SEVEN DOMAINS FRAMEWORK AND

FOUNDATION OF FOUR BUSINESS IDEAS

The Seven Domain Framework
(Excerpt from The New Business Road Test: John Mullins)
In analyzing your business ideas you must be able to pass them through a test to determine if they truly
are valid opportunities. All of your ideas must have a demonstrated need, ready market, and ability to
provide a solid return on investment. Is the idea feasible in the marketplace? Is there demand? Can it be
done? Are you able to pull together the persons and resources to pull it off before the window of
opportunity closes? These questions must be considered and answered. Opportunity-focused
entrepreneurs start with the customer and the market in mind. They would prefer to serve attractive
rather than unattractive markets. They analyze the market to determine customer needs, barriers to
entry, market structure, market size, growth rate, market capacity, attainable market share, cost
structure, the core economics, time to breakeven, opportunity costs and exit strategy issues. This
framework offers a better toolkit for assessing and shaping market opportunities and provides the basis
for a customer driven feasibility study. It is based on seven domains viz. Market domain that addresses
macro level
1) Market attractiveness and micro level
2) Target segment benefits and
attractiveness; Industry domain that
addresses macro level
3) Industry attractiveness and micro level
4) Sustainable advantage; Team domain
comprising three sub- domains-
5) Mission, aspirations, propensity for
risk
6) Ability to execute on Critical Success Factors
7) Connectedness up, down and across value chain.