CHALLENGES AND PROSPECTS OF NEW PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT- THE CASE OF NYALA INSURANCE S.C

Abstract

The main purpose of this study is to assess the Challenges & Prospects of New Product Development the case of Nyala Insurance SC. This research is descriptive type research & uses census survey. Both primary and secondary methods of data collection are applied. The researcher tries to find out the possible opportunities that gained during NPD and identify the major challenges that faced by the company, more over to recommend them to tackle the challenges ahead of time and harvest or utilize the opportunity to the maximum. The consumer perception, nature of insurance products, cost of marketing, mis-trust in insurer- insured relationship, failure to adopt information technology, low trained & inexperienced marketing staff, pricing of insurance products, cost of insurance, lack of innovativeness, complex procedures in claims management, Lack of awareness, cost of product development, lack of professionals like actuarial, budget, product quality, accessibility & warranty, purchasing power & willingness to pay it, policy issues, and distribution issues are found to be the major challenges of new product development. Profit maximization, wining customers, increase market share, build brand, increase business continuity, good will & creating differentiated product are the main opportunities gained from new product development. Based on the findings the researcher recommend to NISCO to give due attention to hire professionals who could possibly perform well in the insurance industry, needs to develop marketing strategy which encourages the development of new products by endorsing the appropriate budget for it & also must work on alleviating all the challenges that affect its new product development strategy.