Testing the Hypothesis, Part 1

2) Clearly state the opportunity you have identified, including the who, what, why. For instance, "Hospitals in the United States are unable to easily, efficiently bill Medicare for drugs they distribute because of the logistical challenges in linking a drug given to a patient and the patient's bill." 

• The who: Hospitals in the United States
• The what: They are unable to easily, efficiently bill Medicare for drugs they distribute to patients
• The why: Logistical challenges related to listing prescribed drugs on patients' bills

3) This is your 'hypothesis' about the opportunity. It is a statement of your belief related to an opportunity. I'd like you to test the boundaries of the hypothesis by pushing and prodding each of the three elements. That means:

• Testing the who: Are there others who have this need? Or, does everyone in your current 'who' share the need? 
• Testing the what: What are the boundaries of the need? For the example above, the questions you'd ask could include, "Are all drugs a challenge, or just some drugs?" "Are all patients a challenge, or just some patients?" "Is it just Medicare, or does it include Medicaid or private insurers?" Etc.
• Testing the why: Not everyone will perceive their need the same way; here, I'd like you to test the boundaries of the 'why' -- for the people who have the need you have identified, what are the range of whys that they offer? Does the "why" you have identified hold for everyone? For the example above, maybe some hospitals will see their need rooted in logistics, maybe they'll blame government bureaucracy, maybe they'll blame the nurses and doctors. 

4) In Part 1, you must interview five people. These interviews must be lengthy enough for you to get the information you need. In these interviews, you want to ask questions that try to capture the variation in the whos, whats, and whys, and your objective is to test the boundaries of your opportunity hypothesis. 

5) Include your write-up of each step in your assignment. For step 4, please summarize what you find. Given your interviews, what do you know about the opportunity that you didn't know before? 

The chip in debit and credit cards tends to stop working before the card expires. 

• The who: people with debit and credit cards with chips
• The what: stop working before they expire
• The why: the technology of this style of card is not entirely perfected yet

Testing

• Testing the who: not all cards stop working before they expire but a good percentage of them do
• Testing the what: certain banks do not seem to stop working more frequently than others 
• Testing the why: the why could expand further than the technology of the cards themselves, it could have to do with how often the person uses the card as well as where they store the card in between uses. 

Interviewing 

Adult female in college, age 20

• Do you have a debit or credit card with a chip? If so, how many?
• Yes, I do. I think that I have five of them. 
• Out of all of your cards with chips is there one that you use most often?
• Yes, I tend to use the one connected to my main checking account most, but I also use my credit card for certain types of purchases. 
• Do you have any cards where the chip has stopped working? If so, how long before the card expires did it stop working and do you plan to replace the card? 
• Yes, my most frequently used card, the chip no longer works so its a bit of a hassle to use it now. I think that my card expires in October of this year and the chip stopped working in January but I do not plan to replace the card since it is close to expiring anyways. 
• Do you use Apple pay or Samsung pay?
• Yes, I have an iPhone so I tend to use Apple pay if I remember to or if the store has the ability to accept Apple pay. 

Adult male, age 25

• Do you have a debit or credit card with a chip? If so, how many?
• Yes, I think I have 3 cards with chips. 
• Out of all of your cards with chips is there one that you use most often?
• I use my debit card the most, sometimes my Venmo card. 
• Do you have any cards where the chip has stopped working? If so, how long before the card expires did it stop working and do you plan to replace the card?
• My debit card has a broken chip. I think it stopped working like a year or so before it is supposed to expire, which is pretty annoying. I don't want to pay the fee to replace my card so I'm just waiting until they send me the new one when this one expires. 
• Do you use Apple pay or Samsung pay?
• Sometimes, but not really, I always forget that I have Apple pay set up on my phone.