Access to Capital Electronic Network

We've all seen the hype: "We'll put your plan in front of thousands of investors!" "We'll write you an award-winning online business plan!" "Only $3,000 for tempat bikin jersey sepeda custom thousands of investors to learn about your company!"

I cringe every time I see one of these ads. Vultures are preying on honest business people who want to fund their businesses. Here are some ways to spot them:

1. "Only qualified investors see your business plan." Yeah, sure. And who "qualifies" them? Have a friend try to sign up as an investor (that part is usually free). How is she "qualified"? Is there a background check? Does she submit a financial statement? Odds are that she will be asked to do nothing more than sign a statement that she has a certain net worth. That's no "qualification" in my book. So who are these "investors"? Who knows. One could be your strongest competitor.

2. "You approve anyone who sees your business plan." Okay. So what are you going to do to qualify the potential investor? Are you going to run a background check? ask for ID? ask for tax returns? or just be so happy that anyone wants to see your business plan that you jump on the idea? (That's how these scams get away with charging thousands of dollars -- too many entrepreneurs are desperate for funding.)

3. "It's only $500 (or $300 or $100) to register." What does it matter if it's free? If it is diverting your time and energy and resources away from finding a viable investor, it's not worth it.

4. "Your idea is great, but we need to put it into our format. This will only cost $800." Don't walk -- run from these guys.

5. "Your idea is so great that we want to invest $2,000 in it." (That's after you spend $5,000 to put it into "their" system.) Do I really need to comment on this?

6. "Talk with a satisfied customer, or 2 or 3." Here's this entrepreneur who just got $2 million in funding, and he has nothing better to do than sell the web scam to you? Trust me, entrepreneurs who just get funded barely have time to eat, let alone talk.

7. "Look at all these written testimonials." This is harder to disprove because the testimonials look so real -- even the companies might be real. But unless the testimonials, and the companies, can be verified independently, I wouldn't trust them. And I'll lay odds that they cannot be verified independently.

There is one huge exception to this: ACE-Net (http://activecapital.org). This is more properly the Access to Capital Electronic Network run by venture capitalists, institutional investors and individual accredited investors. It was developed by the U.S. Small Business Administration's Office of Advocacy to encourage the creation of a national marketplace jersey sepeda bandung  for investors to find and invest in equity offers by small companies.

ACE-Net isn't for all companies. Those seeking under $1 million will probably find the paperwork daunting. Those seeking over $5 million won't qualify. There are special qualifications, and of course lots of forms to fill out -- but nothing like the forms required for a formal initial public offering.

But for those who do qualify, it's an amazing tool in raising financing. Spend some time with the website and the forms, and see if your local SBA office can put you in touch with another company that went through the process.

As with any investor tool, don't rely exclusively on ACE-Net. Use it in conjunction with your personally developed targeted funding search. This, combined with an exceptional business plan, doesn't guarantee success but it places your company head and shoulders above all the rest.


Andon is one of the three elements that make up the principle of Jidoka -

Jidoka
Jidoka is made up of three elements, these are: -
1.Andon
2.Full work system
3.Error proofing (pokayoke)
So exactly what does andon look like?

What an Andon System does:-
l.Andon allows timely corrective actions by alerting personnel when abnormal conditions occur.
2. Allows Shop floor Team Leaders to spend less time and effort monitoring the situation, and more time solving abnormalities.
3. Allows Operation teams to monitor equipment and personnel more effectively.
4. It can act as a 2 way communication device e.g. When indicator returns to green; this tells everybody it’s ‘back to normal’
What an Andon System doesn’t do:-
l. Solve Abnormalities
2. Prevent all defects from being passed forward
3. Replace good verbal communication between work groups
4. Remove the need for rectification or customer protection
Direct Benefits of Andon
Control the production
Operators have the ability to ‘stop call wait’
Defect reportability & correction, operators can report faults immediately and countermeasures can be implemented at source
Safety/ ergonomics, identifies safety and body stress concerns Even loading (balanced processes) will allow rebalance of process if over burden occurs
Workable design highlights problems with work density
Implementation Guidelines:
• Implement following Standard Operations – stability
• Team structure / ratio / roles and responsibility
• Identify work zones / stations
• Divide the process into manageable steps
• Determine what conditions must be measured
• Design the andon board
• Set the escalation procedure
• Determine the support structure
• Set the criteria for collating downtime data
• Determine confirmation points / regularity
•Set effective communication structure
•Visualise problem solving status
•Andon systems should be thought out and appropriate in design to be effective.
•Andon systems should be implemented when and only when an appropriate support system and escalation procedure is in place (Service Level Agreements, problem solving process etc.)
•Andon signals should be simple and easy to understand
•Avoid spending too much money on a ‘State of the art’ Andon System, prove the system out with a simple manual system to judge it’s worth