered or not.
 Based on accuracy of the data used in the model to determine the feasibility of the Business.

Rules and Guidelines for Day 2

 Following this round, 4 teams would be shortlisted for the last round to be held on Day-3.
 The teams have to bring along the presentation as well as the excel model with the detailed
financial analysis for this stage.

Day 3:

The biggest requirement any start up requires is the initial investment to kick off the venture. In this
round, the participants are going to fight for that.

This is the final round, where each of the four teams will give a presentation to a panel which is going to
approve the funding. They would pitch for their own Business plan and ask for the initial outlay
required for this product/service launch. They will have to convince the jury about the viability of the
product they are offering and the business feasibility in order to get that investment. The participants
can use the same presentation (changes allowed post feedback of judges on Day 2) and put forth the
valid arguments to the jury.

Following this round, 1 team would be declared the winner of ABFL NET-WORK.