...The Coca-Cola Company: Basis of Competition As of 2012, Coca-Cola was worth $77.8 billion. It is currently the world’s leading brand according the annual “Brand Value Ranking” from ‘Interbrand’, and now, with ‘3,500 different beverages sold worldwide’ (Interbrand, 2012), Coca-Cola is leading the many emerging markets too. In order to be this successful, Coca-Cola must have an exceedingly strong basis of competition, and that, it does: For starters, Coca-Cola has achieved very high economies of scale since its beginning in 1886. High economies of scale allow businesses to produce more, at a much lower cost, because average costs fall when buying in bulk. This then allows the business to lower its prices, which will obviously instigate an increase in demand and potentially, profits. Then, with more profits, businesses can increase the barriers to entry within a market and deter other companies from entry. Furthermore, within the Soft Drinks Industry, the bargaining power of buyers is extremely high due to low switching costs, and the general ease at which consumers can switch; but due to them amassing a large degree of customer loyalty over the years, Coca-Cola is an exception to the rule as its customers have become increasingly less price sensitive. This is another benefit of having a competitive advantage. Coca-Cola’s competitive advantage comes mainly from its innovation and product differentiation techniques. Coca-Cola ‘spends roughly 20% of its advertising budget...
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...ON COMPETITION Strategy and the Internet 97 Some companies, for example, have used Internet technology to shift the basis of competition away from quality, featurs, and service and toward price, making it harder for anyone in their industries to turn a profit. 98 When seen with fresh eyes, it becomes clear that the Internet is not necessarily a blessing. It tends to alter industry structures in ways that dampen overall profitability, and it has a leveling effect on business practices, reducing the ability of any company to establish an operational advantage that can be sustained. 103 Internet Technology provides buyers with easier access to information about products and suppliers, thus bolstering buyer bargaining power. 105 With more competitors selling largely undifferentiated products, the basis for competition shifts ever more toward price. 107 On the Internet, buyers can often switch suppliers with just a few mouse clicks, and new Web technologies are systematically reducing switching costs even further. ON COMPETITION Strategy and the Internet 97 Some companies, for example, have used Internet technology to shift the basis of competition away from quality, featurs, and service and toward price, making it harder for anyone in their industries to turn a profit. 98 When seen with fresh eyes, it becomes clear that the Internet is not necessarily a blessing. It tends to alter industry structures in ways that dampen overall...
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...Levels of Product Differentiation in the Global Mobile Phones Market The sixth product level called compliant product is a connecting element between the physical product characteristics and the strategy of the producer company Stanimir Andonov* The article discusses the differentiation among the product offers of companies working in the global markets, as well as the strategies which they use and could use in that respect. The main idea of the paper is that the principle “differentiate or die” (Jack Trout) has died. Today the global brands don’t strive to differ from their competitors in everything and at any cost. As an example, let’s have a global look at the business of mobile phones. In June 1998 Ericsson, Nokia, Motorola and Psion established their own International Strategic Alliance, a private independent company called “Symbian”. Symbian Ltd. is an independent, for-profit company whose mission is to establish Symbian OS as the world standard for mobile digital data systems, primarily for use in cellular telecoms. So, the three biggest mobile phone companies at that time and Psion, a mobile PC company, created a new way for competing and differentiating. Today Symbian Ltd. is owned by Ericsson, Nokia, Panasonic, Samsung, Siemens and Sony Ericsson. Figure 1 shows the percentage of shares of each shareholding company: Figure 1 Shareholding companies of Symbian and their percentage of shares Source: Symbian Ltd. – Company Ownership, http://www.symbian.com/about/ownership...
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...1. Describe the three levels of competition permitted under the Competition in Contracting Act (CICA). Give an example of each. a) Full and open competition b) Full and open competition after exclusion of sources c) Other than full and open competition a. Full and open competition; Full and open competition means that all responsible sources are permitted to submit sealed bids or competitive proposals on the procurement. It is the preferred form of contracting and includes contracting by sealed bids, negotiation, and other procedures. Example: b. Full and open competition after exclusion of sources Full and open competition after exclusion of one or more sources is used when the U.S. Government excludes certain potential sources from consideration for a contract in order to establish or maintain alternative sources c. Other than full and open competition Under this method, a bid or proposal is solicited from one, or very few, sources. Detailed justification and approvals are required to document the choice of other than full and open competition as a means of acquisition. Example: The Department of Homeland Security, Office of Procurement Operations, proposes to enter into a contract on a basis other than full and open competition. DHS has a requirement on a sole source basis to upgrade and maintain proprietary software at an estimated cost of $7,550,000. List the name and address of the proposed contractor(s). 2. What is meant by the term “ratification”...
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...Statement How can Singhania And Partners sustain its successful people management system in future? | System | EA Factor (Political, Economic, legal etc.) | Implications on the problem | Political : | As more and more countries (for ex. China, Korea) are increasingly liberalising their legal services, the Indian Government may also follow the path. Thus competition may increase immensely in the sector, an increase in the attrition rates has already created a scarce of resource of legal professionals. Thus Singhania And Partners can also face the heat. | Economic: | There is a scarcity of legal professionals in India, and the scope of work increasing consistently (Starting with the liberalisation of Indian Economy to current outsourcing scenario). Thus it is very important for Singhania And Partners to maintain its people management system. | Legal: | Currently foreign law firms are prohibited from giving any legal advice that could constitute practising Indian law. This is an advantageous situation for Indian law firms like Singhania And Partners as it increases their work horizon and decreases the competition. | Social: | As India’s legal system is slow, the companies preferred arbitration over going to courts for settling disputes. This factor combined with the fact that there are very few legal firms having expertise to handle commercial work for multinationals, creates an explosive demand for legal services in India. Expert firms like Singhania And Partners are...
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...Segmentation Markets are segmented into different 'niches', driven by different types of consumers with different product or service requirements. The fact of the matter is that we do not all want the same products, and we have different requirements for the products and services that we do consume. Product differentiation is based on four elements: Price – How much am I prepared to pay for this product? Quality – What level of quality do I require? Availability – or maybe delivery. How quickly do I want to have the use of this purchase? Promotion – or maybe "branding". Do I want a specific brand, or one of a range of brands that I feel 'says something about me? Think about denim jeans here—a $4.00 pair from Wal-Mart, a $400 pair from Neiman-Marcus We all make "value judgments" based on the inter-relationship of these three elements when we consume a service or product. Stakeholder analysis is a technique you can use to identify and assess the importance of key people, groups of people, or institutions that may significantly influence the success of your activity or project. There are a number of tools available that can assist with this. A Stakeholder analysis can be used to: * identify people, groups, and institutions that will influence your decisions about the form, style, features, etc., of your product or service (either positively or negatively), ------------------------------------------------- Core Competencies or Core Capabilities? Competencies are...
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...order to deliver the Outcomes (e.g. leakage reduction). Outcomes are the things that customers and stakeholders Value and are the objectives companies should achieve through The delivery of the outputs across the value chain. Outcomes are the things that customers and society value. Outputs are specific things that the companies deliver to (help to) achieve Those outcomes. 2. DIFFERENTIAL PRICING Some firms charge different prices for the same product in different zones / areas of the market. Sometimes, the differentiation in pricing is made on the basis of customer class rather than marketing territory. Sometimes, the differentiation is on the basis of volume of purchase. Differentiation on the basis of volume is more common than differentiation based on customer class in marketing territory. 3. GOING RATE OR “FOLLOW THE CROWD” In this method, the firm prices its products at the same level as that of the competition. This method assumes that there will be no price wars within the industry. This is a method commonly used in an oligopolistic market. Despite its advantage of preventing price wars, the method suffers from serious limitations. The first is that, it is not necessarily true that all firms or the leader firm is operating efficiently. In case, it is not, it will mean that the follower firm will also adopt a price level which reflects leader’s inefficiency rather than the firm’s efficiency. Besides, it is not always true that a decision taken in collective wisdom...
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...Competition and Non-Competition and its Relationship to Individual and Group Productivity Author(s): Leo Keith Hammond and Morton Goldman Reviewed work(s): Source: Sociometry, Vol. 24, No. 1 (Mar., 1961), pp. 46-60 Published by: American Sociological Association Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2785928 . Accessed: 04/11/2011 04:16 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org. American Sociological Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Sociometry. http://www.jstor.org and Competitionand Non-Competition its Relationship to Individual and Group Productivity of LEO KEITH HAMMOND AND MORTON GOLDMAN, University Kansas City the Variableswhichwill affect productivity small face-to-face of groups of are of great concernto our societysince so many functions business, government, educationare carriedout in such groups.An important and that study dealingwith this area was done by Deutsch (1). He reported to as groupin comparison individuals individuals working a "cooperative" of group...
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...In an economy, goods and services are produced for the ultimate satisfaction of the consumers. Therefore, all finished goods and services must be sold to the consumers. The process of exchange of these goods is essential. Thus, market is such a place where buyers and sellers gather in order to buy and sell a particular good or commodity. The term market refers not necessarily to a place but always to a commodity and the buyers and sellers who are not in direct competition with one another. CLASSIFICATION OF MARKETS Generally, the determination of price and output depends on the type the market. In a market, the products are produced, sold and purchased. Therefore, the economists from time to time classified the various market structures on the basis of time, area and competition. Here we are going to see about Market Structures on the basis of Competition. On the basis of competition a market may be of following types. * Perfect Competition * Monopoly * Duopoly * Oligopoly * Monopolistic competition PERFECTLY COMPETITIVE MARKET In a Perfectly Competitive Market we have a large number of small firms producing identical products. As the number is large, each firm has no market power. That is they are driven by their rivals to a common price and that will be the equilibrium price in the market. If you are an individual firm in this market your individual demand curve looks like A horizontal line at the equilibrium market price P*. If you raise the price above...
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...The morality of Competition Summary about competition often take the form of: Is competition good or bad? This is indeed the way the main contemporary researchers deal with the problem. Is competition good? They answer: No. Is it bad? Yes, in every way, bad psychologically, developmentally, physically, socially, educationally, and productively. But is this really the case? Surely competition is sometimes bad, but is it always bad, or always as bad as it sometimes is? Consider the following vignette: Jane and Tom lived in a small town. Married with five children, Tom was a carpenter and Jane a homemaker. When Tom lost his job and couldn't find another, Jane offered to go to work to make ends meet. Tom felt threatened. At that time, the carpenter's union was under a federal court mandate and offered an apprenticeship program to women. Jane decided to sign up. After some initial adjustment, and with the encouragement of a woman instructor who had pioneered the entrance of women into the trades, she learned quickly and in a couple of years became a master carpenter, a higher skill level than her husband's. Jane felt guilty about making her husband look bad. But she also knew that without her help her family would have nothing but temporary unemployment insurance to live on. She was also proud of her accomplishment. She became angry when she thought that her husband had for so long belittled her, and enjoyed now demonstrating to him that she could work as...
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...basically looking across the balance sheet or statement. For this task we are given a comparative income sheet. This document lists years 6 through 8. The information on the sheet gives us a look at how the company is doing financially, and what the company is doing in regard to sales. Looking at the horizontal analysis for Competition Bikes, Inc. you can tell see that Competition Bikes, Inc. has experienced a decline of their net sales. It is fairly certain that this decline is a direct correlation to the downturn in the economy. Competition Bikes, Inc. remains upbeat believing that sales will increase during the three year future projections, but they are expecting the new high to fall below the sales figures they saw in 2007. Even though Competition Bikes, Inc. saw their sales decrease, when the cost of goods sold is formulated as a percentage of net sales we see that it remained steady at 73%. This is a good indicator that the labor budget and inventory prices have not seen an increase. We also see that advertising has been cut by 16.3%, this can be assumed is due to lower sales. When looking at the line titled general and admin expenses we see that Competition Bikes, Inc. has been able to contain their costs from the previous period, even though utilities have risen 11.1%, this most likely can be attributed to the higher cost...
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...basically looking across the balance sheet or statement. For this task we are given a comparative income sheet. This document lists years 6 through 8. The information on the sheet gives us a look at how the company is doing financially, and what the company is doing in regard to sales. Looking at the horizontal analysis for Competition Bikes, Inc. you can tell see that Competition Bikes, Inc. has experienced a decline of their net sales. It is fairly certain that this decline is a direct correlation to the downturn in the economy. Competition Bikes, Inc. remains upbeat believing that sales will increase during the three year future projections, but they are expecting the new high to fall below the sales figures they saw in 2007. Even though Competition Bikes, Inc. saw their sales decrease, when the cost of goods sold is formulated as a percentage of net sales we see that it remained steady at 73%. This is a good indicator that the labor budget and inventory prices have not seen an increase. We also see that advertising has been cut by 16.3%, this can be assumed is due to lower sales. When looking at the line titled general and admin expenses we see that Competition Bikes, Inc. has been able to contain their costs from the previous period, even though utilities have risen 11.1%, this most likely can be attributed to the higher cost...
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...Financial Analysis of Competition Bikes, Inc. Competition Bikes, Inc. was founded by one person who saw the need for a light weight, better quality professional bicycle. He built the company from the ground up from his garage. The success of the company relies on accountability and transparency and therefore, a financial analysis is completed on a yearly basis. This process is vital to the success of the company as it gives management the foundation with which to base future long and short term goals. Each financial analysis evaluates horizontal, vertical, trend, and ratio results. A1a. Horizontal Analysis is “A procedure in fundamental analysis in which an analyst compares ratios or line items in a company's financial statements over a certain period of time. The analyst will use his or her discretion when choosing a particular timeline; however, the decision is often based on the investing time horizon under consideration” (Investopedia, Horizontal Analysis, para. 1). According to the Income Statements Competition Bikes, Inc. was strong in many areas from year 6 to year 7. Net sales increased by $1,495,000 from Y6 to Y7 which is a 33.3% increase. When looked at with the cost of goods sold which increased only 31.8% or $1,048,000 during the same time period you can see that the company was successful in increasing its gross profit. Gross profit increased $447,000 from Y6 to Y7 or 37.5%. Increased profit is a big strength for the company. Operating expenses were...
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...I. Point of View The case study is viewed from the point of view of Elizabeth Santos who is currently assigned of the task of designing the store management systems and procedures for all the stores of Gintong Hiyas and the management of the company's two branches. The focus of the case are two the stores managed by Elizabeth so taking her point of view is the most appropriate since she has the knowledge and authority to these stores. The staff incentive system was also implemented under her supervision. II. Analysis of the Case Situation The original store opened in Quezon City in 1968 and sold a line of handmade gold and other jewelry. It expanded in the 1980s by opening four new outlets in different parts of Metro Manila. New lines of jewelry were added as sales expanded. Managing five stores became too difficult for the Santos Family; the original store in Quezon City was closed in 1989. Elizabeth Santos joined the management of Gintong Hiyas after completing her Bachelor's Degree in Commerce in 1992. She designed the store management systems and procedures for all stores while managing one of the Gintong Hiyas stores herself. In 1995, she was asked to manage a store previously ran by her father. In October 1995, Elizabeth introduced an incentive system to increase sales. Thirty percent of the daily wage of the salesgirl will be paid as bonus if the daily quota is exceeded. This resulted in increased sales and morale in the first few months. Employees in other...
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...because the impacts of it affect the outcomes of the market. The market structure is organized according to key characteristics such as the number of firms in the market, the control over the price of the relevant product, the type of the product sold in the market, the barriers to new firms entering the market, and the existence of non-price competition in the market. The goal of the market structure is to arrange all of that affect in order to explain and forecast market outcomes. The structures focus on the affects of economic behavior on competition. These markets are classified according to the structure of the industry serving the market. First I will discuss Pure Competition. Pure Competition involves many firms producing a standardized product, identical to its competitors. Consumers will be unresponsive to which producer is selling in a purely competitive market, making sellers have no control over their prices, but since there are such a large number of suppliers of the product, no firm views another supplier as a competitor. There is little competition under pure competition. No single firm leads in the market under pure competition, which makes it a very desirable market. There are three stipulations that make a market structure "purely competitive." Homogeneity of product means that the product sold by any seller in the market is identical to the product sold by any other supplier. If products of different sellers are identical, 9 out of 10 buyers do not care who they...
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