Uni project, your input is wanted!

FosterK · 29 Nov 2011 at 23:54

Myself and a group of colleagues at uni are working on a project, with an eye to setting up a business.

In essence, we're looking at renting out tablet PCs, loaded with media to make your journey a bit less boring. We're looking at having films, games and other such fun stuff on the tablets.

There's a lot more to it than that, but before we flesh it out, we could do with some data to look at - as such, if you could take two minutes to fill out a quick questionnaire for us, it'd be greatly appreciated!

dead link

(and before someone says, I realise asking this on a technology-based forum will skew the data a bit - we're taking that into account!)

Cheers!

FosterK · 30 Nov 2011 at 00:02

Literally just a concept at the moment mate - looking into feasibility at the mo. Cheers though!

FosterK · 30 Nov 2011 at 00:12

Zero Pope said:
Is this based solely on flights? I haven't been on a flight in years that didn't have inflight entertainment.

For now we're looking at the possibility of short and medium-haul flights, namely the budget airlines.

FosterK · 30 Nov 2011 at 01:41

Just wanted to say thanks to all those who have filled it out so far, as well as for all the responses in this thread. Useful information and ideas guys, and a lot of points I will be bringing up at the next meeting - age restrictions for example.

Had some VERY interesting responses to the questionnaire I have to say, most of which being useful points and information for us. That said, it would appear that there's one guy on OcUK who's education terminated at playschool, thinks provided in-flight entertainment could be better with oral sex (no arguments there), brings a ***** onboard for entertainment, isn't interested in rented tablets because they're islamic, and are wants to see scat on the inflight entertainment.

Needless to say, I doubt we'll consider that set of data.

Anyway, for those of you who would like to know a bit more, and without giving too much away, I'll give you the skinny on where we're at now.

We'd be looking to get bespoke tablets produced for us, including a folding case/stand that provides extra protection and battery life, among other things - we can have this done for a lot less than you'd think. Furthermore, bespoke software - we don't want users ******* the tablets up by messing with setting and such.

We've considered that we need to make everything as simple as possible for users, from a usage perspective, as well as the actual transaction and service provided.

The business model itself is aimed at budget airline passengers, the no-frills type.

We've already looked into media licensing, insurance and various other factors too.

As far as advances in technology and price drops come into the equation, we're cognisant of that and think we've got a method of factoring it into our business plan.

Where distribution, security, storage, and other finer details are concerned, I'm afraid I'm going to keep my gob shut. The concept we've come up with largely addresses those issues, and it's what sets our idea apart from similar tablet rental services that we've researched.

To those who still have their doubts, I'd like to hear them. Over the past week, members of our team have come up with some data and figures through research, other questionnaires and contact with various organisations, and frankly, the figures we've come up with seem too good to be true to me.

So yeah, I would like to know any points people might have to make. I'm not promising an answer, there's likely a lot we still have to consider as it is. I'd just like some good points that we may have missed to take to the next meeting we have.

Cheers again to all those who have responded/posted.

FosterK · 23 Apr 2012 at 13:37

UPDATE: Awesome news.

Holy thread revival batman!

Just wanted to say thankyou once again to all those that helped out in this survey. In the end, this constituted a piece of preliminary research for the project; we did a LOT more research over the course of the year, eventually coming together as a 27,000 word business plan. Needless to say, the entire concept has developed a hell of a lot since posting this thread, fleshed out and come together.

Through the course of developing the idea, we've been in touch with all sorts of market players and industry experts, had interest in the idea from easyJet, flyBe and BA. So obviously we've been pushing the idea.

This past weekend saw Startup Weekend take place in Newcastle. We were there and came out with a prize for the most innovative startup idea. (see http://newcastle.startupweekend.org). The prize is £10,000 worth of business mentoring, as well as fast track access to £10k startup capital, with a further £150k on offer if we get it off the ground. Just as a bit of background, a lot of big ideas have come out of startup weekends across the globe - Dropbox for example.

Met up today with our course lecturer, big grin spread across his face when we told him, and we've scheduled a meeting in which to break down the monolithic questionmark that now faces us in terms of starting this as a business; we'll have the full support of the uni, our own expertise and networks from these types of events, the mentoring on offer and startup capital support. Also expecting a lot of coverage from the uni, they love hearing success stories like this. Exciting times indeed!

So once again, a huge thankyou to everyone who got involved with this survey! And watch this space!

Edit: Any chance a mod could update the thread title with "Update: Awesome news!" at the end?