...CASE STUDY FOR FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT CASE 4: The Battle for Value, 2004: FedEx Corp. vs. United Parcel Service, Inc. VALUE CREATION AND ECONOMIC PROFIT I. OUTLOOK OF CASE 4 Case 4 mentions about the competition between two leading companies in package- delivery market. FedEx which is the largest foreign presence in China, with 11 weekly flights, serving 220 Chinese cities, so the company’s volumes in China had grown by more than 50% between 2003 and 2004. UPS which is the world’s largest package-delivery company and dominant parcel carrier in US, serving 200 cities in 2003. FedEx had virtually invented customer logistical management, and was widely perceived as innovative. Historically, UPS had reputation for being big, bureaucratic and an industry follower. Two companies have their own market, an individual characteristics, and inconclusive. Thus, not only based on the development and operation of the two companies, the analysis also relied on the special purpose financial ratios ( especially Economic Value Added (EVA), an effective measure and rapid for firm within an industry) to find which company has more competitive advantage. II. INTRODUCTION 1. FedEx corporation: [pic] FedEx, formally known as Federal Express, started delivering packages and freight on April 17, 1973. The company was...
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...section vi cases 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 FedEx Corporation Honda Motors Virgin Toyoko Inn Group PowerGen Kao Corporation Continental Caterpillar Metro Grupo Elektra Lego Mindstorms Shell and Billiton 13 14 15 16 17 18 LoJack and Micrologic Proteome Systems Swatch Ducati Chicago Museum Trilogy University 647 663 680 702 709 721 738 755 773 778 795 803 818 827 847 854 872 883 892 901 909 928 19A Cap Gemini Sogeti 19B Cap Gemini Sogeti 20 21 22 Kentucky Fried Chicken Cirque du Soleil Nike and the University of Oregon 933 case 1 FedEx Corporation: Structural transformation through e-business By Ali F. Farhoomand and Pauline Ng1 Case 1 [FedEx] has built superior physical, virtual and people networks not just to prepare for change, but to shape change on a global scale: to change the way we all connect with each other in the new Network Economy. (1999 Annual Report) [FedEx] is not only reorganizing its internal operations around a more flexible network computing architecture, but it’s also pulling-in and in many cases locking-in customers with an unprecedented level of technological integration. (Janah and Wilder, 1997) its inception 1973, Federal Express Since express deliveryincompanytransformed logisCorporation (‘FedEx’) had itself from an to a global tics and supply-chain management company. Over the years, the Company had invested heavily in IT systems, and with the launch of the Internet in 1994, the potential for further integration of...
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...Executive Summary This report endeavors to look at FedEx from the strategic initiative point of view and how it was able to adapt to changing business environment to improve itself. While organisations the world over have come and gone a few leave a lasting footprint on the way they have moved in the particular sector. FedEx with its various innovative ideas has left lasting footprint that has forever altered the scope of service within the logistics industry. From its humble beginnings as a delivery company, it has set itself up a global logistics and business services organisation that has shaken the belief held by behemoths regarding the level of innovation and service that they can offer to the customer base. With its out-of-box approach it has made industrial leaders like UPS, DHL etc, and look like new kids in the block. The strategic initiatives that the organisation has taken during various time a frame has exemplified the leadership ability of Mr. Smith to work toward uncertainly and how to respond to them. Introduction A general assumption regarding strategy is that executives by applying a set of tools will be able to predict a future of any business clearly enough to choose a clear strategy or direction to adopt. This overall scenarios and assumptions made usually led to a layout of vision for the future with assumed precision. However, one needs to remember that when the time ahead looks uncertain this approach is at best only helpful marginally and...
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...THE BATTLE FOR VALUE, 2004: FedEx Corp. vs. United Parcel Service, Inc. Executive Team Summary 1. Introduction a. Main facts of the case In the context of the U.S. & China agreement of liberalization of commercial cargo flights, determine which of the two companies has created more value and is in a better position to take the advantages of the new agreement. b. Most important Characteristics of the company studied in the case i. Industry: Air Delivery & Freight Services ii. Position in its industry & Main competitors 2. Answer the Questions presented at the end of the 1st session and reviewed and answered in the second session. * How have FedEx and UPS performed financially? How do we measure its financial performance? Financial performance measures that can be obtained from a firm’s financial statements consist of absolute data and financial ratios. Absolute measures such as income, net assets and equity, reveal trends and allow a company to be compared to its performance over time, while financial ratios, including return-on-assets and current ratio, adjust for scale and allow for comparisons of different-sized companies. Financial ratios are ideal to compare FedEx and UPS, since UPS has $13.5 billion more in assets and $11 billion more in revenues than FedEx. Please see Table 2 for a comparison of the most common and widely used financial ratios. UPS is outperforming FedEx in liquidity, solvency and profitability...
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...FOR DISCUSSION 1. FedEx entered in to China in 1984 through a joint venture, while UPS entered China in 1988 through an agent partnership relationship. Critically examine the contrasting strategies adopted by both the companies, while entering and expanding their service network in China. The case discusses in detail about the entry and expansion strategies of the two US-based logistics companies - FedEx and UPS in the Chinese market .The case examines the contrasting strategies adopted by FedEx and UPS in their efforts to establish presence in China. FedEx followed an aggressive, high risk, more investments approach to expand its services network in China which enabled the company to capture higher market share .On the contrary, till the late 1990s, UPS followed a conservative, low risk, low investment approach to establish its presence in China. The case brings out the contrasting elements of the strategies adopted by both companies including establishing the services network, advertising and promotion, targeting customers and the investments made. Finally, the case examines how the expansion strategies of both companies have changed with the improving business prospects in China, following its entry into WTO. The case discusses in detail the entry and expansion strategies of the two US-based logistics companies - FedEx and United Parcel Services (UPS) - in the Chinese market. The case examines the contrasting strategies adopted by FedEx and UPS in their efforts to establish...
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...Battle for Value, 2004: FedEx Corp. vs. United Parcel Service, Inc. FedEx will produce superior financial returns for shareowners by providing high value-added supply chain, transportation, business, and related information services through focused operating companies competing collectively, and managed collaboratively, under the respected FedEx brand. FedEx Mission Statement (Excerpt) We serve the evolving distribution, logistics, and commerce needs of our customers worldwide, offering excellence and value in all we do. We sustain a financially strong company, with broad employee ownership, that provides a long-term competitive return to our shareowners. UPS Mission Statement (Excerpt) UPS hubs in China as of 2009: Shanghai and Shenzhen FedEx hubs in China as of 2009: Guangzhou Figure [ 1 ] - Source: http://www.travelchinaguide.com/map/ Introduction June 18, 2004 marked the start of an important international trend in logistics and carrier services. The U.S. and Chinese government came to an agreement that allowed the development of air cargo hubs and landing rights for commercial airlines in China. This pact not only opened up extensive new opportunities for the airborne market in general, but gave FedEx and United Parcel Service (UPS) exclusive cargo transportation rights (Bruner & Carr, 2010). At the time, FedEx was winning the battle for China, with its Chinese volumes nearly doubling from 2003 to 2004. Despite this, rival UPS still held the title...
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...Airborne Express Case Q&A Info other than Case * Airborne Express is acquired by DHL in 2003 * DHL retained ownership of Airborne's ground operations and spun off its air operations as ABX Air, Inc. * Currently DHL is the number 1 delivery service company.(2nd is Fed Ex and 3rd is Blue Dart) Airborne Express Case Q&A 1. Consider the structure of the Express Mail industry in the US and how it has evolved. Why has it evolved this way? 2nd heading is about Express Mail Industry in US (in case study given) * In 1996 shipments was $16-17b Company. * Quick on-time physical delivery was coming * Use of technology was changing the game like routing * Tracking of shipment was a new service offered * Customer service was improving 2. What is Airborne’s strategy? How has it positioned itself in the industry? How is it different from FedEx or UPS? * Targeted business customer that regularly shipped large volumes of urgent items like Xerox (Position) * Never advertised much publically, instead focused on larger shipping companies * Sales force was given good freedom to negotiate volume discounts. * It positioned themselves as low price service. * They owned airports which served as its major hub to reduce the operational cost * Selective in technology selection. Wanted others to use it first. 3. How does Airborne deliver value to its customers? * High-quality, reliable service * Company offers...
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...fourteen small jets at its disposal, FedEx today has more than 560 aircrafts – making them the largest all-cargo air fleet in the world. The total daily lift capacity of their fleet exceeds 26.5 million pounds. Within 24 hours it travels approximately 500,000 miles. With the 2.5 million miles the FedEx Express couriers log a day; it is equivalent to 100 trips around the earth. A need that already has been identified rarely provides companies with big business opportunities. The greatest opportunities arise when you detect a completely new need that your customers didn’t even recognize themselves until you offered a solution to them. That is the success story of FedEx with its overnight delivery system. The company was named “Federal Express” because of the intended associations with the word “Federal” since it expressed an interest in nationwide economic activity. Another trace to the name is the proposed contract with the Federal Reserve Bank, which the company hoped to attain at that time. Although the proposal was denied, the name “Federal Express” was chosen since Smith believed it was a particularly good one for their purposes. It draws public attention to the business and facilitates name recognition. While the ability to identify an unidentified need provides a great business opportunity, it tends to remain useless if a company fails to come up with a new and innovative way of meeting it. The delivery of a new service can be quite tricky. FedEx solved it brilliantly by its hub-and-spoke...
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...reference for other industries, FedEx is chosen as the case study. FedEx, one of the world’s biggest express transportation and logistics companies, has been used many times as an excellent case to help people learn strategy management and acquire experience. It was founded in 1973. With the development of the company, FedEx transferred itself from a traditional express transportation company to a technical global logistics company. It absorbed the upcoming technology and make itself adapting to the change of the industry and the world to acquire the advantage of competition. FedEx spent a large amount of its resources and money on Information Technology and the R&D department to invent new information systems and develop new services. As the competition of the express transportation industry became more intense and took more consideration on customer segmentation, pricing and quality of service. FedEx developed new products and services to consolidate its advantages to acquire cognition from more customers. Also, many acquisitions occurred so that FedEx was capable of broaden its service portfolio and enhancing its market share. Due to those acquisition, FedEx achieved its commitment that was more than just an express transportation company. With the businesses of the company and the distribution of facilities, like warehouses, constantly widened, FedEx’s business covered more than 90% of the world’s GDP. Furthermore, with the launch of internet, FedEx...
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...Case Analysis: Airborne Express (A), Harvard Business School. Not so long ago, there was no such thing as overnight express service and freight delivery. Then Federal Express, United Postal Service (UPS) and Airborne Express, among six second-tier companies, came upon the scene. In 1973, Federal Express invented the concept of overnight express package, soon followed by the other two largest express companies–UPS and Airborne, during the 1980s. The fast growth of the Express Mail industry was mainly due to the success of the express delivery service. Thanks to Frederick Smith, a Yale undergraduate back in 1965, who had envisioned a whole different system on his economics term paper. Smith proposed an airline dedicated exclusively to express delivery of mail. Regardless of a “C” grade received on his paper, Smith incorporated Federal Express in 1971and officially began operations on April 17, 1973. Some of the features in the evolution of the Express Mail Industry includes but is not limited to the creation of the hub system and air express service. Created by Federal Express, the hub system is the symbol of the modern air courier industry. It made possible the large-scale, overnight deliveries and it has remained the standard operating method in use to this day. This system allows air courier industry to ship all freight to the company’s central hub, where it is sorted, and rerouted to its final destination. Also under consideration, the air express service played an important...
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...r p' FedEx Corporation: Structural transformation through e-business By Ali F. Farhoomand and Pauline Ngl [FedExI has built superior physical, virtual and people networks not just to prepare for change, but to shape change on a global scale: to change the way we all connect with each other in the new Network Economy. (1999 Annual Report) [FedExl is not only reorganizing its internal operations around a more flexible network computing architecture, but it's also pulling-in and in many cases locking-in customers with an unprecedented level of technological integration. (Janah and Wilder, 1997) ince its inception in 1973, Federal Express Corporation ('FedEx') had transformed itself from an express delivery company to a globallogistics and supply-chain management company. Over the years, the Company had invested heavily in IT systems, and with the launch of the Internet in 1994, the potential for further integration of systems to provide services throughout its customers' supplychains became enormous. With all the investment in the systems infrastructure over the years and the US$88 million acqrtisition of Caliber Systems, Inc., in 1998, the Company had built a powerful technical architecture that had the potential to pioneer in Internet commerce. However, despite having all the ingredients for the maltings of a successful e-business, the Company's logistics and supplychain operations were struggling to shine through the historical image of the Company as simply an express...
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...Air Cargo Management-13 Yoon Seok, Chang School of Air Transport, Transportation & Logistics, KAU Email: yoonchang@kau.ac.kr 1 Why Use 3PL’s? • Save time – Don’t need to invest in: Trucks, Training, Development • Narrow your focus – Allows you to focus on your strengths • Reach more customers more effectively – Can ensure delivery times – can help a company run leaner Types of 3PL Providers • – – – – • Transportation Based Services extend beyond transportation to offer a comprehensive set of logistics offerings. Leveraged 3PLs use assets of other firms. Non-leveraged 3PLs use assets belonging solely to the parent firm. Examples: FedEx Logistics, UPS Logistics Financial Based – Provide freight payment and auditing, cost accounting and control, and tools for monitoring, booking, tracking, tracing, and managing inventory. – Examples: Cass Information Systems, CTC, GE Information Services, FleetBoston Types of 3PL Providers • Warehouse/Distribution Based – Many have former warehouse and/or distribution experience. – Examples: Exel, Caterpillar Logistics, IBM • Forwarder Based – Very independent middlemen with forwarder roles. – Non-asset owners that provide a wide range of logistics services. – Examples: AEI Types of 3PL Providers • Information Based – Significant growth and development in this category of Internet-based, business-to-business, electronic markets for transportation and logistics service Levels of Outsourcing • Transactional...
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...Introduction There is no doubt that FedEx Freight is a leading U.S. provider of less-than-truckload (LTL) freight services. It is known for exceptional service, reliability and on-time performance. (History of FedEx Operating Companies About FedEx) With the rapid rise of virtually instantaneous electronic mail, some wondered if FedEx overnight mail delivery was as important as it was in the past. Margaritis pointed out that the company received only 9.3 percent of its revenue from overnight express mail, and that much of that mail could not be delivered electronically, such as gifts, electronic components, and medical equipment. (FedEx Cooperation) Nevertheless, “While FedEx Ground and FedEx Freight posted solid financial results, the third quarter was very challenging for FedEx Express due to continuing weakness in international airfreight markets, pressure on yields due to overcapacity, and customers selecting less expensive and slower transit international services,” said aid Frederick W. Smith.( Jeff B. 2013) In view of these issues, this essay is aimed to discuss how the business environment, company 3 resources and segmentation are related to the business performance. The paper analyzes these three elements using Porter’s five forces and SWOT. Porter’s five forces model analysis The five competitive forces model was came out from Porter’s first book "Competitive Strategy" in 1980. From that on, the model is broadly used by business managers as a guide tool to analyze...
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...Fedex: a perspective study | | Contents Introduction 3 1. The outside in perspective 4 1.1 Markets over Resources 4 1.2 Opportunity driven. 5 1.3 Market demand and industry structure 6 1.4 Adaptation to environment 6 1.5 Attaining advantageous position 6 1.6 Acquiring necessary resources 6 1.7 Inside-out perspective 7 2. Industry dynamics perspective 8 2.1 Compliance over choice 8 2.2 Uncontrollable evolutionary process 8 2.3 Fitness to industry demands 9 2.4 Low and slow ability to change the industry 9 2.5 Convergent to dominant design 10 2.6 Profit is largely industry dependent 10 2.7 Industry Leadership perspective 10 3. Integrated perspective and portfolio perspective 11 3.1 Synergy over responsiveness 11 3.2 Tightly related composition 11 3.3 Joint strategy development 12 3.4 Multi-business synergy & integrating resources, activities and positions 12 3.5 Acquisitions are difficult to integrate 12 3.6 Portfolio perspective 13 4. Conclusion 14 4.1 What strategic perspective does FedEx fit in? 14 4.2 Did it lead them to having a sustainable competitive advantage? 14 Introduction FedEx started out in its early years as a true pioneer. Originally an express delivery company, it transformed itself to a global logistics and supply chain management company. The CEO of FedEx saw enormous potential in connecting their business with IT. For instance, in the 80’s, FedEx gave away more than 100.000 PC’s...
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...David Faskas, Julius Cano, Dan Dragomir, and Tisha Ray FINC 4369 Dr. Jonathan Du February 7, 2011 Analysis of FedEx and United Parcel Service The domestic United States market for package-delivery is a $45-billion dollar market. The air express market is a $25-billion dollar segment of this market. The package delivery industry is very large and highly competitive. Two of the top competitors, FedEx Corporation and United Parcel Service have been racing to gain a larger portion of this multi-billion dollar market for years. Recently with a landmark air-transportation agreement being reached in China, the market for international delivery has boomed. Analysts expect China to become the world’s largest economy within the next few decades. The air-cargo market in China has been growing at a rate of 30 percent per year and is expected to increase for at least 5 years at this rate. With such an important growing market opening to international companies, the opportunity is great. Many risks may also be present with this new venture, but the reward may be great for the company that can take hold of this market share first. Through this analysis I will analyze the goals of each firm, how each firm has achieved or strived to achieve these goals, and how each company has dealt with threats from competitors. FedEx has stated in their mission statement that they have the goal of “[producing] superior returns for shareowners by providing high value-added supply chain, transportation...
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