Sumer as a start-up

Finding investors depends on demonstrating a viable product. This requires developing Sumer as a start-up and creating a customer base.

An economist would describe Sumer as a business with

• an extraordinarily high cost-of-entry; developing Sumer software is prohibitively expensive, but the work is largely finished.
• an extremely low marginal cost; adding new clients is virtually free.

Sumer as a start-up will include overhead expenses for

• Azure data-cloud services,
• salaries for a small development staff—no programmers required—and
• other incidentals,

but these overheads are relatively low compared to most start-ups.

Investors need to see a product with a proven track record. The purpose of the start-up is not so much to create an immediately profitable business, but to demonstrate Sumer's potential to investors.

Our most important tasks as a start-up are to:

• Grow a client base to demonstrate Sumer's viability. The larger the client base and the faster it grows, the more attractive Sumer will appear.
• Develop a wide variety of templates to enable broad and rapid growth across many business fields.
• Draw attention to Sumer as a rising star.

Opportunity to create a product identity

Low marginal cost means that Sumer can offer our product to any groups or individuals regardless of their ability to pay. Sumer even has an option to provide services for free.

By original intent, Sumer was developed as a alternative technology to empower medium and small businesses, organizations, and individuals to thrive in a world in which they are increasingly overwhelmed by technology.

The most obvious candidates for Sumer as a start-up include organizations and small businesses with the least ability to pay, perhaps the highest need for management help, and probably the least efficient existing management systems, including:

• Non-profits,
• Charities,
• Nature conservancies and environmental groups,
• Community and neighborhood groups,
• PTA's,
• Sports, music, art, and dance clubs,
• Struggling small businesses,
• and many other volunteer organizations.

These organizations often draw media attention and support. Assistance to these organizations from Sumer could be a media story in its own right.

Building Sumer on this base could help establish a long-term business identity and ethic that can survive far beyond the start-up stage.

Source of funding

Kickstarter or other crowd-source websites would probably provide the best funding platform.

Sumer has an existing product with a compelling story, especially when coupled to Sumer's initial outreach to non-profits as a foundation for production identity.

Funding goals could be modest and linked to providing broader services to more clients.

Subscribers could receive free use of Sumer during the start-up phase.

Developing clients

Sumer stages of development for start-up include:

• Developing staff with fluency in Sumer's goals and techniques.
• Writing and initiating the Kickstarter campaign.
• Developing client candidate lists and designing an approach to potential clients.
• A check-list of questions might include:
• • What management tasks does the organization need?
    • Purchases
    • Sales
    • Inventory
    • Staff hours and schedules
    • Facility or equipment schedules
    • Project status
    • Cash flow
    • Bookkeeping and accounting
  • What management tools does the organization use now?
    • Point of sale
    • Excel or other spreadsheets
    • Quicken or other bookkeeping programs
    • Scheduling software
    • Cash flow software
    • Quicken or other bookkeeping program
    • Manual records
  • How satisfied are they with their current methods?
  • How much time is currently spent on tasks that could be streamlined with Sumer?
  • Are there things they would like to do that they are unable to do now?
• 
  
• Developing templates to meet clients' requirements, preferably in small steps.
• Installing the templates.
• Follow-up with clients to evaluate client satisfaction.
• Reporting progress back to Kickstarter.
• Reaching out to media for coverage.