1. Background document:
Trans-national scale project and spin-off
company
based upon the results of
Local Development Cooperation Actions
Enabled by Semantic Technology
Maria.GERONYMAKI@ec.europa.euFP6-2004-IST-4-26919]
The proposal concerns two major action plans capitalising upon the results of the FP6-2004-
IST-4-26919 - Local Development Cooperation Actions Enabled by Semantic Technology - Specific
Targeted Research Project Information Society Technologies:
The industrialisation of LD-CAST technology and consolidation of adhering Private and Public
Institutions both as service provuiders and as service distruibutors i.e. through a 2009 - C.I.P. or other
adequate EU programme available during 2009 - funding needed < 2.500.000,00 €.
The start-up of a spin-off company to exploit and manage the Business model proposed to the EU
Commission in the conclusive phases of the 6th FP in July 2008 - funding needed > 2.500.000,00 € to
be possibly financed via EIF venture capital.
The LD-CAST agency main value proposition would be the offering of day-to-day services enhancing
and catalyzing cross-border business ventures. These services are mostly supporting businesses in

2. completing bureaucratic procedures quickly and accurately (i.e. obtaining documents certifying the
financial, legal and technical-quality skills).
The predominant VALUE offered in the LD-CAST scenario is:
saving of time and money (i.e. a service taking now days to perform, may be performed by LD-CAST
within minutes)
trustworthiness of services.
What is more, LD-CAST will offer one stop access to a wide variety of services coming also from a
large network of service providers and different countries. Thus, an entrepreneur may concentrate on
business critical issues rather than spending time on lengthy bureaucratic procedures.
Startup service offering (funding from EU C.I.P 09 or other similar program)
In the startup phase (2,5mio € funding i.e. from C.I.P.) where service suppliers are increased jointly
with distribution channels and the technology refined, the first release of the LD-CAST system will
allow the execution of a set of services (the so called “startup service offering”) chosen among a larger
offer responding directly to the common requirements of EU mSMEs.
During the requirement analysis phase, the supply specialty sub-contract has been chosen among the
ones considered more suitable for the needs of LD-CAST as the most used, the most widespread and
flexible contract form in EU business environment.
Although the supply specialty sub-contract does not exhaustively cover all possible business
relationships and services used by European enterprises (as for example those related to e-
Procurement), it provides a typical scenario for Business Episodes in the LD-CAST scope, including a
heterogeneous set of services to be provided as part of a complete process or as stand alone offering.
Apart from satisfying specific market needs, these services have also been selected due to their extreme
flexibility that allows for the future implementation of further well-connected business episodes. For
example, the domain of international trading partnership for a company residing in Italy comprises all
those contractual relationships in which a sourcing need is satisfied cross-nationally in a value chain
finalised in the finished or semi-finished products.
The initial offering must be turned into concrete products/services that represent this giant step
forward; a disruption from the way the same services are today accessed or offered. At the current
stage, the market’s trends have underlined the increasing transnational trade exchanges, the increasing
need for transnational trust networks and the increasing need for fast and cheap access to business
services. To respond to these market needs, the LD-CAST value proposition has been focused on the
following services:
Trustworthy Partner search
Company legal verification
Company fiscal verification
Technical and quality standard verification
Company/Branch registration abroad

3. General Business environment information
Fiscal information
Legal information
Technical and quality standard information
Social security information
Logistic information
Market evaluation
It should be noted that the aforementioned set of offered services constitutes the superset of the
offering; some of these services will not be available in all countries as their implementation is
prohibited due to different regulatory frameworks.
The LD-CAST main value proposition is the offering of day-to-day services enhancing and catalyzing
cross-border business ventures. These services are mostly supporting businesses in completing
bureaucratic procedures quickly and accurately (i.e. obtaining documents certifying the financial, legal
and technical-quality skills).
The predominant VALUE offered in the LD-CAST scenario is:
saving of time and money (i.e. a service taking now days to perform, may be performed by LD-CAST
within minutes)
trustworthiness of services.
What is more, LD-CAST will offer one stop access to a wide variety of services coming also from a
large network of service providers and different countries. Thus, an entrepreneur may concentrate on
business critical issues rather than spending time on lengthy bureaucratic procedures.
Future service offering (Post start-up; funding from E.I.F. or other public-private risk
capital)
The Chambers of Commerce participating in LD-CAST shall be able to implement more services in the
future thanks to the state of the art LD-CAST platform. The nature and number of these services will
depend on LD-CAST development during the expansion phase at startup. The new institutions private
and pubblic joinging the group shall carry an endowment of their own services and distributive
capacity. Possible future service implementations may include either some of the initial services that
were not originally implemented in some countries or completely new services, such as the following:
Business Start-up assistance.
Training.
Information on funds, financing and incentives.
New Business services integration for future proofing.
Multilinguism services

4. The LD-CAST Business model has been adapted on Osterwalder model, which synthesises the
different conceptualizations into a single reference model based on the similarities of a large range of
models.
From the financial point of view, the revenue model has been taken into account by looking at
differences between cost structures due for example to the maturity level of technologies supporting
services and to the effectiveness and efficiency of existing processes.
In the next picture the four pillars and the nine building blocks of the BMO are depicted together with a
set of numbers representing the order with which data have been collected and analysed during the LD-
CAST project.
For exploiting innovative technology in order to extract value, the appropriate business model needs to
be defined. The LD-CAST Business Model addresses the following four main areas:
Value Proposition: what are the products and which is the value that LD-CAST proposes to offer to
the market;
Customer Interface: who LD-CAST’s target customers are, how it plans to deliver them products and
services, and how it intends to build a strong relationship with them;
Infrastructure management: how will LD-CAST carry out infrastructural and logical issues
effectively, with whom and what kind of network enterprise/bodies will it perform business;
Financial aspects: what is the revenue model, the cost structure and the business model’s
sustainability.

5. Business Model Architecture
Target Customer segment
The customer relationship constitutes the pillar of this business model. Thus, a conceptual approach to
customer relationship is needed to understand the essence and the relation between the LD-CAST value
proposition, the target customer segments and the distribution channels. Furthermore, the conceptual
approach will allow the determination of customer segmentation. Effective customer segmentation will
enable the LD-CAST consortium allocate investment resources to target customers that will be most
attracted by its value proposition.
In overall, the following target customer segments for LD-CAST have been identified:
Individual businesses (no matter if already exporting or first time exporter);
Business consultants;
Private business service providers;
Chambers of commerce & professional associations;
Online business information Portals/Vortals;
Investors and companies interested to make joint ventures;
Public Institutions (looking for suppliers);
Public business service providers;
Local/National development agencies (and in general governmental bodies like Foreign Trade Centres, Euro Info Centres,
and the Chambers of Commerce abroad);
Other NGOs;
Others.
Distribution Channel
The distribution channel is the connection between the LD-CAST value proposition and its target
customers, and could be also the future promotion channels. The nature of distribution channels
depends on the nature of value proposition and target customers, and the proliferation of a stream of
new channels allows new distribution hypotheses. This magnitude of change demands a strategic
perspective that views channel decision as choices from a continually changing array of alternatives for
achieving market converge and competitive advantages [RD-09].
LD-CAST project will utilise the following distribution and promotion channels for reaching target
customers:
Web sites and portals:

6. The web sites that will be utilized for LD-CAST distribution and promotion will be the LD-CAST
system website, LD-CAST partners’ websites and especially CCs websites, the online services
syndication and other Professional Association Websites throughout Europe. In addition, a special web
page will be added on all the partners websites. For instance, ICI’s web site will be allocated to LD-
CAST in the Romanian language; this is considered an important initiative as this web site is visited by
potential service providers that can benefit from ICI's training and assistance in LD-CAST use (same
strategy is to be adopted by other partner as LSCC, BCCI, Retecamere and technology partners
involved in supplying services to public (or even private) SPs.
Several other distribution channels will be activated according to ROI analysis to be conducted in the
startup phase:
The first most obvious concerns the aforementioned direct Selling channel through the LD-CAST.org
system;
CCs which have a widespread geographical distribution are also an important channel to vehiculate
offline information regarding the ‘LD-CAST FACILITY’, ease of use, low cost offering and other.
This is important, as mentioned in the business plan for incentivating the adoption by local agencies
(starting with CCs but not limited to them in so far as a number of local development agencies exist in
the 4 countries involved);
Agents, who typically use or may even sell direct on behalf of LD-CAST as for the case of accountants
and several other business consultant segments;
Though the syndicated offering of services contemplated in the business plan several third parties
online distributors (also identifiable as wholesaler) will help increase sales volumes.
The main aim of the LD-CAST distribution strategy is to move the service as close as possible to the
service buyer’s decision making point. This is why both direct and indirect channels may be used and
distribution will take place at the desk of a local CC as well as through direct (or indirect in case of
third party portals and vosrtals exposing its services) access to the platform. Considering also the
opportunity after startup year to sell print or electronic directories of aggregates of statistical data
issuied from ld-cast platform usage as contemplated in the business plan, print books distribution may
be necessary.
Partner Network
In the context of business services (supplied through LD-CAST by CCs partners), Institutions and other
Actors (as for instance National Service Providers) hold a very high rank as direct providers of most
part of Legal and Fiscal verification services in Bulgaria, Poland and Romania.
Establishing business alliances with National Courts and other National Institutions is therefore
essential to enable on-line operation, and to deliver a cheap and quick offer to customers.
Lobbying and networking require however differentiated strategies by member CCs, to be devised
through a thought-out and thorough analysis of potential partners. The analysis results lead to set up a
detailed development plan based on very well-motivated benefits coming from joining the LD-CAST
project, to be presented potential partners and agreed upon.

7. The plan here proposed takes into account two different categories of partners: Local CCs (as potential
Service Providers and Local Agencies) and other Institutions or National SPs.
In the medium-long period, the involvement of Chambers of Commerce and other actors, such as
Public Institutions and Governmental bodies (i.e. local councils, local health authority etc.) as Service
Provider aimed at providing new o improved services can be divided in three phases:
Development Plan
The development plan to be released to other SPs presents the description of strategies to attract them (such as large
customer segment, brand name, technology LD-CAST offers or EU Market analysis). The actions may also include a
Business Plan describing in details benefits (as technologic excellence in LD-CAST etc.), potential revenues, limited
risks etc. The plan will be presented during meeting and events to be scheduled;
Agreement
The agreement phase involves the arrangement of an informal involvement based on opportunity share for all partners.
In the last stages of the project informal arrangement might also be formalized as official commitment;
Service provision
The service provision phase defines the list of actions required to start supplying services through LD-CAST, and the
resources (material, immaterial and human) needed for the newly joined partner CC.
TAB. 20 - TOTAL COSTS AND REVENUE