Congratulations to Bamidele Ogunjumelo, a Computer Science MEnt student, whose company ‘Niche Mobile Creations’ took third prize in the recent Venture Further Awards; the University’s business creation competition.
The reward was in recognition of the strength of Niche Mobile’s business plan.
Bamidele, originally from Nigeria, studied an undergraduate degree in Electrical and Electronic Engineering at UMIST. Following graduation in 2001 Bamidele worked for a number of years for ARM limited in both Cambridge and Sheffield before returning to the University to study for a Masters of Enterprise (MEnt) degree. The programme is taught jointly by the School of Computer Science and the Manchester Science and Enterprise Centre.
"When deciding on which postgraduate programme to study I was looking at the possibility of studying an MBA programme in the States. However the MEnt programme at the University of Manchester offered a mix of the kind of topics covered by an MBA programme, but also the technical component and support I knew I’d need to progress my business; Niche Mobile Creations.
The strength of the MSEC programme is that it is highly practical, taking you through the real word steps needed to take any business to market. Following initial ideas evaluation we were taken through how to develop our business model and implement all aspects of our business plan, from marketing to financials.
The programme is supported by Industry and I found talks given by IBM and Transitive Ltd really helped put into context what we were learning on the programme, as well as provide useful networking opportunities. The idea for Niche Mobile Creations was born out of one of these networking opportunities. On meeting a former MEnt student who specialised in language teaching, we came up with the idea for LingoMobo.
LingoMobo is a mobile learning language application that helps users to quickly acquire a second language by taking them through a number of educational games. The product, designed on the Symbian platform using C++, is free to download and use.
The product has been developed in partnership with two other companies. The novel language learning methodologies were developed by Creative Languages Ltd, and the Bluetooth distributions and targeted advertisement management are handled by Proximity Media Ltd.
A partnership with proximity media, who are facilitating the delivery of the product via blue tooth, has enables us to deliver real time advertisments, craeting the primary revenue stream for Niche Mobile. The long term goal is to have the product available to customers in travel agents, airports, hotels and a host of other outlets".