Method and apparatus for facilitating evaluation of business opportunities for supplying goods and/or services to potential customers

US5627973A · kind A · utility

Assignee

• Moore Business Forms, Inc. · US

Inventors

• Hugh E. Armstrong · Wilmot, US
• Brad Bailey · Denton, US
• Gregory T. Lynch · Vernon Hills, US
• Judith A. McMahon · Libertyville, US
• Karen L. Schweinzger · Waukegan, US
• Suzanne M. Vaughan · Vernon Hills, US
• Gregory C. Schweinzger · Waukegan, US

Key dates

• Filing date: Mar 14, 1994
• Grant date: May 6, 1997
• Expiry date: Mar 14, 2014

Classification

• Technology area (CPC G): Physics
• CPC primary: G06Q30/0203
• WIPO field: IT methods for management
• WIPO sector: Electrical engineering

Abstract

A method and apparatus for evaluating business opportunities for supplying goods and services (such as business forms and services) to potential customers takes a quantative approach that allows a user to evaluate a potential customer's needs, and the user's ability to supply those needs, to see what the area of opportunity for the user to supply that need is. Calculations can also be made comparing the user's ability to fulfill the needs to some absolute standard, to also determine an area of emerging technology. A series of questions relating to the customer's level of sophistication for predefined business techniques in a number of different categories are inputted into a computer, as well as the responses, and weights and values are assigned to the question responses to indicate a level of sophistication for each possible response of each business technique for each separate category. The user's capability of supplying the potential customer's needs are also evaluated and this data is inputted into a second computer which calculates, taking into account the weights and values, for each separate category a potential customer's score, the user's score, and the area of opportunity…