Below are starting points and background info for the X-Culture projects.  This includes suggestions for how to approach the research, and direct links to resources where it is technologically possible for me to create those links. 

In addition, please use the resources on the guide's homepage,

Use the table of contents or navigation area at left to jump to a specific project.

This is an e-commerce B2B business.  Here are some of the problems you will have to deal with during your research:

• Learning about e-commerce technology platforms
• Learning about potential clients and their industries

➤ Use the techology reports in IDC and Gartner. 

Remember that you will need extra time to navigate and understand these sources! 

Sample market share reports: 

Possible strategies:

1. Decide on one or a few industries to target.  Read those IDC and Gartner reports to glean which industries still need help with ecommerce portal development. 
2. Also try to determine if there is a geographic region/country which would be a good prospect for Atwix. You may also want to use some country profiles resources for this. 
3. Use the directory databases to create lists of potential companies for Atwix to approach. 

➤ Use Passport, which has an entire module on travel (under Services).

To put this company and project into context, read about the UN's Sustainable Development Goals.  

Keywords to use and look for:  ecotourism, eco-tourism, green tourism, specialty tourism ...

Sample backgrounders:

This is a B2B business, manufacturing apparel for other companies.  This means that your research may have to follow several tracks:

1. Looking at end-consumers of the apparel produced: determing their geographic location, brand preferences, and more.
2. Looking at the apparel brands that have the potential to contract with Blu Eco.
3. Looking at competitor B2B apparel manufacturing companies.

• Use Passport and MarketLine reports (sample MarketLine reports linked below) about apparel retail to get a sense of countries/regions with sufficient consumer populations and discretionary income. Equally these will likely give you some brand names to propose as potential customers for Eco Blu.
• Use the directory databases to find the names of and information about competitor apparel manufacturing companies: try Gale Business Insights and the Nexis Uni Company Dossier "Create a List" search.  Search using NAICS industry codes!
• Relevant NAICS codes for men's and women's/girls/infants clothing manufacture:
  • 31522 - Men's clothing manufacture
  • 31524 - Women's, girls, and infants clothing manufacture

This is an apparel manufacturing company that sells primarily online, so an e-commerce company.  Given their location in Ukraine, distance may be a factor in where they can sell to.  This challenge is different from the Eco Blu challenge because it focuses more on the end-consumer.   

Use Passport and the country profile reports to determine likely countries for Garne to target. 

Sample country/industry reports from MarketLine:

This project could be huge! 

➤ Try a "divide and conquer" approach in order to narrow it down: 

• Choose one or two academic programs that EAFIT is strong in, and look for educational partners for those only. 
• Evaluate potential partner universities or colleges from one region only, e.g. North America, Europe, Asia, etc. 
• Look for universities with similar academic programs, and with a foreign language requirement. 

➤ Search in the Education databases, looking especially for trade journal articles, doing two separate searches:

1. "study abroad" or "foreign study" -- look for best practices, best of examples, and so on.
2. "joint degree" or "exchange program" or "double degree" or "dual enrolment" or "dual enrollment" or "dual degree" 

➤ Search for educational attainment information in the country profile resources: 

• Fitch Solutions Country Industry reports
• Passport (in the statistics results usually)
• The UNESCO Institute for Statistics data portal.
• The MarketLine Country profiles (PESTLE)

Directory websites:

Use the directory websites below to find the names/websites of universities/colleges.

Other sites and resources: