Business Plan Requirements: 1. Technology and innovation in value proposition or competitive advantage 2.

Must be medium-level in either business innovation or technology innovation (defined in the innovation matrix) 3. Can be for an operating enterprise established no more than one year before submission of entries. 4. Must be a mentored plan. The entry should fall within any of these industry categories: IT/Telecom Agriculture and Aquaculture Life and Biosciences Energy Environment

PESO Semi-Final Submission: Full Business Plan Business Plan Sections and Format The following is the recommended format for the PESO semi-final submission of the full business plan. Acknowledging that different business ideas may require different areas of emphasis, teams are free to add, delete, or modify sections as they deem appropriate for their particular business concept. Please use your best discretion. A sample business plan following this format can be viewed online at: http://entrepreneurship.mit.edu/15975/VirtualInk_Complete.pdf Other useful references from the PESO Participants Enrichment Series can be downloaded from http://web.mit.edu/peso/pes1.htm and http://web.mit.edu/peso/pes2.htm, including: Business Plan Basics (PES 1) HBS How to Write Great Business Plans (PES 1) "A sensible approach to writing a good business plan," Chapter 2 of PWC's Technology Entrepreneur's Guidebook (PES 1) Entrepreneurial Finance (PES 2) Business Plan Sections Note: The guide questions that appear below are not meant to be exhaustive. Feel free to expand your discussion as you feel is necessary for your particular business concept. Executive Summary Guide questions: What is the product/opportunity? What is the market size? What is its competitive advantage? What are the startup costs? What is the payoff? Management team

1. THE COMPANY & THE PRODUCT 1.1 OVERVIEW 1.2 BUSINESS MODEL Guide questions: How will your business make money? 1.3 THE PRODUCT Guide questions: What is your product? How does it work? 1.4 PRODUCT VALUE Guide questions: What is your value proposition? What problem does it solve, what unmet need does it fill, or what opportunity does it take advantage of? 1.5 MARKET ENTRY AND GROWTH STRATEGY Guide questions: How do you plan to sell your product? How do you intend to grow your sales? 2. MARKET RESEARCH AND ANALYSIS 2.1 MARKET DEFINITION Guide questions: Who are your potential customers? 2.2 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY Guide questions: What are your sources of data? How did you analyze your data? 2.3 MARKET SIZE Guide questions: What is the size of your target market? Be sure to translate it in terms of $/year in sales. How quickly would you be able to penetrate the market? How much of your market will your product capture over time? 2.4 MARKETING STRATEGY Guide questions: How are you going to penetrate the market and drive adoption of your product? 2.5 COMPETITOR PROFILE Guide questions: Who are your competitors? How do their products compare with yours? 2.6 COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGES Guide questions: What is your competitive advantage? (i.e. Why would customers choose you over your competitors?) How will you sustain your competitive advantage? How will you defend against new entrants? 2.7 MARKETING PLAN Guide questions: How will you reach your customers and make them aware of your product? How will you promote your product? How will you price your product?

How will you deliver your product to your customers? 3. FINANCIAL STATEMENTS Guide questions: What is your projection of your financial performance? What are the assumptions behind your projection? Provide a summary of your financial statements in this section and the complete ones in your Appendices (see below) 4. DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT PLANS 4.1 DEVELOPMENT STATUS AND TASKS Guide questions: What is the current status of your product development? What are the next steps in development? 4.2 CURRENT DESIGN GOALS Guide questions: What are your current design goals? 4.3 DIFFICULTIES AND RISKS Guide questions: What are your design issues and challenges? Feel free to use additional sections below to expand this discussion on each critical component of your design. 4.4 [Optional discussion of specific component of design] 4.5 [Optional discussion of specific component of design] 4.6 [Optional discussion of specific component of design] 4.7 [Optional discussion of specific component of design] 4.8 PRODUCT IMPROVEMENT AND NEW PRODUCTS Guide questions: How do you plan to enhance your product going forward? 4.9 PROPRIETARY ISSUES Guide questions: What standards will you use? If any, what are the IP issues? 5. MANUFACTURING AND OPERATIONS PLAN 5.1 DEVELOPMENT STATUS: ALPHA PROTOTYPE Guide questions: What is the development status of your prototype? Describe your prototype product in terms of components, materials, manufacturing processes, and costs 5.2 STRATEGY AND PLANS: PRODUCTION MODEL Guide questions: Describe your production model (a true representative of the actual product that gets in the customer's hands) in terms of components, materials, manufacturing processes, and costs Who would your suppliers be? What are the production lead times? 6. MANAGEMENT TEAM Team summary Team members, credentials and roles they will play in your startup company

APPENDICES Provide your complete financial statements here, including: o Assumptions and Summary o Pro-Forma Income Statements o Balance Sheet and Statement of Changes of Cash Flow o Sales & Projected Revenue Model o Operating Expenses Submission Format To be submitted electronically (e-mail). File name: PESO[your teamname here].doc Hard copies also needed for judges; number of copies to be specified later. MS Word 2000 or higher (.DOC) File size < 800 kb Page size: "Letter" Margins: 1" all around Font: Times New Roman size 12 Maximum 20 pages (excluding Appendices containing financial statements, all other tables and charts must be embedded in the body of the plan) First page of business plan must contain: TITLE OF COMPANY/TEAM NAME (all caps, bold) Name of Product/Service (bold) Names of Team Members (normal) (mandatory member designations are identified: student; tech member; management/business member)