Study goals
Analyze how Brazilian start-ups in the educational sector innovate in creating, proposing and capturing value in their business models.
Relevance / originality
The expansion of the offer of vacancies in private HEIs led to intensified competition between these institutions, which resulted in a constant pressure for greater operational efficiency and an increase in the quality of services. This scenario created a space for expanding the offer of educational technology solutions, which several new companies that have formed in Brazil in recent years have been trying to occupy (Ferreira, Rosado, Lemgruber, & Carvalho, 2019). As far as we know, this is the first Brazilian work to analyze the innovation of the business models of start-ups in the Brazilian educational sector.
Methodology / approach
For this investigation, we conducted a multiple case study covering 6 start-ups from the educational sector. Our field surveys included interviews with principals, observations and documents as sources of data. For this investigation, we conducted a multiple case study covering 6 start-ups in the educational sector. Our field surveys included interviews with directors, observations and documents as sources of data. The interviews were conducted in person, via Skype or, in some cases, by email. We used a questionnaire developed based on the IMN scale proposed by Clauss (2017) to support semi-structured interviews.
Main results
We analyzed 10 sub-topics of the Clauss Model (2017). Here are some extracts from our results:
a) Training of employees and new competences: The accelerated pace of competition observed in the higher education market opened up new opportunities for companies in the technology area, but created a constant need for updating. Training of employees and the development of new skills has become imperative. For the founder of start-up D, linked to the technology area for the educational segment, “people are always the biggest asset of all companies, but in startups (like ours), people are more than“ the biggest asset ”, people are "everything". The founder adds, revealing the difficulty of retaining talents, especially in the area of technology. One way to circumvent this "are challenges and the possibility of professional and personal growth, seeking to allow employees conditions to be challenged and show their value".
B) New processes: “Lean Startup. We fail fast, cheap and learn fast ”(founder of start-up B). The idea behind this concept is to create rapid prototypes, based on the needs brought by the market and use customer feedback to develop them much more quickly than by traditional methodologies. This is the way that start-ups use to reconcile the speed of the market with the scarcity of their resources.
Theoretical / methodological contributions
We realize that in the creation of value, the development of skills takes place in an informal and unstructured way. In the value proposition, there is a lot of creativity by start-ups in the offer, but little attention in their channels and in customer relationships. In capturing value, there is too much focus on the search for revenue, but inattention on cost control and pricing structure.
Social / management contributions
We emphasize that the lack of resources and the dynamism of the market drive, as start-ups to collaborate and co-create or value each other within the innovation ecosystem. To develop skills, technical resources and new partnerships, such as start-ups practiced collaborative actions, such as sharing information in WhatsApp groups, sharing applications and sharing events together.