Degradable Mobile Phones Proposal

Running head: DEGRADABLE MOBILE PHONES PROPOSAL 1
Business Plan Proposal
Name
Institution

DEGRADABLE MOBILE PHONES PROPOSAL 2
Introduction
Increasingly, e-waste products are considered to be disposal items which have a
catastrophic effect on the ecosystem. Statistics indicate that New Zealand individual waste
accounts for almost 19 kilograms of e-waste annually. Further, the environment ministry has
indicated that the rate will increase to 26.9kgs by the year 2030. Majority of e-waste products
end up contaminating the environment as a result of toxic materials (Blake, Farrelly & Hannon,
2019). New Zealand continues to struggle in the fight against e-waste with the increase in
number of mobile phones among other electronic gadgets.
For the country to address this solution completely, new approaches should be used to
address the issue. The most viable approach to this problem is the development of degradable
mobile phones because it considers environmental issues as well as encourage sustainability. For
this reason, this business proposal is based on the idea of developing degradable mobile phone
by considering all significant aspects related to human rights, sustainability and environmental
issue.
PESTEL analysis
The following PESTEL analysis aims to provide information regarding how the factors
influence New Zealand.
Political factors
New Zealand is a democratic country that is governed through a parliamentary system.
The country is also considered as a constitutional monarchy. Queen Elizabeth 11 is also the
queen of New Zealand and the head of state. The Governor of the country is a representative to
the queen appointed by the queen after recommendation from the Prime Minster. Various reports
indicate that New Zealand is among the developed countries in the world. According to Asia-
Power Index, the country has economic resources, military capabilities, resilience, cultural and
diplomatic relationship (Denison et al, 2018). The country is politically stable and peaceful based
on the current data. Corruption rate is quite low and there has been one terrorist attack that
occurred in March 2019. The political structure is capable of developing policies that will
support the degradable mobile phones.

DEGRADABLE MOBILE PHONES PROPOSAL 3
Economic factors
New Zealand is a developed country which will offer the business skilled labor. The
agricultural sector is the largest contributor to the national economy. Other economic activities
include forestry, tourism, fishing, mining, construction and food and beverage industry.
According to World Bank statistics, the GDP for 2018 stood at $205.9 billion. New Zealand
exported $39.8 billion worth of products across the world in 2018. Among the products exported
include dairy products, meat, wood, fish, drinks and machinery.
The country also receives imports from various countries such as Australia, China, Japan
and the United States of America (Chen & Davis-Ngatai, 2017). Among the products that New
Zealand imports include Sweetened milk, sheep meat, butter and wine among other popular
electronic gadgets. New Zealand supports free trade which is responsible for the growth in mixed
economy. The employment rate has been up and down over the years and tax remains to be a
challenging issue in the economy. There is various tax charged on employees based on the
income while corporate tax is a flat rate of 28% (Cruz & Alley, 2017).
Social factors
The total population of the country is estimated to be around 4.7 million people. The
main languages that are spoken in New Zealand include English and Maori. Christianity is the
main religion and there is no official religion in the country. The life expectancy for men is 80
years while women is 88 years.
New Zealand is a culturally diverse nation and majority of its population in the country
attest to the fact that they enjoy a society that comprises people from different races, religion and
cultures. New Zealand is considered as one of the best country to live. The satisfaction of living
in New Zealand is pegged on its performance with respect to employment, social support and
quality of atmosphere (Exeter et al, 2017). Internet penetration in New Zealand is high with more
than half a million people visiting websites on a monthly basis. However, there are other social
challenges that face the country. The country is looking to address issues related to income and
housing. Other challenges include crime, social welfare, youth issues and poverty.
Telecommunication factors

DEGRADABLE MOBILE PHONES PROPOSAL 4
New Zealand has a more diverse technology sector which is rapidly growing and requires
many people to the industry. There are numerous ICT jobs that can contribute in providing
sufficient labor to produce degradable mobile phones (Locke & Cave, 2018). The country has
experts in software engineering, project management, marketing and application programmers.
Majority of information technology companies have been acknowledged across the globe
for their innovation practices. The technology sector employs approximately 140,000 people
with a large number being women. The country is making efforts to ensure that ICT sector grows
to the second largest economic contributor. This approach requires both local and international
talents although the country is not considered as a hub for recruiting talents in the ICT.
Environmental factors
New Zealand is considered as one of the top holiday destination across the world. It has
numerous attractions such as glacial mountains, lakes, sandy beaches, bungee jumping and
biking among others. The climate of New Zealand supports agriculture as a result of consistent
rainfall and does not experience long drought seasons. However, there is concern regarding the
loss of habitat, decline of species, air pollution, deforestation and soil erosion.
Legal factors
New Zealand is one of the least corrupt nation and accepts foreign direct investment. It is
ranked the first in the world in terms of ease of doing business which will support the degradable
mobile phone business.
Critical and reflective thinking
The main challenge in this concept would have to mimic the human functionality in order
to be able to think about the development of degradable mobile phones. However, flexibility and
self-healing aspects have already been realized and the issue lies on how to tackle the problem of
biodegradability (Rosca, Arnold & Bendul, 2017). This will require developing electronic
devices that can degrade by weak acid. In this respect, semiconductor polymer can be used.
Besides, it will require a conducive plastic to develop a circuit as well as a degradable substrate
from which electronic components will be attached.