Potential Business Plans

The core project of TINST 475 is to create a business plan for a hypothetical (or real) business. I currently have the following ideas floating around:

Synthesizer Control Panel
    This project aims to solve a problem I have personally had as a musician. There is a class of instruments called synthesizers, usually referred to as "synths".  A Synth is, in essence, an electronic instrument controlled by a piano keyboard that is capable of producing an extremely wide range of sounds. A synth could have dozens, if not hundreds of parameters that can be tweaked and adjusted to achieve the desired tone. The problem is that hardware is expensive; a synth with 50 adjustable parameters may only have physical switches and dials that control 20 of them. The rest of the parameters are accessed via "menu diving", using onboard controls and a typically small and confusing screen to navigate to the desired parameter and adjust it. This is a huge hassle for musicians because it impedes workflow and reduces creativity by discouraging the adjustment of more inconvenient parameters.
    My solution is to create a panel full of knobs and buttons that can be mapped to these parameters. The product would have accompanying software that would make it seamless and easy to set up, compatible with a wide range of synths. While I am by far not the first person to have attempted this, there currently exists no convenient, commercial solution. This plan would involve funding, developing, and ultimately launching this product. It is currently my #1 contented out of my potential plans.


Mobile Game
    I, like many developers before me, enjoy playing video games. I also, like many developers before me, have an idea or two for a fun video game. While I don't have an explicit idea for a game, I don't think I would even need one to create a business plan. This plan would involve funding, developing, launching, updating and monetizing a small mobile game. This game, being developed only by myself and potentially a few other colleagues, would be classified as an "indie" game: a game with a small team and small funding. The business plan would have to focus on the advertisement and monetization techniques required to launch and sustain a game in an incredibly crowded market.

Tournament App
    I have worked a side job at a comic shop for the past few years. Over the course of working there I heard a myriad of ideas from gamers on how the company behind their favorite game should fix their grievances. One such idea that came from a good friend of mine was to fill the absence of tournament organization software for a certain game by developing an app. This plan would involve the development, deployment and sustaining of this app. It would also require finding the best way to monetize it while keeping it freely available so that it would become widely used.