Marketing Plan / Tutor:
Pr. Jean-François DAVID
MARKETING PLAN
RFID Technology solution for emergency case
Tutor : Jean-François DAVID
TABLE OF CONTENT
MARKETING PLAN : 1
Tutor : Jean-François DAVID 1
1. EXECUTIVE ABSTRACT 4
2. CONTEXT 5
3. OBJECTIVES 6
4. METHODOLOGY 7
4.2. Processes 8
4.2.1. Various tasks 8
4.2.2. Figure: Process Groups 9
4.3. Planning 9
5. MARKET STUDY 10
5.1. Emergency care 10
5.2. Statistics on emergency healthcare 12
5.3. Customer’s needs 14
5.4. Creative idea 14
5.4.2. Our Mission: We are a young start-up that integrates technology into emergency care industry in order to develop and optimize the best care practices that a hospital provides to their clients. 16
5.4.3. Our Vision: To become a leader company in integrating technologies in the emergency care industry, within a period of four years. First, Centoramo will develop its strategy in France, a known market, before becoming stronger and going for new markets (especially in European and Asian countries as the North American market is almost saturated). 16
5.4.4. Our Values: 16
5.5. Study of the open market 17
A) Size of the market 17
B) Market trends 17
5.5.1. Internal market analysis: SWOT 18
5.5.2. Internal market analysis: PEST 19
5.5.3. Network Model: 20
5.6. Competitors’ analysis 21
5.7. Implementation scenario 22
5.8. Value chain 22
A n s o f f m a t r i x 23
PRODUCT 23
DEVELOPMENT 23
Decision tool 24
5.8.1. Routes to markets 24
5.8.2. Partnerships 25
5.9. Marketing Mix 27
5.9.1. Problems 27
5.9.2. Strategy 27
5.9.3. Products 28
5.9.4. Price 28
5.9.5. Place (channel of distribution) 29
5.9.6. Communication plan 29
5.10. Core competencies 30
Work: The way people relate to IT 31
Human rights : Private liberties 31
Medical care : Health enters the digital world 31
6. RECOMMENDATIONS 32
7. DISCUSSION 33
8. REFERENCES 34
8.1. Bibliography 34
8.2. Articles, magazines, press 35
9. APPENDICES 36
1. EXECUTIVE ABSTRACT
“Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) is a disruptive technology that has broad applicability across the healthcare industry. With RFID, healthcare organizations (HCOs) can automate inefficient manual processes to help increase operational efficiency and improve the quality patient care delivery. RFID enables HCOs to positively identify patients, accurately track mobile assets and patients, and optimize supply chain inventory management and logistics. HCOs are investing in RFID today. Healthcare organizations are investing in RFID solutions today to better understand the viability of the technology and to figure out how to leverage RFID to solve real problems within their organizations.
Active solutions are propelling growth of RFID in healthcare.
Healthcare organizations are primarily deploying active RFID solutions for tracking assets and patients. With RFID, HCOs are achieving a compelling ROI to help increase operational efficiency and improve the quality of patient care. Passive RFID solutions lack a compelling business case. Healthcare organizations are having difficulties identifying a compelling business case to justify an investment in passive RFID for patient safety and inventory/supply chain management solutions. RFID solutions are not ready for large-scale, enterprise-wide deployment due to healthcare organization concerns about network infrastructure, network scalability, application availability, and systems integration complexities.”
Good, but a bit too much general ideas… Executive abstract is not a teaser, it is a real "sales" synthesis of proposal ideas…
2. CONTEXT
What if a person could be transferred to a hospital following an emergency call with the confidence that his/her treatment would be efficient, safe, with accurate care and reduced risks ? It may be hard to envision, but we have the knowledge and technical assets to make this hypothesis come true. However, our medical system doesn't have the infrastructure or funding to fully address these issues.
ok
Nowadays, the French emergency services are faced with an increasing number of calls ( 4.5 million for medical emergencies, 650 000 SMUR operations, increase of 10% every year) resulting in a high number of patients treated every day in hospitals. The latter in turn struggle to manage the allocation of resources, cope with the fluctuating flow of patients, coordinate the different steps of the procedure of emergency care all along their course in different departments through to their release.
good
This triggers several issues like the difficulty to keep track of one patient's treatments received, medicines absorbed name of the appointed doctor... On top of that, there is no way to quantify the level of activities, the frequency of use of equipment and even assigning the right skilled staff member to the patient has proven difficult to achieve. For instance, 33% of patients’ s files do not mention the name of the doctor who is treating them, and 20% of them are not readable; worse, 10% do not state any diagnosis. What are the consequences of this alarming situation ?
OK
There still are hundreds of cases where the lack of coordination between the different teams (Smur, Emergency and Intensive care departments) have led to medical complications, excessive duration of hospitalization and additional costs supported by the national health service (“Sécurité Sociale”), resulting in a ever bigger deficit. GOOD Plus, the slow and still manual process of patient’s medical files (or partially computerized) in each department makes the task even more difficult for the medical personnel when it comes to make critical decisions for patients’ sake.
yes
M. David, head of emergency services department of Cochin public hospital, has cumulated, over his decades of service, a knowledge, that is to say a set of procedures to follow, that could help improve considerably the emergency medical care processes.
Our company dedicates itself to the development of innovative software solutions for all the health industry. The solution is at hand, through the combined technologies of the healthcare supply chain: cutting-edge technology, support for decision making based on procedural knowledge.
good
The following will address the quality and accuracy of patient care, based on future patient expectations within our healthcare delivery system. This study will provide you with the tools you need to achieve this goal.
Excellent part
3. OBJECTIVES
M. David, head of emergency department of a Parisian hospital, is looking for a way to market his knowledge and the model of emergency care implemented in Cochin public hospital.
Cochin hospital emergency service receives 50 000 patients every year, which means that an average 130 emergency medical care procedures are performed every day. As said above, there still is many things to improve in order to provide high quality services to patients. This implies a better coordination of the emergency care chain, the patient’s file and reaching greater accuracy in the choice of appropriated treatment.
ok
Taking this into account and after a thorough study of the different emergency department processes at Cochin hospital, we identify three main domains in which our input could make significant difference: the patient’s file, the management of resources and the choice of appropriated treatment. Therefore, our main objectives in that study will be the following:
1 / Identify and focus on our customer’s needs to be able to help him provide added value services. This entails innovative methods and equipment that will allow to stand out from the crowd. ok
2 / Reach an agreement with the customer in order to introduce cutting-edge technologies and collaborative work chain (sustained interaction between stakeholders) in healthcare industry.
yes
3 / Provide help to set up a field for study and medical research based on data collection of patient history, treatment using statistics. The said studies could serve to measure up the impact of technology on health public expenses.
ok
The actions derived from these key principles will be :
- Improve the management of patient’s medical files ;
- Provide the hospital with the needed tool to implement appropriated medical care ;
- Maximize the use of the resources of the hospital.
4. METHODOLOGY
4.1. Methods
We used universal methods to prepare our marketing plan. This involved methodic research of the market combined with teamwork management tools using various frameworks:
- Market study : benchmark (have a flavor of what is coming up next), competitors analysis, data collection, quantitative analysis, qualitative interviews ;
- Modeling our approach to the market: SWOT and PEST models for both the hospital and the company in order to emphasize opportunities and identify the external forces impacting upon this organization, Ansoff matrix to decide on growth strategy, Porter’s 5 forces model, core competencies analysis using Hamel and Pralahad framework… ;
- Project management methods: simple RAM to evaluate the workload, Gantt chart and WBS for planning and breakdown of tasks, Project charter to make sure every member was aware of their role, Meeting management checklist to conduct efficient meetings…
YES
4.2. Processes
4.2.1. Various tasks
The processes that are described here are the actions undertaken by the team in order to produce a marketing plan. Preparing a marketing plan is much about research; that is why we spent most of the time looking for information, searching for relevant and accurate pieces of information. The main processes were:
- Meeting the other team members (formal meetings) : we decided to meet to officially discuss the methodology, the actual topic, the evolution of the idea based on the data collected ;
- Talk about the project on a regular basis but in informally (informal meetings): they were more frequent than formal meetings. Their purpose was to keep connections with the evolution of each other’s searches, compare the solutions offered by the competitors …;
- Searching for information on the target market (actual research) : we went hunting for information on healthcare, health services using first a very broad scope (what’s happening in leading countries like the USA, UK, Japan…) that we gradually narrowed to the market on emergency medical services in France. This includes research on statistics, a deeper understanding of the emergency procedures, and reading of professional press…;
- Interviewing of possible end-users (interviews) : meeting with acquaintances working in emergency departments of hospital, medicine students ;
- Report writing : the first synthesis of the research were summed up with the help of mental models;
- Rehearsing (preparing the pitch for the presentation): emphasizing our ideas with the best arguments to convince the investors of the added value and the innovative aspect of our concept ;
OK good if no window-dressing…
4.2.2. Figure: Process Groups
funny and nice
4.3. Planning
The first marketing plan was produced over a period of one month, from the 6th to the 26th of September 2006. The project was divided into tasks and sub-tasks which were assigned to the different team members. After analyzing of the topic altogether during the first week, the team gathered to exchange views on the way to approach the project. A brainstorming session took place to discuss the best approach and ideas. Following that, that is to say the week after, and once everybody had agreed on one solution, the project was broken down into smaller tasks and domains to explore. Everyone started to dig for more detailed information on a specific area of the topic. The final week was dedicated to the writing of the final report along with the preparation for the final presentation in front of main actors of the project. Below is a Gantt chart illustrated the distribution of tasks as well as time management throughout the month.
(See full size chart in appendice)
ok
Major milestones for our project are:
Dates / DeliverablesSeptember 6th / Building of a complementary team (various skills: marketing, law, IT and management).
September 13th : / Definition of a creative idea
September 19th : / Submission of a first draft
September 26th : / Final presentation of our idea
5. MARKET STUDY
5.1. Emergency care
First of all, we focused on the medical emergency system and intend to synthesize its functioning, in order to be able to position ourselves best and detect areas where news services could be introduced. This approach requested a deep understanding of the profession and all its processes.
GOOD
SMUR services were identified as the main stakeholder in the first phase of emergency, as it is the first actor that administrates medical care to the patient. Taking one step further, the following treatment of patients in emergency departments once arrived at hospitals was studied. This phases included interviewing emergency care department staff members (one internal student and one nurse) and ask them about their daily activities, their needs, the qualities and weaknesses of the current processes.
Simultaneously, the study was oriented towards general state of the art hospitalization and we went digging for statistics on the efficiency of patient care current treatments.
5.2. Statistics on emergency healthcare
First of all, the chart below sums up the course of the patient in emergency services of hospitals. This is an extract from the book “Réduire les temps de passage aux urgences”:
GOOD
q Waiting time: patients wait for doctors, available equipment and some actions like the results of examinations and decision process leading to hospitalization take quite a long time.
q Difficulty to deal with the fluctuating flow of patients: as a result, staff members are overworked or have a too low workload, which brings additional costs.
q No control on neither upstream nor downstream flow: no communication between the different stakeholders, no common basics to build on.
q Emergency services works twenty-four seven but the efficiency is questionable :
- Interrupted tasks
- some staff are affected to several patients in a short lapse
- staff qualifications are under or over exploited, which means the right staff is often not assigned to tasks matching their competencies,
- no control is possible : its is impossible to know who does what, when and how ?
q Poor quality of service :
- 30% of patient’s files do not mention the name of the doctor who examined the patient;
- 10 % of files remained without diagnosis ;
- 1 patient file out of 3 do not follow any official healthcare procedure ;