Industry Analysis * Outlines the main issues facing the industry and it’s global value chain
Innovation has never been more important than it is today. It’s the main issue facing Nike industry.
Innovation. It’s Nike’s growth engine. It’s what they athletes, consumers and investors expect of them – and always have. It’s what they expect of themselves. It enables new heights in performance and raises the bar for their industry and beyond.
We focus sustainable innovation on our biggest areas of opportunity and risk. We ask difficult questions of ourselves, our business model and our industry. We seek to understand the meta-trends and the signals – strong and weak – that add complexity and uncertainty to the future. Rather than working to avoid only known risk, we work to understand where risks and opportunities may emerge as well as what’s needed to address them and enable new forms of innovation to take hold.

Innovation has never been more important than it is today. It’s not just about improving the products we make. It’s about how we invent better ones, work with other companies and organizations to develop markets that value and encourage the creation of new sustainable processes and products, and improve lives by leveraging sustainability as the world’s greatest innovation opportunity.

We focus sustainable innovation on our biggest areas of opportunity and risk. We ask difficult questions of ourselves, our business model and our industry. We seek to understand the meta-trends and the signals – strong and weak – that add complexity and uncertainty to the future. Rather than working to avoid only known risk, we work to understand where risks and opportunities may emerge as well as what’s needed to address them and enable new forms of innovation to take hold.

* Provides some context for worst and best social and environmental performers in that industry
[2] Nike’s success. In the early days, anybody with a glue pot and a pair of scissors could get into the shoe business, so the way to stay ahead was through product innovation. Nike happened to be great at it. Bill Bowerman, my former track coach at the University of Oregon and cofounder of the company that became Nike, had always customized off-the-shelf shoes for his runners. Over the years, he and some other employees came up with lots of great ideas that we incorporated. One of Bowerman’s more legendary innovations is the Waffle outsole, which he discovered by pouring rubber into a waffle iron. The Waffle Trainer later became the best-selling training shoe in the United States.
We were also good at keeping our manufacturing costs down. The big, established players like Puma and Adidas were still manufacturing in high-wage European countries. But we knew that wages were lower in Asia, and we knew how to get around in that environment, so we funneled all our most promising managers there to supervise production.

What did you learn from the casual shoe failure?
Understanding the consumer is just part of good marketing. You also have to understand the brand. That’s really the lesson we learned from casual shoes. That whole experience forced us to define what the Nike brand really meant, and it taught us the importance of focus. Without focus, the whole brand is at risk. Just because you have the best athletes in the world and a stripe everybody recognizes doesn’t mean you can take that trademark to the ends of the earth. The ends of the earth might be right off that ledge!
Ultimately, we determined that we wanted Nike to be the world’s best sports and fitness company and the Nike brand to represent sports and fitness activities. Once you say that, you have focus, and you can automatically rule out certain options. You don’t end up doing loafers and wingtips and sponsoring the next Rolling Stones world tour. And you don’t do casual shoes under that brand.

Company Overview * Describes the company’s main products and services
The three main product lines of Nike’s brand: footwear, apparel and equipment, are made by approximately 600 contract factories that employ more than 800,000 workers in 46 countries around the world.

* Provides an overview of the company’s ownership and governance structures and any issues these may raise

* Introduces the company’s overall position on business and society related issues
[1] Nike's growth has been phenomenal. Globally it is a $9 billion company and the largest in its market, having started as recently as 1971. Europe has been the star region for Nike recently, with revenues growing by 23% annually from 1996 to 2000. Britain is Nike's second-biggest market and Nike is the UK market leader, despite being a company with American origins in a country which is obsessive about football. Possibly Nike's greatest achievement in the UK has been to bring a new dynamism to football marketing.

* Critically reviews the company’s values/mission/vision/purpose statements, code of conduct/ethics as well as general approach to ethics/responsibilities in the workplace in light of their stated vision
Values:

Mission: As the world’s leading athletic footwear, apparel and equipment company, NIKE, Inc. is dedicated to inspiring every athlete to reach their full potential. NIKE co-founder Bill Bowerman saw: “To bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete in the world.”
Vision:
Purpose statement:
Code of conduct:
Ethics:

Links:
[1] http://www.brandrepublic.com/article/148384/superbrands-case-studies-nike

[2] https://hbr.org/1992/07/high-performance-marketing-an-interview-with-nikes-phil-knight