Now that my MiE journey is completed, I would like to take some time to reflect back on how much I've grown since the start of MiE.

During my internship experience back in Y3S1, I had come to this daunting realisation that maybe the world of biology was not for me. I found myself desperate to expand my skillset and experience beyond my major. That's when I stumbled upon the MiE email. I still remember contemplating joining the MiE programme. I was torn not only because it was something very far outside my comfort zone (as someone who's been hyperfocused on pursuing biology her whole life), but also because enrolling in MiE meant having to overload 15 AUs. Looking back, I'm very thankful I decided to face my fears and just sign up!

MiE was stressful, not going to lie. Having been thrown into this new world of business terminologies and accounting (omg too hard), I found myself often wondering if I had made the right choice. Through et9131 - et9134, I think it's safe to say that those arduous 4 weeks taught me to push myself to my limits (in churning out business plans and slide decks within a day) and improved my mental flexibility. After that initial burst, I found myself craving for that same adrenaline rush. After summer, I enrolled in bio-business modules in SBS hoping that they'll satisfy the craving (spoiler alert: they did not HAHAHA). I found myself excited for et9135 to begin.

This et9135 journey was long, tiring and often stressful. I recall at the start when school was laxer, all of us were eager to get started and were excited about the endless possibilities that could be Little Dipper's success. We were pushing out deliverables at an ungodly speed and I became very inspired by my teammates that I too started pushing for greater successes. However, I think we all very quickly realised that it was almost impossible to sustain the pace that we were going at as our other commitments began piling on. Soon, we found ourselves struggling to even push out content by the date that we said we would. It was in these times that I was extremely grateful for the open communication and consideration of the team members. We checked in on each other's workload, mental health, and feelings and provided support wherever possible. There was this period where I was experiencing burnout after pushing on for so long with just grit. I found myself questioning why I was pushing myself and began spiralling. In that instance, I was grateful to have friends (read: LD teammates) by my side who did not judge me and gave me the space and time to heal.

I'm very proud of how much we've grown as entrepreneurs, but more importantly, as friends.

Jiaqi, thank you for interjecting humour into our otherwise 'all-serious' work meetings. I'm very thankful to have met a fellow '99 boomer who never fails to make me laugh and forget all about my troubles. Even if the others call us old, please la, we're not that old, hehe 👀 I'm very sure of the success you will achieve in your future, I'm rooting for you 💪

Dan, the many times that you came all the way to my house to help deliver things... I don't think I could ever say it enough, but thank you. Without you springing into action for our QR code crisis I don't think we could have solved it as fast. All the best with your new business endeavours 🍀

Grace, your quiet determination and your nudges to focus us were very much appreciated. I remember thinking that I should learn from you; someone who's younger but so much more mature than I ever was. I'm grateful for having gotten many opportunities to see you manage work and play. Our 15 Jan shoot would have never been a success without your playful banter and hand modelling 💅 I honestly don't get why you keep adding on more commitments, but if anyone can do it, you can 😋

Last but definitely not the least. Kerrianne. Where do I even begin? You were there for me from the start. Checking in on my mental health, on my physical health (when I got COVID, urgh), being there to listen to me rant for hours on end. I'm so very thankful that this et9135 experience gave me both the youngest friend I have, and one of the best friends I have. Thank you for stepping up whenever I told you I needed a break away from LD, and thank you for always finding ways to implement ideas and thoughts that I might have otherwise disregarded after a day or two. You believed in me even when I didn't. While you often remind me that I'm old, I genuinely find no disconnect between us when we hang out or work together. You're easily the most hardworking person I know. With all that you have on your plate, I'm grateful that you found the time to entertain me, and somehow managed to squeeze your way into my heart (ew cheesy 🧀, HAHAHA). I really do hope that I am a person that you can rely on, the same way I rely on you ❤️

Of course, Little Dipper only made it this far with the help of the instructors who lent us both wisdom and guidance. I think advice from every instructor from et9131 - et9135, found a way to be manifested in Little Dipper. Thank you for believing in Little Dipper 🌌

Little Dipper to the moon!

~ Nandika 🥰

PS: Ofc honorary mention to batch 57 friends who made MiE fun! It was great catching up during our biz showcase, but still hopeful for a batch 57 outing hehe 🤞

To anyone who's read this far... WOW you damn committed sia! Either that or you're really kaypoh HAHAHA!!! Thanks for reading LD's blog and feel free to connect on ig @nandiiikaaaaa

[21 February 2022]

Last week, I had been approached by some juniors within my major who were interested in MiE and in my journey in LD. I was surprised as to how they recognised me, but after the initial awkwardness and shock, I managed to relay across my experience in MiE and LD. This got me thinking about LD's next steps beyond ET9135. We had a sit-down with the team where we openly discussed our plans for after the module ends, without judgement. Some shared that they wished to exit since they had no bandwidth to continue, etc. I'm incredibly grateful that we were all able to share without judgement and resentment. But, initially I was a bit worried since if the team dissolves, I feel like our efforts would have gone to waste since I believe that we have not achieved the success that I was hoping to achieve. I remembered the juniors who approached me, and asked the team if they were open to the idea of having interns. We all shared that having interns would help us ease processes and would be a good way to expand the team and expertise. I managed to talk to these juniors and we'll be having a get-to-know session on 22 Feb, before we decide to onboard them.

Moreover, last week, I had reached out to a dozen more micro-influencers and had favourable responses that required me to follow up. Ultimately, I had collaborated with micro-influencer, @lovelledebra and had assured her that we would deliver our Polaris box to her by the end of the week (last week). Since I had multiple interviews and internship responsibilities throughout the week, I had asked the team if anyone was able to deliver the boxes several times, but ultimately had to cancel some activities on my schedule so that I could deliver the box. This was disappointing since I had thought that we would all be excited to make the delivery so that the micro-influencer could faster push out content. However, I think being the week leading up to CA week, everyone got equally busy. I think, learning from the experience, our team could definitely put in place a delivery schedule since our current system is pretty inefficient :(( On the positive side though, thanks to that speedy delivery, the micro-influencer pushed out content (a post and some accompanying stories) within 2 days, and assured us of future posts that she'll put up too. The overall aesthetic of her post was very appealing, and I'm excited to see more sales come from this effort.

Unfortunately, I had tested positive for COVID on 20 Feb and have had the brunt of the symptoms draining my energy. Leading up to the 20th, I did feel more tired than usual, but I had simply written it off as me pushing myself with all the interviews, meetings and group assignments I had. Now, looking back, I realise I should have taken more care of myself. Especially as a paranoid Bio major, I was pretty ✨shook ✨ that I had managed to get COVID since I was taking every necessary precaution. Hopefully I will be able to push through my symptoms and still be present for the get-to-know session, and submit my CAs and assignments that are due this week 💪🏾

Having tested positive, I can testify that it ain't as fun as people make it seem on tiktok 🥲 Self-isolation sucks pretty bad ☹️

So pls everyone stay safe 😷

[Photos: Content that Debra had posted on her IG - reels & story]

[11 February 2022]

Over these two weeks, we managed to push out a whole lot of content. Firstly, we delivered our Polaris box to Jill (microinfluencer), and she had immediately shared some stories on her IG. This gave us two genuine sales of the Polaris box. We were ultimately very surprised since we had not been expecting genuine sales this early. Roderick & Adrian both pre-empted us that out of our initial 10 boxes that we produced, it would be surprising to even achieve 1 genuine sale. Therefore, seeing our order form after Jill had put out her IG story, I was pleasantly surprised and excited for what the future would hold.

We had also put out quite a number of targeted ads over these two weeks. We had run video and story ads concurrently to investigate which performs better for our target audience. Ultimately, we were going to choose the better performing platform to run more frequent ads. It was heartening to see our posts that we had boosted gain likes from non-followers, and even see parents following our IG page. I felt reassured that our product was something that these parents and individuals were at least interested in. Therefore, to me, the next step was to decide on ways to convert these interested individuals to customers. We would be working on how to get more customers in the next weeks.

Kudos to us :) Let's press on hehe

[Photos: Content that Jill had posted on her IG story]

[28 January 2022]

The past two weeks were pretty intense. To meet our launch date of 29th Jan, Kerr and I had to brush up on both the videos and the information booklet ASAP. This is so that we can send the booklets for printing, and still have sufficient time for me to pack the remaining items into the boxes and prep for sales. Within these past two weeks alone, Kerr and I had multiple zoom calls, and probably hundreds of tele conversations on how to improve the booklets and the videos. I also liaised with industry expert, Angela, who had suggestions on how to improve our 'parent talk' within our booklets. With Kerr having a full-time internship and being in charge of video editing and the booklet layout design, I was incredibly grateful that she stuck to our timeline of when to achieve what, and really pushed herself so that we could meet our deadlines. I tried to assist her in multiple ways throughout the process by having multiple rounds of editing on my end before I gave them to Kerr so she just had to copy and paste them into the placeholders of the booklet and the videos. Moreover, Kerr and I also worked on the DM message for the micro-influencers and sent them out. Some micro-influencers had replied enthusiastically asking for more details, which we provided. Most, however, after some back and forth messaging, had stopped expressing interest in a collaboration. We further worked to try to bump them to get a response. But we decided that with our pre-sales interest, we ultimately were not relying on the micro-influencers as much, and therefore its not essential that we had to secure the micro-influencers now, before our launch.

Probably due to the close 1+ month of extreme work and being available even when I really wasn't, I experienced some mental burnout early on this week. I informed Kerr that I would be detaching from Little Dipper's work for a week just to not be as high-strung and to chill out more. During this past week, I really appreciated Kerr for stepping up, as well as my other teammates, for accomplishing the tasks that they said they would. I believe that while the break was short, I definitely feel recharged and ready to push on with our sales. In retrospection, I feel that the reason why I was so burnt out was probably due to my passionate nature of wanting to plan for everything, which eventually meant that I started to make myself available for work even when I wasn't. I had pushed other commitments aside and let Little Dipper take precedence. However, after some re-evaluation, I realised that as a graduating student, I should be focusing on my job applications and interviews especially during this intensive hiring period. While I have decided to take a more chill approach with Little Dipper, I am still very excited for our upcoming milestones, and am looking forward to our sales and success as a group. I am still very much invested in seeing Little Dipper through to success!

As we prep for sales, since I previously had all the boxes and materials at my house, I had finished up the packing of the boxes and delivered half of the boxes to Kerr. This is to improve accessibility to all team members and faciliate the delivery process of our boxes. Moreover, we will be beginning our social media marketing at the end of this week. I'm looking forward to the consult with Roderick so that we can get some timely insights on our marketing plan right as we start our targeted ads and sales :)

[Photos of some DMs from micro-influencers & behind-the-scenes of the video and booklet editing with Kerr]

[15 January 2022]

Over the past 2 weeks, we had gotten many things done as a team, including the marketing plan & budget, finalising the selling price of the boxes, drafting the information booklets and most importantly, the product and video shoot :)) yay team HAHA

The journey to get here was not easy though. Especially since we had a lot of trouble finding a willing parent and baby duo for the video and product shoot. Since a lot of our plans moving forward in the timeline relied heavily on the product shoot, naturally I felt very anxious and stuck when our shoot kept delaying. I knew I had to get something done ASAP so that we do not have any further delays in our timeline. So I had asked the team to exhaust all options (parent & baby duos) around them, in their immediate family and friend circles, and even beyond. Truth be told, this process was very nerve-wracking. As I reached out to close to 30+ contacts, none of whom replied favourably. I began to grow more anxious as I felt heavily responsible for the team and our progress. Luckily, a contact of mine replied enthusiastically about the shoot, which really rescued our timeline and our plans moving forward. I quickly put together the team for the shoot, gathered the resources and solidified our game plan for the shoot day. Sadly, due to the pandemic, only 3 of us could go for the shoot. Nonetheless, it was heart-warming to see the rest of the team rally together to prepare the materials that we needed for the shoot and help in the finalising of the details. One such example is when Dan collected our logo stickers, bought and had DIY-ed some materials that we would need for the shoot and had come all the way to my house to drop them off. Similarly, Jia Qi too helped out together with the 'Shoot team' on finalising the shots that we would need to get.

Though the shoot was very tiring due to the early morning and long duration, I am very happy that the 'Shoot team' pulled through and managed to get all the shots that we needed. Throughout the shoot, I noticed that Kerrianne, Grace and I often worked even without needing to communicate our intentions and ideas. We were able to pick up on cues from each other and worked synergistically to get the job done ASAP. For instance, since Kerrianne was the one who was handling the camera, both Grace and I worked to prepare the materials for the next shot, monitor the shots and capture the attention of the baby (to look at the camera). I am very thankful that we work well as a team, and are able to pick up on what needs to be done and just do it, rather than wait around for instructions :))

Further, on speaking to the industry experts and some of my friends who are experienced in designing, I managed to gather feedback on both the information and the design of the information booklet that Kerr and I had done up last December. With the feedback, Kerr and I are working towards improving our information booklets before we send them for printing the next week. Since we have also settled on the marketing budget and our marketing plan, as a team, we are working on scheduling and ironing out the details of our posts. For instance, Grace and I collaborated for the first post that was to act as a soft launch of Little Dipper. Grace and I went through multiple iterations of the caption to finally decide on one. Then, we shared our decision with the team to gather their consensus. Through experiences like this, I become incredibly grateful for having friends (read 'teammates' hehehe) who support each other's functions and do not calculate the nitty gritties of who does what.

[Photos to commemorate our teamwork on the day of the shoot :))]

[1 January 2022]

Since the ordering of our materials to go within the boxes, most of the products arrived with the exception of the stacking cups. As such, the whole team got together at my place on 27th Dec to repackage the materials and bring together our playboxes. In doing so, there were several challenges that we faced, but we managed to overcome them. One such challenge was the insufficient amount of kinetic sand. However, after the many iterations of calculations that we had done, the team managed to find a solution to our kinetic sand problem. Mainly that 9 of the 10 boxes packed would be of standard quality, while the remaining box would be used as a trial box, and be used for the product and video shoots, etc. This allows us to not only preserve the 9 quality boxes but also circumvents the issue of potentially having the lacking box being given to a customer.

During our meet-up, aside from settling the boxes [which took slightly north of 5h - including dinner :))], we settled our logo design. It was raised by the team that our existing logo, while was in-line with the constellation and night sky theme, seemed incongruent with materials for babies given the darker colours. Therefore, Kerrianne was tasked with sprucing up our logo to match the nature of our business. During the meeting on the 27th, Kerrianne showed us her drafts and the whole team naturally gravitated to one logo that we decided to use. The very next day, Kerrianne had requested the printing of our logo stickers which would be ready for collection by 3rd or 4th Jan.

Following this, Kerrianne and I started drafting the information guide that would be placed within each of our playboxes. Kerrianne focused on the layout and design of the info guide, while I focused on the prose that we would include in the guides. Together, Kerrianne and I went through several layout changes that arose after the prose was added to the draft. After we settled on a version that we were both happy with, we sent them to the rest of the team for their opinions. The team were optimistic and pleased with the guide, which was very encouraging :))

To further refine the info guide, I had sent the final draft of the guide to our industry expert, Ms Angela, for her input. This is because Ms Angela has extensive knowledge of the phrasing of technical terms and 'parent language'. We are currently awaiting her response before we go ahead with the printing of the guides.

Also, from the 27th meeting, Jia Qi was tasked with liaising with her cousin to settle dates for our product and video shoot since we would be filming with her cousin's baby. We are quite excited about the product and video shoot so that we can start with the creation of our marketing materials. Meanwhile, Grace would be coming up with an in-depth marketing plan so that we do not face any delays after the video and product shoot.

Overall, these past two weeks were quite demanding in that we all had to take on several responsibilities, but seeing how the team managed to do well, I am very encouraged that our team can handle any further challenges that come our way hehe :))

Some photos to commemorate our team-bonding :))

[18 December 2021]

In the past two weeks, there were several adjustments that we had made to the initial concept of our playboxes; brought about by conversations with our Roderick, Adrians and our industry experts.

After the consultation with Roderick and Adrian, the team had decided it was most practical to focus all our effort on launching a single box first and had decided to go ahead with our 1-2 year box, simply because parents would be less 'sticky' and 'fussy' in terms of what they give their children to play with, making it easier for us to garner customers.

Also, in talking to ShuQi, the concept of thematic boxes (each inspired by a book) was born. She had advised us to select DIY activities or even create DIY activities based on a book, with the sole purpose of encouraging parent-child bonding, and allowing parents to visualise creative ways to use the products within the boxes (beyond the obvious). Next, Shai had further deconstructed our thematic box for 1-2 years and had advised against a single box for the age range of 1-2, but to rather have a series of boxes for this age range. We had noted and accepted her concerns, but collectively agreed that doing so now would demand even more resources like time and money, which we might not be able to afford right now. As such, we still stuck to focus all our efforts into launching a single thematic box, but had planned for the next 2 boxes; with product links, prices, etc, for easy access to launch in the future. Also, Shai had circled back to how our current envisioned thematic boxes would be incredibly useful to preschools and had advised us to consider a secondary market of preschools, in the future.

Based on these two meetings with our industry experts, we had finalised our item list within our first thematic box: The Hungry Caterpillar and began working towards ordering the materials, etc.

Our next meeting with Belinda, another industry expert, had left us feeling more assured in our products within the boxes, and our linked activities that we devised to encourage more creative play and bonding between parents and their infants. She also gave us potential expansion avenues in parent education which we have decided to KIV but may revisit in the future. Lastly, Belinda, having been involved in her own entrepreneurship venture, in the past, advice us to keep really good records of our money, and reserve emergency funds for our business. On hearing her give this advice, I was touched that our industry experts, not only are looking for accuracies in our content and material but are also caring towards us, as a team :)

Following these meetings, we placed orders on Shopee for our products, just in time for the 12/12 sales, and began gathering resources to build our playboxes (i.e. the packaging boxes, tissue papers, repackaging containers, etc). Further, we also started discussing storyboarding for the filming of our instructional videos for parents, which will be included via QR code in our information guides, and sourcing for 'models' - parents & babies, who would be willing to partake in the filming process.

With all the products that we had ordered streaming in, I feel more excited that our venture is more concrete now, and is not just a concept that is in the air. However, I recognise that this is the beginning of our challenging time (i.e. marketing to get customers, and convince them to buy, etc), but I am confident that our team can handle the challenge :)

[03 December 2021]

In the last two weeks of school, we found it harder to meet both physically or virtually, given the number of assignments and final examinations that we were preparing for. Therefore, after Finals ended, we had set a date to recce 4 toy warehouses who were potential suppliers for materials within our playboxes. These 4 warehouses were: Toy Tag, Tai Sing, Sintat Toys & T for Toys. The various warehouses had toys for 0-2 years (our target group) but in varying diversities. For example, Sintat Toys did not have much variety for toys for 0-2 years, but had a lot of DIY material which could be useful if we follow Ms Shai's recommendation of doing a DIY preschool activity box. Therefore, for the recce, we noted down as many things as possible, and even went to ask the managers or owners questions on MOQ, lag time, delivery details, etc. Of all the warehouses, I particularly liked Toy Tag and T for Toys. Toy Tag appeared to stock toys that were of excellent quality and seemed the most like what I had envisioned to be within our boxes. However, with such quality came a hefty price that we collectively agreed was too much for us to pay, especially when we are starting out. T for Toys, on the other hand, had a massive collection of toys for 0-2 years which was a refreshing change from the limited varieties that we had seen in the other warehouses. Furthermore, I had given the T for Toys owner a call to ask questions about MOQ, etc. and felt very reassured in his ability to guarantee both quality and lower prices. Also, the huge variety of toys within the T for Toys warehouse inspired us to consider other types of toys that we had not considered initially.

After the recce, we compiled an Excel spreadsheet comparing similar toys across the warehouses to rank our choice of warehouses. In our ranking, the price was the major determinant, followed by the overall aesthetic and prolonged use of the toy. Since we had already picked out the toys that we were going to have within each box, we began exploring alternatives online (on Shopee, AliBaba, etc). Moreover, to end off our recce day, we had projected and planned a revised timeline of activities that we had to complete over Winter Break.

Side note: During the recce, when we were working together as a team and visiting the various warehouses, I realised how amazing our teamwork skills were, and how respectful we were of each other. I'm so thankful that we gel together very nicely as a team :)

Some photos to celebrate, hehe :))

[21 November 2021]

We were able to have a quick chat with Ms Shaireen, our second KOL in the education sector. I was incredibly grateful to have had the opportunity to discuss with her the milestones, toys and activities to do for children. Unlike Ms Anthony who helped us scope our milestones and work on 'parent language', Ms Shaireen immediately zero-ed in on the activities that parents can do to engage their infants and how Little Dipper can value-add. During the call, there were several key points that she brought up that warranted us to sit down as a group and iron out further details.

First, she iterated that since our target market is first-time parents of age group - the late twenties to thirties even, our marketing of Little Dipper should be hyper-focused on social media. She even suggested that we do away with our information booklet, and rather provide our customers with videos on how to play with the instruments within the boxes. Next, she also commented that we need not purchase toys necessarily since play for infants is all around. She recommended that we look into DIY play kits using things that can be easily found at home so as to make the playboxes more affordable and thereby more accessible to the mass market. Ms Shaireen even suggested that if go ahead with the DIY play boxes with household items, we may be possibly opening up a secondary market; directly to early childhood educators and centres. Another point that she had raised that resonated with what Ms Anthony had said, was that while we are able to provide the tools for parents to engage with their children, it is the quality of the engagement that makes a bigger difference in the developmental journey of children. Therefore, she prompted us to devise ways to relay across to parents that their engagement with their children is ultimately what should be achieved through the playboxes.

Following the call with Ms Shaireen, having had several points to ponder over as a group, we planned another meeting post-finals to decide how best to address Ms Shaireen's points that she had raised. Further, we had decided to also go ahead with the toy warehouse recce that we were planning after finals. This is because despite what Ms Shaireen had raised about the DIY tools using household items, we still feel that these toy warehouses may offer some value in either better price-gauging, or with innovative play toys.

I am incredibly grateful to have had the chat with Ms Shaireen since she was able to value-add in ways that our team was previously not focused on. Personally, while I understand her concern that our playboxes may be too expensive for most parents, I believe that we should not ultimately go to a 100% DIY playbox using household items. I feel that this defeats the sole mission of Little Dipper, in that we wanted to bring parents credibility, convenience and ease of mind in terms of their children's early developmental process with quality instruments. However, since I believe that the DIY process has its benefits - namely can allow parents to appreciate that play is all around them, I am considering a mix of quality toys and DIY toys. This is something that we would have to discuss as a group post-finals.

[7 November 2021]

Over these two weeks, we had focused on securing KOLs, pushing out a market survey to better understand our target market, and on less urgent needs like web design and product sourcing.

Using connections, I am very pleased that we were able to tease out 3 KOLs that are willing to lend their expertise to Little Dipper. We are in the process of speaking to these KOLs, as a team, to better learn from them what needs to be done better, and what sort of products we should include within our boxes. Although this process took longer than anticipated, I believe that our team has learnt valuable lessons from this experience; for example, how best to approach KOLs, how to succinctly convey our ideas across so as to assess their interest, etc.

Within the duration of one meeting, we had crafted a survey that aims to gather the opinions and thoughts of both current parents as well as potential parents. The crafting of the questions in the survey was cumbersome as we had to set the questions such that there were no possible misinterpretations and such that we could minimise any potential irrelevant answers. Since Kerrianne had relevant experience in crafting survey questions from her coursework, she was a great asset in helping to mitigate against weak or biased questions. After crafting our survey, we had sent it out within our circles of friends and family. After 1.5 weeks of the survey being open, we have yet to hit our target response rate. Thus, we are now exploring disseminating the survey through Facebook parent support groups and Telegram parent support groups. To do so, we are currently in the midst of opening a Facebook business account so as to increase our credibility in pushing out the survey to parent support groups on Facebook.

Another milestone that we have embarked on as a group these past two weeks was speaking to potential website designers to gather their insights on creating a Little Dipper website. After some back and forth, and some internal consensus, we have decided to do away with the website for now, and rather leverage on Shopify to get started. This decision came after realising that Shopify would actually make the order processing and payment process very seamless and easy for both the customers and Little Dipper. We have decided to incorporate a stand-alone website after Little Dipper has grown quite substantially. Although the Shopify option does require our team to design the interface ourselves, I am highly confident in the team's ability to pick up the skills and deliver a favourable result. Moreover, since the Shopify platform seems relatively easy to play around with, I am very sure we can pull it off.

Lastly, we have also begun exploring sources to get products that go within our boxes. While our initial concept was to clear the items within the boxes first with our KOLs, we have realised that with the current time crunch that we were facing, and the uncertainty surrounding the KOL front, we had to go ahead with the sourcing for items that would certainly be within our boxes. This was mainly just to reduce any time constraints that we would otherwise face in the upcoming months. In our sourcing efforts, we explored websites such as TaoBao and Alibaba. While the products listed here were of minimal cost, it required more out of the team; in terms of ensuring baby-friendly materials and safety standards, etc. In a bid to free up the team's time to be more meaningful work such as web design, marketing, etc, I suggested to the team that we could explore partnering with local toy wholesalers. I strongly believe that despite the slightly higher prices, using local toy wholesalers would ensure our products' quality and would minimise the amount of inventory that Little Dipper needs to have. I was pleased that the team saw some merit in the suggestion. We quickly worked to compile a list of local wholesalers that we are planning to recce after finals season so as to gather information about their toy quality, MOQ, etc.

[23 October 2021]

Since Roderick's feedback on the Business Plan presentation day, we have met twice.

The first meeting was centred around the LLP registration and discussing possible markets to enter. In the process of LLP registration, we hit several walls. We were intending to pay the LLP registration fees via a business account but were struggling to determine which bank's business account to choose. Moreover, there were a lot of documents that were required to open such a business account; documents that we simply did not have. When we asked Roderick for advice, he suggested that we start with a financial platform rather than a bank account. We had taken his advice and started to look into financial platforms and narrowed it down to two options - Aspire & WISE, both of which are capable of multi-currency transactions (perfect for Little Dipper who would be transacting across borders). As for the potential markets to enter, we decided to reconvene another day after doing substantial research on some regional markets so as to have a better basis of understanding, before discussing which market to enter. In the meantime, the KOL email draft that I had prepared was collectively vetted by the team such that we could begin sending out our KOL emails. Grace and Kerrianne then went on to send those emails out to 13 identified KOLs the next day. I am incredibly grateful to have such an efficient team.

In preparation for our second meeting of the week, I had realised that most of the KOLs had not replied to our emails. This was very worrying as we needed to secure our KOLs ASAP for us to finalise the playbox content and then move on to sourcing for these instruments. As such, I decided to start exploring connections within my circle. I started reaching out to Psych profs who I have met through coursework, and friends of friends who are involved in the industry. Through this, I have managed to get some interest in Little Dipper that can be refined. Furthermore, this week, I have realised that with an increasing number of assignments and coursework deadlines approaching, all members of the team find it hard to devote as much time as they would like to, to Little Dipper. As such, it becomes quintessential for us to explore how to best be productive with the least amount of time (more focused discussions, etc.)

While we did anticipate a challenging journey ahead, we hoped these challenges would appear later on. As the CEO, I try to motivate the team to not be discouraged and to explore alternatives that can be more easily exploited. As a team, I am confident in our ability to work together and iron out any issues that need to be addressed. While we are an honest bunch, I am also thankful that the team is respectful of one another and can provide productive criticism with collective growth in mind.

Jiayouz frens :))))

[16 October 2021]

Today marks the first milestone down for ET9135; the business plan presentation.

The past three weeks were hectic. During the idea generation phase, many ideas were shot down by Roderick due to lacking feasibility. As a team, we held several meetings each week, to try to come up with as many ideas as possible. During this idea generation phase, I pitched the playbox idea to the team, however, we decided to KIV it due to the lacking credibility the team had.

During the second session with Roderick and the class, I had pitched the idea to Roderick, and the Little Dipper playbox idea was most positively received by Roderick. With that mark of approval, the team was reassured of the doability of the playbox idea and delved straight into researching market feasibility. As a team, we recognised several potential pitfalls and devised strategies to overcome them during this phase. However, after the initial research phase, the common consensus was that Little Dipper is highly viable and has immense potential if done correctly. This spurred the team to invest more time and effort into our business plan.

After today's business plan presentation, Roderick gave us several vital critiques that the team has taken into consideration. We are performing individual research before meeting next week to discuss changes to Little Dipper's operations to incorporate Roderick's feedback.

I am looking forward to beginning LLP registration and Little Dipper's operations together with my team :)