Answer:
a. Product Development
Explanation:
A new product development refers to all the stages and activities wherein an altogether new product has to be launched in an unfamiliar market. Product development has 5 stages namely,
- Idea Generation: In this initial stage, a business gathers ideas regarding product it plans to create, through information of the market, competitor products, through magazines, etc.
- Screening: After all the ideas have been gathered, only the viable ideas are taken up while remaining are filtered out. This stage involves discussions with employees, workers and customers to select the viable ideas.
- Concept Development: Under this, projected costs, revenues, profitability are ascertained and SWOT analysis is carried out and target group is defined. The product concept is tested and prospective customer response is ascertained.
- Product Development: Here, the business carries out testing and actually designs and manufactures the product. The product is subjected to market testing and based upon the results, the output level of production is decided.
- Product Launch: Positive results of testing entail a business to engage in large scale production of such a new product and the product gets launched in the market.
Under the given case, since new product concept got positive responses from the prospective customers, the next stage would be Product Development.