The Nokia Company - Case Study Example

Nokia Company and Industry Background Nokia with its famous line, “Connecting People” has always been catching the attention of its target s for many years. With its cutting-edge technology and high user-friendly featured mobile phones at affordable prize, people from around the globe find Nokia a highly remarkable brand that has something to say in both quality and economic considerations. At this point, it is essential to understand that the primary and important factor that Nokia has to consider in connecting people’s lives is to provide its market with high value for its product and service offerings. This is due to the fact that Nokia is not the only company or brand operating in its industry. The industry for mobile phones is very competitive with various key players trying to differentiate their product and service offerings. This is to enhance their competitive advantage. One perfect example is the Apple Incorporated which is having consistent brand portfolios specializing on creating needs. In fact, the latest trend in mobile phone industry and particularly within its marketing activity is to create a need for certain product offering. The important point of marketing activity is to satisfy customers’ needs (Boone and Kurtz 7; Kotler et al. 9). This leads to sustaining customers’ needs in the future. This is highly evident in the case of Apple Incorporated together with its varying innovations it has created on its brands. LG Electronics on the other hand is always anticipating customer needs. It is in this reason that the company is always up-to-date with the latest innovation and enhancement of its cutting-edge technology. Its high focus given on giving value for its customers is remarkably in line with its ability to anticipate customer needs. Samsung is in line with enhancing strong brand awareness for its high-end product offerings. However, this does not mean that it is setting aside the management of its mid-to-low range of products prior to catering a significantly wider range of customers around the globe. Motorola on the other hand as the pioneering company in the mobile phone industry has also considerable experience on how the entire business in mobile phones has to be operated. In line with this, its competitive advantage remarkably lies on the fact that its basic foundation is rooted in its basic knowledge on how to stay in the competition in its industry. Even though the above mentioned companies in the mobile phone industry have remarkable strengths in order to stay on top of the competition, Nokia has never been far behind. In fact, it was able to survive in the 2008 economic downturn because of its ability to maximize its strategic acquisitions, partnerships and its leading research and development in its industry. It is remarkably good at predicting the future, understanding the current trend of customers’ needs and many others. Strategically speaking, Nokia is good at studying the prevailing competition in its industry. Thus, it cannot be denied why it is always looking forward to achieve its sustainability through its competitive advantage both in quality and economic aspects. The above mentioned background of Nokia and the industry where it belongs certainly provide us the basic idea that competitive advantage and strategy are upshots of the existing competition in the environment. In reality, the essence of competitive strategy is actually trying to relate a company to its environment (Porter 3). One triggering circumstance that blows away Nokia is when it knows the fact what its competitors are doing in the market. One important scenario is the ability of Apple to change the market for smart phone and its capacity to attract new developers to a market run with a very tough competition. At some point, Nokia did not anticipate this to happen and only to find out that the market will eventually buy into the latest innovations in mobile phones. At some point, Nokia is so focused on attracting low-end target market audience without knowing that advanced phones may also work out in this market niche. Thus, competition triggers the entire market to change its direction. Therefore it is clear enough that Nokia has a significant relationship with its external environment particularly with its competitors and target market. Population ecology Target market A single plant needs to be planted in the best and suitable soil, but it does not just end up there. It needs regular sunlight, water, air and other nutritional requirements. In the same way, Nokia is like a plant that needs to be placed somewhere where there is a good chance for its growth and survival. Its customers are the reason why until now Nokia is still able to provide latest innovative product offerings. Lately, it is able to compete with Apple Incorporated by providing its latest models for smart phones (Nokia 1). Why Nokia does followed the pattern of innovation which was already started by Apple? The reason is very simple. In doing this, Nokia finds its opportunity to grow by providing the latest trend or breakthrough technology for its existing customers. Apple has existing customers in the same way with Nokia. Thus, it is part of Nokia’s survival to provide various options for its existing customers. The target market is a perfect representation of Nokia’s external environment where it has to be rooted over the course of time in its entire operation, and while it continues to exist. Thus, it is important on its part to have chosen the most potential market in order to sustain its growth and maintain its effort in the midst of most challenging times in a constantly changing market due to competition. The bottom line of its user-friendly featured mobile phones is to acquire as many customers as possible. Nokia is diversifying its target market, but it actually ensures meeting the needs of its target customers. As stated earlier, the needs of customers are eventually created in the process due to existing competition. Different customers have various needs and Nokia is offering a service or product offering that aims to address this issue. In this regard, Nokia is trying to take its chance in achieving its potential market share due to the changing needs of the market. Nokia tries to survive in this scenario by taking its chance and at the same time formulating its idea. Today, the target market of Nokia is not actually changing, but their needs do. It is in line with this that because of the existing competition, Nokia finds its way to create a need for its product or service offerings. However, the bottom line is actually Nokia is seizing its opportunity. Opportunity for Nokia is very important because this is how it should start its survival. When there is no opportunity, Nokia will not be able to survive today. It would have been doomed to fail. This opportunity is only found in its external environment and that is through its target market. The competitors The forest is one of the most perfect representations of how the entire mobile phone industry and even other industries when it comes to understanding their growth and how they achieve their opportunity. At the forest, each living organism competes for space, light, and food among any others. The survival is within their reach but they have to work out for it. If they do not compete then they will loss their chance to survive. The same scenario is applicable in the mobile phone industry and to its stakeholders or different key players. The mobile phone industry is very competitive knowing the fact that Nokia is faced with different strategies employed by its competitors. Thus, in the industry where Nokia belongs, the principle about “survival of the fittest” applies. In general, the principle in biology about survival of the fittest can actually be applied in the case of mobile phone industry. Each organization or firm that tries to compete in this industry needs to actually find its strength to compete in order to take its chance for survival. However, it is not enough to only have strength. What is important is the ability to grasp an opportunity from day to day situation. By this, Nokia has to establish potential strategic moves or even ideas that are in line with its opportunities. From day to day basis, Nokia grapples with the existing competition and in particular with its competitors. From monitoring the existing market needs, competitors’ strategic moves down to evaluating its market share, Nokia has to stay tough in all times just to be able to maintain its slot in the competition and eventually find its opportunity to grow more. Each of its competitors are rooted in specific target market, but the reality is that they all are actually competing for survival because they all are aiming at the same customers who have the needs for mobile phones and have the ability to use them. They could not deny the fact that they are actually racing towards achieving many customers as possible in order to supplement their growth. That is why it matters a lot to each of them how far they are achieving their market share, which is actually the bottom line aside from creating profit. It is not just enough to create a profit, but one essential point in order to stay tough in its business is for Nokia to establish a strong market support from its customers. This is where it actually finds its sustainability. The existence of competition in the mobile industry provides the chance within its market to have diverse choices and various options to choose from. This also had diversified the needs of consumers in the market. Nokia and its competitors are responsible for this. Even in its industry, stakeholders compete with each other and this eventually changes the pattern of how they treat the market as an entity. This eventually changed the way how each of the competitors produced their goods and services just to be able to entice attention of their target market. Conclusion In order to understand the relationship between Nokia and its environment particularly with its target market and competitors, the perspective about population ecology is very meaningful in its case. The first reason is the fact that Nokia is a remarkable company that is tested by time and one of the fittest to survive in the long race of competition in its industry. It is clear that this entire thing needs to be understood from the point of view of population ecology where the idea about chance, growth or opportunity is an integral part. Furthermore, in this perspective the major areas of concerns are Nokia’s target market and existing competitors. These are entities in the mobile phone industry that are said to be the basic things to understand especially on how they create impact on an organization’s opportunity, survival, chance and growth. References Boone, Louis. E. and David L. Kurtz. Contemporary Marketing. 12th ed. Ohio: Thompson/Southwestern, 2006. Kotler, Philip, John Saunders, Gary Armstrong, and Veronica Wong. Principles of Marketing. 2nd European ed. Cambridge: Prentice Hall, 1999. Nokia. Nokia: Connecting People. [online]. Available from: http://www.nokia.com/, 2003. [Accessed 23th September 2011]. Porter, Michael E. Competitive Strategy. New York: Free Press, 1990. Read More