...Apple Case Team Assignment 1. What historically have been the sources of Apple’s competitive advantage? (15pt) Apple, since its conception, has been focused on making a superior personal computer. Apple was, at first, ahead of their competition due to their improvements upon the personal computer. Apple was adamant on creating an easy to use personal computer with exceptional design and style; creating a premium product. Apple was focused on being different, rebellious and cutting-edge. Steve Jobs coined the motto, “It’s better to be a pirate than join the navy,” which exemplifies the rebellious and unique nature of Apple’s culture. Innovation and aesthetics were, in Steve Jobs’ eyes, the competitive advantage of Apple. When Apple shifted away from this vision, it took major hits to their profits and lost much of its market share to its competitors. This is because Apple tried to implement the advantage that IBM and other competitors had, which was low-cost mass market appeal products. Apple even started creating desktop peripherals and other products not true to the identity of the brand. This marred the image of Apple and confused its identity; ultimately making Apple lose their competitive advantage. Apple went from a unique, rebellious, and innovative company to just another mass-producing computer company with inferior technology. Once Steve Jobs returned, after all of the chaos, they went back to their roots of being an innovative company focused on creating...
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...Evaluatie case volgens mij. Structuur: 1. Bottom-line evaluatie 2. Evaluatiecriteria 3. Argumentatie 4. Actieplan Vragen: * Callcenters daadwerkelijk efficiënter en kostenbesparend? Merk differentiatie t.o.v. concurrenten opgeleverd? * Groei: gestandaardiseerde of targeted aanpak? * Evalueer het Customers Really Matters initiatief van Hilton Hotels. Hoe succesvol is dit project? * Hoe zou u het management van Hilton adviseren ten aanzien van verdere investeringen in Customer Relationship Management (CRM)? Is het noodzakelijk om verdere investeringen te doen of is het simpelweg voldoende om de status quo te handhaven? Welke aspecten van Hiltons CRM toepassing zou u willen verbeteren, en hoe zou u dat doen? Diversificatie, groei, verschil in klantenwaardering; maar toch dezelfde treatment. Wat ze goed doen is aansluiten bij de strategie. CRM systeem is geen doel op zich, maar een hulpmiddel. ‘relentless focus on measurement, executive championship, employee training and empowerment’ is de aanpak geweest om CRM in het Hilton DNA te krijgen. Doelen voor de best guests waren: 1. Recognition, 2. Personalisation, 3. Service recovery, 4. Customer analytics. Daarvan afgeleid: speed up reservation process, increase service quality en enable cross selling. Probleem is dat rigide wordt als company groeit. Voorbeeld: 50% gasten met pre-assignment kost flexibiliteit. Daarnaast is een probleem met pre-assignments dat reguliere gast-voorkeuren niet persé te allen...
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...Team K Subject: Apple Case Analysis Date: 02/08/2016 Introduction The purpose of this memorandum is to provide an analysis of the consumer technology giant, Apple Inc. Here we will briefly mention Apple’s strategic position in each of the markets that it has become involved in, to better understand how this company has been able to attain financial success despite near bankruptcy in 1996. How Attractive is the PC industry In 1970, a ‘personal computer’ was sold for a ridiculous cost of nearly $100,000 in today’s money, which were only bought and used by enthusiasts. In 1975, Apple Computers was founded by two college students, who created the first PC with the intention that anybody could use it, named Apple I. A year later they introduced an improved version named Apple II, the computer that symbolized the explosive growth in the PC industry. Competition soon arose; by 1981, IBM partnered with Microsoft to launch their first PC, which eventually reached a peak of 85 percent market share within the industry. With the strategic implementation of selling their computers in department stores and the decision to make the PC an open system, IBM’s success was undoubtedly evidential. The latter factor soon proved to be the cause of Apples downfall in the 1980’s, who reverted to a close architecture Macintosh Computer, while IBM invited hardware and software companies to develop on the basis of their computers. Early Stages Industry Analysis: Both IBM and Apple were leaders...
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...primary commodity to significantly influence Intel Corp’s business because Intel can afford to have several suppliers. Additional suppliers provide the metallization needed between the silicon layer and the plastic for the packaging of the fully manufactured processors. These too are plentiful and Intel can afford to have several suppliers at considerable prices. Competition rivalry:. Intel Corp continues to enjoy large market shares with minimal competition. In 2011, the company controlled 79.3% of the PC processors market and 84.4% of the of the mobile PC microprocessors. These figures included a 2% drop from the first quarter of the year. The decline in market share could be attributed to increased competition from companies such as AMD, Samsung, Texas Instruments, and Toshiba. These companies sell their products at reduced prices and run aggressive marketing. Competition is therefore one of Intel’s biggest challenges in their pursuit to retain and increase their market share. Being highly regarded for production of high quality products stands the company in good stead and should the company fend off damaged reputation due to counterfeits, it will sustain its status as the market leader. Buyers: Buyers...
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...Strategic Analysis Nokia Introduction / Case Context Nokia for many years was the largest mobile phone company in the planet. It sold in 2010 the great amount of 450 millions mobiles around the world (Gartner, 2011). However, today Nokia has been challenged and has lost market share due competitor’s pressure. According to Douglas Perry, “Samsung has become the world's largest cell phone maker in Q1 2012, overtaking Nokia for the first time”(2012). Nokia has been left behind because if its inability to quickly respond to innovative competitors, such as RIM with Blackberry and Apple with IPhone. Nokia’s rivals are not just in North America, but all around the world. Asian competitors threaten Nokia by taking control on the mass population with low costs. Researcher have said, Nokia has been experiencing “lower-margin, feature phone business in emerging markets from cheaper Chinese handset makers” (Financial Times, 2011).“The once-dominant phone maker was described as needing to jump from a “burning platform” earlier this year by Stephen Elop, chief executive”(Charles, 2012).These factors have been critical in driving Nokia to re-elaborate and re-think its corporate strategy, core capabilities and vision. Recognizing that their strategy needs to be reformulated and successfully implement a good strategy is what’s going to make Nokia increase their market share. On February 2011 Nokia and Microsoft made a strategic partnership to make Windows phone as their smartphone...
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...SOM 498-002 Dr. Yan Ling ASSIGNMENT 2 FIRM ANALYSIS REPORT: APPLE INC. ------------------------------------------------- GROUP # 4 Sonny Nguyen || Brittany Krammes Larisa Zenokhova || Bryan Berduo Table of Contents Page # SECTION I – INTRODUCTION3 SECTION II – BUSINESS LEVEL STRATEGY3 SECTION III – VRIO FRAMEWORK OF RESOURCES & CAPABILITIES4 SECTION IV – VALUE CHAIN ANALYSIS6 SECTION V- INTERNAL WEAKNESSES7 SECTION VI –STRATEGIC ACTION RECOMMENDATION 7 A. REFERENCES…………………………………………………………………………………………………………….8 B. EXHIBITS………………………………………………………………………………………………………..……….11 SECTION I – INTRODUCTION For this analysis, we chose Apple Inc. because of its impact on the smartphone industry in the United States. First, the report will identify the business level strategy that the company has pursued and key factors that attribute to its success. Next, the report will use the VRIO framework to analyze Apple Inc.’s tangible and intangible resources, and capabilities. Then, a value chain analysis is provided to evaluate how Apple Inc. creates value for their customers, followed by a brief explanation of three internal weaknesses. Finally, based on what our group knows about the mobile industry in the United States and Apple Inc., we recommended strategic actions the company should take in order to maintain its position in the industry. SECTION II-BUSINESS...
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...Samsung case I. How attractive is Samsung’s primary (core) industry? Founded in 1938, Samsung is one of the industry leaders in a multitude of industries from power generation through to smart phones (Kovach, 2013). Each of their business units adhere to the same vision of becoming the preferred supplier of products and/or services to their clients, but the methods used to achieve this vision are tailored to suit the specific market focus, therefore demonstrating the adaptability of the company. The biggest players are Apple, Samsung with well over 50% market share. Samsung has achieved these amazing results due to its success in the mobile business, which contributed more than two-thirds of its operating profit. Anyone following Samsung, however, should not overlook its other businesses. In Samsung's non-mobile businesses, the company holds a leading position in solid industries and has consistently increased its year-over-year operating profit for the last several quarters. Most of the innovation for the Samsung products shared the same core design. Samsung flexible product line able them to materialize those ideas to end products with minimal cost occurred. For every new invention and innovation, Samsung does not need to set up a new facility. The results, higher yield against the cost of the production. Lower cost of productions allowed Samsung to offer attractive and competitive price for the consumer. The relatively lower cost gives lots of rooms for the pricing...
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...Samsung Case Analysis Ernest Coronado Samsung Case Analysis Ernest Coronado CSUCI – Spring 2015 Prof. Jeffrey Stone - Capstone 499 CSUCI – Spring 2015 Prof. Jeffrey Stone - Capstone 499 Smartphone Industry in 2013: Samsung’s Dilemma (1) In 1938, the Samsung Corporation began in Korea as a trading company selling fish, fruits and vegetables to Asia and eventually expanded to manufacturing, machinery and sales operations. Over several decades, the company diversified and grew to become an international conglomerate, which included Samsung Electronics. Samsung’s Electronic business operates in several areas such as visual displays, appliances, health and medical, mobile communications, memory, etc. that generate revenue close to US$100 billion in 2012, making it the world’s largest technology company based on revenue. Samsung Electronics is one of a few major players in the fast-moving smartphone industry. This industry is parsed into two primary segments, the hardware (handset/phones), and the (OS) operating systems that run them. The key issue facing the company today is whether it should enter the OS market for itself, or keep existing relationships and look for other ways to gain strategic advantages in the market. There are several aspects to the environment that faced the smartphone industry. The social and cultural phenomenon where over the last decade consumers have been using technology that allows them to stay connected and communicate anytime and anywhere...
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...1. At the time Palm Pilot was launched, Palm was in the in the industry of hand-held computers. In order to assess the attractiveness of the hand-held computer industry, Porter’s 5 Forces will be used. Threat of Entry: Low Customer switching costs were low in this case, as vendors have the option to choose from different suppliers that offer products within the same industry. Should one supplier, such as Palm, start to fall behind competitively, vendors can easily switch to the more popular supplier Palm Inc. has an incumbency advantage over new entrants. Palm gained the cumulative experience from past failed strategies. This experience has enabled them to conclude that reconceptualising the aim of their product was necessary. Palm began to stray away from the aim of PDA substituting laptops, and began replicating a pen and paper style instead. The Power of Suppliers: High Firstly, the suppliers of the hand-held computers industry must be identified. Assuming that Palm Pilot supplies themselves, they are suppliers alongside Motorola, Sony, Nokia, and Microsoft. Palm, being the first to launch a successful PDA device, had a significant amount of power in this industry as their brand was the most recognizable, and their product was in high demand, dominating the market share. Through the Palm Pilot, Palm introduced “the first successful hand-held on the market” (Pp. 2). Palm’s product was indeed the best of all PDA options on the market and it differentiated itself both...
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...Resource Based View A question summarizing RBV approach. Definition The resource-based view (RBV) is a model that sees resources as key to superior firm performance. If a resource exhibits VRIO attributes, the resource enables the firm to gain and sustain competitive advantage.[1] What is a resource based view? RBV is an approach to achievingcompetitive advantage that emerged in 1980s and 1990s, after the major works published by Wernerfelt, B. (“The Resource-Based View of the Firm”), Prahalad and Hamel (“The Core Competence of The Corporation”), Barney, J. (“Firm resources and sustained competitive advantage”) and others. The supporters of this view argue that organizations should look inside the company to find the sources of competitive advantage instead of looking at competitive environment for it. The following model explains RBV and emphasizes the key points of it. _ Improve your management style, hire a business speaker According to RBV proponents, it is much more feasible to exploit external opportunities using existing resources in a new way rather than trying to acquire new skills for each different opportunity. In RBV model, resources are given the major role in helping companies to achieve higher organizational performance. There are two types of resources: tangible and intangible. Tangible assets are physical things. Land, buildings, machinery, equipment and capital – all these assets are tangible. Physical resources can easily be bought in the market so...
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...Strategic Management Case Analysis: Samsung Electronics Memory chips were further classified into DRAM (Dynamic Random Access Memory), SRAM (Static RAM), and Flash memory. Flash memory, which was the hot-growth area, was used heavily in digital cameras and mobile phones. While DRAMs lost data when power was turned off, Flash memory could continue to store data in the absence of a power source. Considering the fact above, the flash memory market in the future will be very attractive. Along with the technology development there will be so many electronic devices using flash memory. Samsung started to create the advantage in Flash memory that it enjoyed in DRAM. Started in 1999, Samsung was seeking to move some of its production capacity from DRAMs to flash memory. Nowadays, people are always looking handy electronics device with multifunction ability and able to store huge data. Therefore, if Samsung makes investment in Flash memory technology, then it would be their advantage in the future. Foundry companies, whose sole business is manufacturing, have recently come to the fore, providing attractive outsourcing options. In addition to foundries, the ranks of increasingly specialized designers and chip testers are starting to swell. Chip companies are emerging leaner and more efficient. Four main product categories: Memory: Memory chips serve as temporary storehouses of data and pass information to and from computer devices' brains. Companies: Toshiba, Samsung and NEC Microprocessors:...
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...Table of Contents 1. PESTEL analysis 2 2. Porter's five forces model 4 3. Strengths and weaknesses of Apple, Inc (7-s model) 6 4. Core competency of Apple Inc and VRIO model. What were Apple’s competitive advantages? 8 5. New formula to create a sustainable competitive advantage 8 6. Assessment of Apple’s initial strategy for the iPhone. Quick change to a different strategy. 8 7. EFE and IFE matrix; strategic recommendations on Apple Inc SWOT matrix; SPACE matrix; evaluation of strategic choices on QSPM. 9 8. Balanced scorecards 13 PESTEL analysis Beginning in the 1950's, research on organisations emphasised the importance of understanding the wider macro-economic environment in which organisations operate. An organisation on its own cannot affect environmental factors, nor can environmental factors affect the profitability of an industry or an organisation. Conducting a strategic analysis entails scanning the general or macro-economic environment to detect and understand the broad, long term trends. [1] The PEST analysis divided the general environment into the following categories: 1. Political 2. Economic 3. Social 4. Technological 5. Environmental 6. Legal 1) Political-Legal Forces * Different countries have different legislations and these in some ways restrict the company or give opportunities to the company. * NAFTA, European Union and other regional trade unions open doors to market in Europe, Asia, Latin America that...
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...Swedish telecommunications equipment company Ericsson, under the name Sony Ericsson. (Wikimedia) VRIO Framework As the fourth-large smartphone manufacturer, Sony Mobile’s technological resources are very valuable and inimitable. The communications technology expertise and knowhow accumulated through its experience in the mobile phone industry, to launch new mobile products and establish new business models. Additionally, by integrating operations across its entire mobile product lineup, Sony aims to achieve further efficiencies and optimization (Sony Website). Technologically, Sony Mobile is more advanced in producing consumer electronics products than its competitors. Technological Resources also support the innovation resources. Innovation is the most important thing for the current mobile markets and that is hard to imitate and valuable. There are so many competitors, and so many new products come out every year. If Sony Mobile wants to against their competitors, they should have enough innovation to create new product. The Smartphone market has lot of competitors, and potential competitors, but some competitors may lose their competitive advantages when they cannot follow the market or they lack of innovation or technological resources. For example, Google bought the Motorola mobile years ago. Motorola was the mean competitor in the mobile market, but after Apple, Samsung, HTC and other mobile company into the mobile market, but in the end Motorola mobile lost its...
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...Apple in case study Question 1/ Analyze the microenvironment and drivers of changes of the PC industry. What are the opportunities and threats facing Apple, Inc. (PESTEL analysis, “Uncertainty/Impact” drivers’ analysis and Scenario Planning)? 20% : a) Opportunities and threats facing Apple, Inc. Opportunities: * Entrance in new markets; * High levels of demand of Apple’s products (IPhone, IPad); * Damages from competitors who doesn’t respect Apple’s patent; * Exploitation of new advertising methods. Threats: * High levels of competitiveness; * Dependence on specific suppliers; * Android system Vs. iOS; * Inflation; * Levels of taxes. b) PESTEL analysis Political factors: According to Datamonitor (2012), 38.6% of the total revenues of Apple Inc. were from U.S. during 2011. Therefore, 61.4% of sales of Apple Inc. were from outside America. Bad global relations, wars, and terrorism can affect the business of Apple Inc. Furthermore, Apple Inc. manufactures many of its products and parts outside the U.S., like in Czech Republic, Korea, Ireland, Cork, and China. Economical factors: The global recession might have influence on Apple Inc. The inflation rate is high, while consumer’s earning did not have significant changes. Moreover, the unemployment rate has amplified, affecting consumers to spend less, especially on ‘Luxury products’. However, Apple’s revenue is not affected by this economic recession although most of...
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...Introduction In 1976, a couple of college dropouts, Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, founded Apple Computer. Working out of the Jobs family garage they built a computer circuit board that they named the Apple I. Jobs made it Apple’s mission to bring an easy to use computer to market and in 1978 introduced the Apple II, which was a relatively simple machine that people could use out of the box. Apple quickly became the industry leader, until IBM entered the PC market in 1981, which lead to Apple fundamentally changing their competitive position. Apple was still considered aesthetically pleasing compared to the bland IBM PC, but lacked the “open” system that other producers could clone from the IBM PC. In contrast, Apple relied on proprietary designs that only Apple could produce. In 1984, Apple introduced the Macintosh, marking a breakthrough in ease of use, industrial design, and technical elegance from a PC, but it still lacked a microprocessor with speed and compatible software. In 1985, Jobs was removed from his operational role and eventually left the company to start up a new company called NeXT. After this Apple struggled with establishing a sustainable strategy and suffered an up and down history. Finally, when Steve Jobs returned and was made CEO of Apple in 1997, Apple finally saw the turnaround it needed. He quickly shook things up and established relationships with Microsoft and Intel, which would take Apple’s PC to new heights. In January 2007, three decades after its...
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