Mark Candela's Blog

Mark Candela 14A Halfway Reflection 1. Tenaciousness is a Competency: The course and the numerous assignments and activities assigned are going to be very challenging for the next couple months or so of taking the course. Regardless of this, with hard work and dedication and most importantly TENACITY you can overcome it all and achieve success. Personally I have been able to succeed by establishing an organized time to finished all the assigned work effectively. I believe the habits built in this course can benefit me n the future for years to come. 2. Tenaciousness is also about Attitude: There was also many times that I simply did not want to do the work. I felt that I was tired and wanted to give up but I was able to push through and overcome the adversity. My commitment to the course and ensuring my success was a very driving factor that I knew would not fail me. I believe that the course only helped me establish and evolve my tenacious attitude. I understand that when I am ...

Mark Candela 13A Reading Reflection #1 I chose to read the book "Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future" by Ashlee Vance. For the majority of my life I have always been very interesting in the advancement and development of technology in the modern world as well as the future of SpaceX. The first thing that really surprised me was the fact that he moved away from his family by himself when he was younger as Elon Musk was a very talented student. His family resided in South Africa but he moved away to Canada and then later the United States by his lonesome. What I most admired on reading Elon Musk's biography was his ability to dramatically shift the American and worldwide future of space technology and travel. He was able to create the most efficient way to send satellites and launch experiments into the earth orbit and beyond. These advancements could have major implications on space exploration in the future. Something that the author spoke ab...

Mark Candela 12A Figuring out Buyer Behavior #1 I think the age segment of my product is pretty obviously anyone who has a drivers license in their respective country. In the United States, that would be 16 years old, typically with 1 full years experience driving restricted or with an adult next to you. Anyone can use the product even those younger than 16. For example even children can download the application and use it to assist their parents while they are being driven. For my interview process I interviewed 3 different individuals and attempted to create some diversity among them. One was a freshman undergraduate student at UF from South America who lived on campus. I asked her when she would usually use her scooter the most and how often she was impacted by difficult parking to which she responded it affected her every single day. She claims that parking for her scooter on her way to class is always very difficult to find as people do not park well and make it difficult for...

Mark Candela 11A Idea Napkin #1 1. You: My name is Mark Candela and I am an undergraduate senior at the University of Florida. I believe that my product could be very successful in todays day and age. Having attended a community college before transferring to the university, I have seen the difficulties of finding parking spots in numerous areas around the country. Growing up as the son of an entrepreneur, I have seen firsthand the hard work and dedication it takes to be successful in the field. I am a very social creature and through my interviews and throughout common conversations, I know that many individuals both young and old would love the product as well. 2. What are you offering to customers: Essentially, I am offering a product that is an application typically found on smartphones. This application would notify drivers of both scooters and cars of newly available parking spots for one's vehicle. An individual would only have to log in and the app using location ser...

Mark Candela 10A Elevator Pitch #1

Mark Candela 9A Testing the Hypothesis, Part 2 Interview 1 (Andy): My first interview for this blog was on my friend and fellow UF undergraduate student Andy. I knew that Andy had a scooter and had class on campus and he worked out regularly so there was no excuse for him not to park on campus and have the same difficulties finding scooter parking as countless other students and friends of mine. I asked Andy if he had purchased a more lucrative parking decal that would allow him to have reserved parking spots but he said that was not the case. The way that he figured out how to beat the disastrous parking mission that is finding scooter parking at UF, was through training his body and mind to be an early bird. I asked what he meant and he elaborated that the majority of students prefer class between 10am and 11am typically, and knowing this Andy purposely schedules his courses earlier than those, usually around 8:30am or 9am to beat the rush hour later and have a usually chill morn...

Mark Candela Solving the Problem In the earlier exercises a problem that I reported was the lack of scooter and car parking and how some sort of device or application should be developed to relieve us of this difficulty. I believe a solution to this would be an app that when accessed, gives you an update of how the parking situation is in a given region is. This could save many drivers time as they don't have to franticly look for a parking spot while they could be in a hurry. It could lead to reckless driving and unnecessary accidents. I believe this product could also help college students across the country who drives scooters and have difficulties finding space for theirs as well. It could tell you the most open and available parking areas close to you. I believe the app could be a success. Students and drivers alike must be committed to the success of the app and updates regularly but i believe this is an overcome able obstacle.

Mark Candela You Have an Opportunity, Now What? Students and individuals across the country have very difficult times finding parking in heavily populated regions and zones in the United States because of the mass number of people driving vehicles and the limited number of spots and ways of getting available spots to pursuing drivers. The Who: Drivers, of both cars and scooters, across the United States. The What: They are unable to easily and efficiently find open spots to park and are late to events or forced to park illegally as a result. The Why: Not enough parking spots for both cars and scooters and a lack of a function of communication to get notifications for when potential parking spots are available.  Testing the Who: I believe the vast majority of the people I have listed, both car and scooter drivers, would appreciate the product for a potential opportunity. Yet college students around the country who drive scooters would be the perfect prototypical customer ...

Mark Candela 6A - Identifying Opportunities in Economic & Regulatory Trends Regulatory Opportunity 1: I believe a regulatory opportunity is Uber. I found the Uber app through social media and the app store. I believe this recent product brings a dynamic to todays culture that was severely lacking in decades of the past, and social media and smart phones have been a major component in its success. I believe this works as an opportunity because a major source of usage for the Uber app is late at night following a night out. Often times individuals have been drinking and Uber provides a wonderful, safe and legal alternative to driving home over the legal alcohol limit. I believe there are multiple "prototypical" customers for this product as many individuals my age use it, and as the older generation gets more accustomed to using smart phones they will take advantage of it as well. On top of this, Uber now provides a service that drivers will pickup packages and food and...