Three franchise business initiatives, more fully explored at www.lowearthorbitnow.org, will provide the financial support for these cities. Micro-Farm™ Enterprises (developing four-season, controlled environment greenhouses), Micro-City™ Enterprises (promoting housing developments, with a nominal population of 100, that are self-sufficient with respect to food, energy and work), and AEGIS Enterprises™ (where AEGIS is an acronym for Amalgamated Entertainment, Games & International Shopping) will be aligned in a Holding company named Allied International Franchises (AIF). AIF will promote an AEGIS cruise ship on a perpetual world tour marketing not only the three above franchise businesses but also the nonprofit Phoenix Enterprises, which will be set up to coordinate the design, construction, and operation of these Cities of the Phoenix.
The AEGIS cruise ship will be docked such that a multi-story greenhouse outfitted as a micro vertical farm is facing the sun, the opposite side has luxury staterooms for overnight guests, and the interior contains state-of-the-art entertainment, games, and global shopping options. The intent is to publicize the micro farm and micro city concepts through extended stays by the cruise ship in ports around the world attracting customers with a combination carnival/rock concert atmosphere under a banner of The Circus Is Coming to Town!
AEGIS Enterprises will build a franchise network of land based replicas of this cruise ship. The lion's share of the profits from the AEGIS cruise ship and AEGIS franchisee operations will be used to shield the poor and the homeless from the effects of poverty through donations made to The Phoenix Enterprises to build and operate Cities of The Phoenix.
The three business franchisees and the one nonprofit franchisee will operate independently in each of 1,000 regions aligned to give full global coverage. In each business network AIF will own 50% of the stock of corporate headquarters, 25% will be reserved to redeem convertible bonds purchased by sophisticated investors, 15% made available as bonuses to employees, and 10% sold in an initial public offering to acquire the money to redeem the convertible bonds. "Angel" investors will be solicited to purchase enough convertible bonds to build and test a "Proof of Concept" for each venture.
In the ideal form, the stock of each franchisee will be owned 50% by the franchisor, 25% by investors, 15% by employees, and 10% by the general public (sold in an initial public offering). MBA students from the University of Southern Maine are exploring the content of the business plans that will be needed to capitalize Micro-Farm™ Enterprises and Micro-City™ Enterprises.
The startup time line includes five years to bring Micro-City™ Enterprises and Micro-Farm™ Enterprises to profitable operations, ten years to use AEGIS Enterprises™ to market them throughout the world, and five years for The Phoenix Enterprises™ to design and start construction of the first city. It is then expected to take the better part of one hundred years to set up all four franchise ventures for operation in each of the one thousand regions aligned to provide full global coverage.
