Sparky +
The Next Generation College Mobile Solution
Ruoyang Zhang ENG 302 Class Project
All rights reserved 08/06/2014
I called my mobile application
“The Next Generation Mobile
Solution”, but first, the
question is why students
needs an mobile application?
Why College Students Need A Mobile
Application for Daily Life?
 They need to use social networking websites to stay connect
with the world everyday
 They need a phone to be reached by other people
 They need get school course updates, check their emails
 They need to search internet for what the answers, anytime,
anywhere
College Students True Needs
 Access all their course contents anytime, anywhere
 Stay connect with their friends, real time update of what is
happening within the campus
 Know the fun things to do around campus
 Cheap consumer goods with fast delivery speed
 User friendly website/tool to buy and sell staffs
 Vacation/Event planning website with low price
Current Websites College Students Using
 Social Networking Websites
 Facebook: World’s largest social networking website
 Twitter: popular micro blogd
 Groupon: discounted gift certificated website
 Amazon: Textbook/consumer goods online delivery company
 Study website: StudyBlue, Quizlet (popular study material/flash cards share
website among college students)
 Buy/Sell staffs: Craigslist (World’s largest online catalog and free listing website
 BlackBoard (Arizona State University official courses/online courses website
solution provider)
Mobile Application Market Potential
 New Generation Mobile Company
 Facebook: IPO in May 18th 2012 with $192 billion current market
value
 Twitter: IPO in November 2013 with $26 billion current market
value
 Current education online/software solution leader
 Blackboard: their online course system been used by more than
160 national universities with current estimated market value of
$8 billion
ASU’s current mobile solution
 MyASU Mobile Application developed by Arizona State
University Department of Technology
Why MyASU Mobile Application is not
good enough?
 It did not meet students’ needs
 Basically students can do nothing in the application
 No social networking function built in
 No event list students interested
 To access course contents, needs download another application
 It was developed under HTML format
 Means the application itself running on web browser
 Without internet connection, the application can do nothing
 It did not optimized for smartphone
Current Customer Review of myASU
App in Apple’s App Store
About Sparky +
 The idea of Sparky + is to build a better version of MyASU
 Sparky+ has all the built-in functions to satisfy students
needs with in one application
 Sparky+ can help you discover what’s inside and outside
ASU’s campus
 Sparky+ can also help you make friends, find parties, and stay
up to date of your classes at the same time
Why Sparky+ is better?
 Sparky+ is designed to
be smart and
intelligent, with
minimum of info to
input, it can automatic
get everything from
myASU’s website, like
course assignment
due dates, instructor’s
contact info and
classmates name.
How to define a smart mobile application
 Sparky+ is also designed to help students know each other
within the campus, even outside the campus. Just choose you
hobbies, joined student organizations, it will automatically
match you with the people you may know, or you may
interested
 By knowing your interests and courses taken, Sparky+ will
also give you related contact info based on Arizona State
University alumni database, to extend your social networking
 Sparky+ will also allow you to post pictures about staffs you
want to sell, matches with you the students needs them
Function Introductions
Social Networking
Social Networking:
Allow students share photos, videos
and text and sync instantly to all the
social networking websites
connected to this account at the
same time.
Function Introductions
Courses
Push Notification
Once logged in to myASU account,
Sparky+ will automatically download
all the course deadlines and due
dates, as well as or the event dates
based on students’ interests, remind
student in the right time and
automatically organize students’
time.
Function Introductions
Event Finder
To enrich students after class life,
Sparky+ will sync the campus area and
input all the activities within school
during the semester and update daily.
Based on students interests, show
events they may interested in the app.
This function optimized for
smartphone and can directly message
and invite friends.
Function Introductions
Find Connections
Once you logged into Sparky+, it will
not only automatically input you
class schedule, and also input your
whole classmates including your
instructor into your class contract
list. Help you make friends, ask
questions and score a better grade
during the semester.
Target Market
 Sparky+ currently will only focus on Arizona State University
Tempe campus’ students and instructor, the function built in
this app such as location and event list will specific optimize
for Tempe area.
 Sparky+ will first release in iOS plan form, come to android
plan form later.
 ASU has more than 60000 current enrolled undergraduate
student, over 3000 undergraduate faculties, around 79% of
the students have a smart phone.
Future Business Plan
 Once Sparky+ collected enough data from ASU and have a
stable version, it will extend to all four ASU campus.
 For event list function, it would be a great business
opportunity for business owners around campus to
advertisement their products and services.
 If it get success in Arizona State University, will consider
working with other universities to deliver this application to
other states, and optimize for other campuses.
Challenges We May Facing
 Copyrights and tech supports from Arizona State University
technology department.
 Authentication costs of using Sparky logo and BlackBoard
online system.
Questions?
Thank You
Work Citied
 Arizona State University, T.D. (2014, July 28). myASU
Computer Software. Apple App Store.
Vers. 4.0. Retrieved from
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/arizonauniversity/id453761080?mt=8
state-
 OOHLALA Mobile Inc. (2014, July 31). OOHLALA – Campus App
Computer Software. Apple App Store.
Vers. 5.3.0. Retrieved from https://itunes.apple.com/
us/app/oohlala-campus-app-events/
id389713598?mt=8
 Smith-Farrow. D. (2013, Dec 3). “10 Universities With the Largest
Undergraduate Populations” , Retrieved from http://
www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/the-short-listcollege/articles/2013/12/03/10-universities-with-the-largestundergraduate-populations