Identifying Opportunities in Economic & Regulatory Trends

Regulatory Changes

1. Bright Future Scholarship have set requirements higher.

• Source of Information:https://www.abcactionnews.com/news/state/new-florida-laws-that-go-into-effect-july-1-2019
• I believe that there is an opportunity in “the “Academic” scholarship, covering tuition and fees entirely at state colleges and universities, will require a student’s SAT to be near 1330 instead of 1290. The “Medallion,” which covers 75 percent of the costs, would move to about 1200 from 1170.” This is going to very much raises the standards and makes it harder for more students to get these scholarships. Students will have to study more and teachers might have to update their curriculum.
• This is a great opportunity for tutors and study guide manufacturers.
• I feel as though this opportunity will be very easy to exploit. Even if it's just another student charging extra to tutor those about to take the SATs. Speaking from experience, most students (who plan on attending college) will do whatever it takes to do well on the SATs. And more than this, most parents will do anything to make sure their children do well on the SATs.
• Having personally bought several practice SAT books, and having a younger brother that is currently studying for the SATs, I know that there is money to be made by exploiting this opportunity. When I read that they were changing the Bright Futures Requirements, my first thought was ‘thank God I already graduated’ because I know how much harder I would have had to study to get the scholarship that I needed.

2. Virginia raises the legal age to buy Tobacco

• Source of Information:https://www.cnn.com/2019/07/01/us/new-state-laws-july-2019-trnd/index.html
• An opportunity does exist with Virginia and Illinois raising the legal age to buy tobacco from 18 to 21. This excludes the military. However, I think that health organizations, such as The Foundation for a Smoke-free America, that promote non-smoking have room to benefit from this by promoting  things to make people not want to smoke.
• The customers that are most related to this opportunity are non-smoking or anti smoking companies and foundations.
• As long as the company knows how they can make a profit from people not smoking tobacco, I feel as though this opportunity could be pretty easy for companies to exploit. According to the CDC “nearly 9 out of 10 cigarette smokers first try cigarette smoking by age 18, and 98% first try smoking by age 26 (1).” This being said increasing the legal age to obtain tobacco should relatively decrease this statistic, the company simply has to know how to make a profit off of this.
• I do not have as personal of a connection to this topic as I do the rest. However, I saw this as an opportunity because I know a lot of people my age who smoke and I know that if they did not have access to tobacco until we were older, then there would be a lot less.

Economic Trends

3. Texting and Driving in Florida.

• Source of Information: https://www.abcactionnews.com/news/state/new-florida-laws-that-go-into-effect-july-1-2019
• There is an opportunity in this economic trend as car dealerships continue making new cars with new advanced technology that allow you to receive and respond to not only to incoming calls but also text messages. I feel as though this will soon also spark phone/electronic companies such as Apple and Google to do something about this opportunity as well. I believe that this law is very important, because texting and driving is reckless, however, if people want to read ‘just one more’ message, there is nothing that's going to stop them from trying, and there are going to be different companies trying to exploit this and get around the law.
• The most likely customer for this opportunity would most likely be car manufacturers and/or electronic companies.
• Exploiting this opportunity, myself would be very difficult. However, car companies such as Honda, who uses the HandsFreeLink, could take advantage of this opportunity by simply innovating their current product to either incorporate more or to simple function more efficiently.
• As a new car owner, and fellow Floridian, I see how useful my HandsFreeLink app is in my car. I know that it is hard to resist the urge of seeing what made your phone go off while you're behind the wheel, and therefore believe that a safe solution could potentially be found.

4. Banning the Use of Single-Use Styrofoams in New York.

• Source of Information: https://www.cnn.com/2019/07/01/us/new-state-laws-july-2019-trnd/index.html
• There is DEFINITELY an opportunity in New York setting fines to back up these bans. With increasing the amount of the fine for each offense, there is a whole market that is now going to be sought after even more so in this economy. Places will be looking for styrofoam substitutes.”The ban will be enforced through health and other inspections.” Obviously most places will look for other products that are cheap, long lasting, and temperature-keeping. However, with the right market I am sure that this law change could also promote places to go greener and use an even more environmentally friendly product.
• The customer that I think is likely to take advantage of this opportunity companies that produce kitchen utensils and appliances, such as KitchenAid.
• I feel as though it might be a little more difficult to exploit this opportunity for many kitchen appliance companies. Or companies coming out with the best new environmentally friendly replacement. I say this just because most of the restaurants or businesses that were using styrofoam are probably going to be looking for the next cheapest option. So the difficulty here will be properly pricing and marketing your product.
• I do not live in New York, however, I do work at Planet Smoothie, and we recently got rid of all o our styrofoam cups and switched to the one-use plastic cups. The thing is though, when people ask me why we switched and I tell them about the environmental benefits of switching, most people care more about their drinks staying cold longer than about the fact that you can't recycle styrofoam. So I see the opportunity.

Citations:
(1) https://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/youth_data/tobacco_use/index.htm