Surveyor Instrument Business Plan

The Digital Geographer product is what makes Bottlieb Innovations a unique business.  The product contains the power to revolutionize all industries that require accurate land-based area measurement.  When properly marketed, the patented Digital Geographer has the potential to quickly transform Bottlieb Innovations into a very successful business.

No fair comparisons can be made between the functionality of Bottlieb’s Digital Geographer and the distance wheels offered by a range of other manufacturers.  The Digital Geographer transforms complex area measurements into a simple task.  What used to require several measurements, a large degree of estimation, and a lot of geometric calculations, now only requires the abilities to walk and push a button.

3.1 Product Description

As of December 2000, Bottlieb Innovations has a single Digital Geographer product, the DG-2000.  The professional grade product is constructed of high-quality plastic and metal components. 

An excerpt from the Web page:

Bottlieb Innovations, Inc. has created a new type of land survey equipment that will revolutionize the industry.   Our newest device, the Digital Geographer, DG-2000, has the look and feel of a traditional distance wheel – but with one amazing new feature. When wheeled around the perimeter of ANY area, the DG-2000 will calculate the area inside!

The DG-2000 eliminates all of the problems and inconveniences associated with current area estimation methods. Before the DG-2000, an estimator had to somehow break odd-shaped areas into simple geometric shapes (squares, triangles, circles, etc.) and add up the areas of those shapes. The result was usually both inaccurate and time-consuming.

The importance of accurate area measurement is well known by contractors. Better knowing the scope of a job can help to eliminate the costs associated with underestimating in a competitive market.

The DG-2000 is the perfect tool to help with that next driveway, patio, roof, or landscaping job. It can display results in square feet, square yards, or square meters at the touch of a button.   The DG-2000 can also be used as a traditional distance wheel, offering results in feet, yards, or meters.

3.2 Competitive Comparison

Since the Digital Geographer is a breakthrough product, it currently has no direct competition.

The Digital Geographer is expected to segment and take a portion of market share from companies that manufacture distance wheels.  Every major distance wheel manufacturer has excellent distribution and product support structures in place.

The following table gives a brief summary of the largest worldwide distance-wheel manufacturers:

* Estimated Sales reported annually, worldwide and in thousands of U.S. dollars.

3.3 Sales Literature

Online product ordering and sales capabilities will be added to the company website as soon as product is available.

3.4 Sourcing

Bottlieb Innovations, Inc. assembles its own products, using local vendors for materials and services.  The company owns molds for making plastic components such as the wheel and encoder box. 

Most other components, including the LCD display, printed-circuit board, microprocessor and other electronic components are available from multiple distributors and manufacturers.  Bottlieb Innovations currently has an excellent working relationship with Cartwright Plastics and American Distributors, key suppliers of parts for the Digital Geographer.  The current Digital Geographer product, the DG-2000, contains an electronic compass integrated circuit.  The electronic compass device is manufactured exclusively by Precise Notation, Inc.  Bottlieb Innovations is working to establish a relationship with Precise Notation.

3.5 Technology

Bottlieb Innovations has filed for a U.S. patent on “ground-contact area measurement devices.”  This patent is pending.

3.6 Future Products

Plans for the DG-3000 product are already underway. The DG-3000 will use two wheels and a differential-based system, instead of an electronic compass, for determining directional changes.

Bottlieb Innovations is also developing plans for personal computer software and Palm Pilot interfaces to the Digital Geographer products.  These products from Bottlieb Innovations will allow customers to transfer information stored in the Digital Geographer to common standardized systems with more powerful processing and graphical display capabilities.  The software algorithm used in the DG-2000 product is applicable to the DG-3000, as well as any future iterations of the product which may utilize a Global Positioning Satellite (GPS) system.