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Where do business ideas come from?

Find out where to look for ideas
Young student looking annoyed whilst working at a desk with notebooks
© pxfuel
This is the starting point for all businesses. Simply put, businesses exist to solve problems profitably. Other types of organisations, such as charities and not-for-profits, also exist to solve problems – although profitability is not usually the main driver here.

Yes, they have to generate income to sustain the organisation, but making ‘as much money as possible’ is less important for charities and not-for-profits. They want to help as many people as they can in relation to the specific issue they were established to tackle.

Over to you

  • What problems have you encountered in the last month?
  • Whether at university, work, or when socialising?
  • What have other people in your life complained about – your partner, family and friends, for example?

Usually, complaints, moans and challenges can be a good place to discover problems worth solving. Although, a very important point to make clear: not all problems make good businesses! However, we’ll explore this further as we work through this course.

© University of York
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Enterprise: Everybody’s Business

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