Market Mapping

Databases, analysis algorithms and Geographical Information Software (GIS) are used to develop detailed information about our client's market. This fact base enables scenario and other analysis routines (such as cluster analysis) that are jointly developed in customized software to explore and model different actions and reactions by the company, its competitors and its customers. This quantified analysis is often mapped using GIS to show different aspects of Supply and Demand and build the case for a variety of applications such as:

• Market entry and expansion strategies
• Marketing and Sales campaigns
• Proving the case to the customer and the customer's customer
• Company business planning
• Investor and board presentations
• Operational deployment and network architecture plans

Decision-Support Tools

The databases, analysis systems and results Stratsoft develops are always transferable to our clients as part of the project. Often they have lasting value well beyond the time period of the project and Stratsoft supports the continued independent use of these systems by the client. In some cases this requires the development of the system into a tool that is adapted for a variety of internal uses by the client, either as a stand-alone tool or in combination with client's own systems. Examples include:

• M&A analysis tools
• Network Design for telecommunications and other infrastructure providers
• Market analysis and opportunity representation for Partners and Investors
• Marketing Strategy and Sales tools
• Software and databases to support Call center Agents

Operational Software Tools

Stratsoft develops custom software that can be incorporated into the client's operational systems. Investor analysis systems, contact-center applications, optimized field service deployment, telemarketing campaign management, complex bid and quotation systems are all examples of cases where Stratsoft has been able to provide new capability for our client using specialist software tools.

Strategic Planning Workshops

Stratsoft has developed unique methods that use systems thinking, scenario planning and business ecosystem analysis to lead groups through the strategic planning process. Our workshops result in a strategy implementation plan that combines analysis with action planning. Our approach is based on award-winning thinking that has been taught at corporate business schools and applied with Fortune 500 corporations, pre-IPO firms and mid-sized companies. The workshops are modular and adjusted to the individual client circumstance. The results are subjected to successive levels of scrutiny and refinement according to the issues and needs of the situation. Modules include:

• Market research and insight
• Supply chain, competitors and adjacent company analysis
• Bargaining power and influence mapping
• Risk analysis and contingency planning
• Scenario and preferred outcomes analysis
• Strategic beachhead mapping
• Change campaign and stakeholder influence plans
• Change management and organizational re-structuring

Business Development Evaluation and Planning

Stratsoft brings systematic evaluation techniques that result in well justified business development plans. Data-driven analysis establishes a common understanding of the business conditions that govern the business development initiative. Data, assumptions, and forecasts are subjected to structured test & challenge by the Stratsoft team with a clear audit trail that allows our client to have confidence in the information and reasoning underlying its initiative. Work plans within this category include:

• Business Case Validation
• Business planning
• Economic analysis
• Investor business case development
• Board submissions

Alliance Development

We focus on developing a portfolio of partners at different points along the supply chain, and with adjacent companies that provide complementary products/services to the same customers as our client, and occasionally with competitors. This allows systematic consideration of the client company's bargaining power, ally motivation and intent, and most profitable areas of collaboration that then help structure the alliance proposition, often as part of an overall portfolio of alliances. We focus on:

• Partner identification and research
• Partnering purpose and partner motivation
• Staged partner development plans
• Partnership oversight and management

Technology Commercialization

Intellectual property, methods, concept proofs, and prototypes often require commercial evaluation for licensing, collaboration, protection and exploitation strategies. Stratsoft undertakes analysis, planning and evaluation of this type of intellectual asset so clients can realize realistic value for their investment. Services include:

• Patent portfolio mapping
• Value and value enhancement
• Licensing, sale and collaboration options
• Protection, policing, and prosecution strategies
• Direct and indirect competitive innovation

Senior Executive Marketing

Stratsoft specializes in building the strategic investment case that makes our client's products and services critical to the development of their customer's business. This is a powerful complement to traditional sales & marketing campaigns as it creates senior executive champions within the customer organization that can support and endorse serious evaluation of our client's products and services. The main activities within this service include:

• Characterizing our client's prospective customers
• Defining how our client's products and services contribute to fulfilling their customer's strategic and business goals
• Developing the business case that provides strategic and economic justification for using our client's products and services
• Presenting the opportunity for senior meetings with our client's customers
• Developing the senior marketing campaign

Investment Due Diligence

Stratsoft reduces investor risk by providing independent corroboration (or otherwise) of claims made in an investment business plan. Our analysis and market quantification systems often become an analysis asset for the investee company when investment is made. This service is applicable at start-up and expansion stages and has also been applied in syndicated investments and public offerings. Verificiation of claims, risk analysis, and substantiation of data and assumptions provides the Investor with fresh insight into the risks and rewards of the investment, often also providing new ways to monitor progress and measure success. Activities include:

• Business case validation - identification and independent validation of key assumptions and forecasts
• Risk Analysis - identification, classification of sources of major risk, risk tracking systems and risk mitigation options
• Competitor analysis - direct and indirect competitor research, direct and indirect competitive technology analysis
• Forecast Sensitivity Analysis - systematic examination of the range of forecast outcomes
• Valuation - costs to replicate investee company capability, market valuation metrics, value of intangible assets and accomplishments