Strategic Issues of Uni-president China Holdings LTD - Case Study Example

STRATEGIC RESEARCH PROPOSAL (Student Name) (Course No.) (Lecturer) (University) (Date) Introduction Uni-president China Holdings LTD is a company that deals with the production of fruit juice, food products, and other drinks, and conducts its operations in Taiwan (Ito, 2012). It offers around thirty percent of the Chinese mainland market; this has made it ranked the second in the country. The company’s target market includes housewives, restaurants chefs, and hotels. Over the past years, the company has been regarded as the best company that delivers good quality products. The company is also known for their good credibility as the offer great services and fair prices to their customers. This paper tries to analyze all the strategic issues that the company faces and the strategic ways to solve the problems including recommendations that would help them in staying on top of their competitors and expand their market internationally. The significance of this proposal is to help and solve the issues that this company might face. Some of the issues the company might be facing currently and some of them are issues the company might face in the coming future due to changes in the market or changes in the taste of the consumers. The proposal will, therefore, be used as guidelines by the company tackle the challenges. There are a lot of issues that the company faces; they include the issue of food safety, the second one is the issue of maintaining the consistency, introducing Chinese food to the international market, producing enough products that can serve the increasing Chinese population. There are also other issues that might affect this company like the decrease in the agricultural workforce, improving the quality of food that is being produced especially after several complaints have been reported in China (Thoumrungroje, et al, 2013). Strategic issues of Uni-president China Holdings LTD When trying to analyze the issue of food safety, it is connected to the issue of consistency. As most companies try to push their employees to release their products into the market consistently, the employees fail to follow all the policies and procedures that are meant to be followed to produce a quality product. This has been a bigger issue that has been facing food and beverages companies and it has led to the issue of many to lose trust in the local foods and to prefer imported foods (Ito, 2012). Most companies face the challenge of competition with the international producers (Roth, et al, 2015). Therefore the company of Uni-president China Holdings LTD decided to perform research to know the improvements that they are supposed to have the qualities of their products. To outdo their competitors and to venture into the international markets, they order all their employees to follow all their cultures and produce the products according to the business ethics. Another thing concerning the quality of their products is the issues of flavor (Ito, 2012). To compete with the international and local market, the company plans to create different flavors that will meet every customer’s desires. Consistency is one of the major tools that are being used by companies to stay relevant in the market. Therefore Uni-president China Holdings LTD is trying as much as possible to maintain the quantity of the products that they release into the market. It has been realized that the food industry has a culture of forcing the ingredients they use in the manufacturing of food beverages to fit into the market, unlike the other companies, this company tries to meet the expectations of their customers. Another issue is about introducing the company to the global market, following the issue of fake food and beverages products in the local Chinese market a lot of foreigners do not trust the Chinese market and their foodstuffs. There are companies like the KFC and McDonalds that have established their market internationally and beating them in the game would need a lot of strategies. A lot of companies from China have failed in the international markets; this is because of the failures to test the flavors of the products that they produce (Douglas, et al, 2011). Due to the introduction of counterfeit foodstuffs into the Chinese market and the emergence of foreign food investors, most of the food companies are currently facing stiff competition an issue that is making them run at a loss. Uni-president China Holdings LTD is one of the companies that are currently affected by these competitions from foreign companies. As much as the company tries to produce food that can serve the growing number of Chinese, another challenge that they face is lack of agricultural workforce. The Chinese population is growing at an alarming rate it, therefore, makes it hard for the local companies to meet the expectations of the growing numbers. Most of the products that are produced by this company get their raw materials mainly from agricultural produce. Currently, most of the Chinese population has moved to the urban centers thereby making it difficult for the companies to get sufficient raw materials for their products. It would be therefore appropriate for the company to come up with a solution that can assist them being consistent in their production and to meet their customers’ demands. According to the reports that have been released by researchers and the media, most of the foodstuffs and beverages that are found in their markets are counterfeits. This has led to a lack of trust between consumers and local producers (Thoumrungroje, et al, 2013). Most of the consumers prefer foreign food products that are in the Chinese markets like the McDonalds to the foodstuffs that have been manufactured by local companies like Uni-president China holdings LTD. These are the challenges and issues that most food and beverages companies face in China and Uni-president China Holdings LTD being one of the companies also faces the same challenges. It would be therefore appropriate for the company to come up with strategic ways of solving these issues so as to be on top of their competitors. Another reason for coming with strategic plans to solve these would for the benefit they will enjoy in the international market. Impacts of strategic issues In every business and company that wants to prosper in their operations, strategic issues are the most significant part that should be dealt with keenly. The fact that these issues are never complete, it would be advised that every company should set their issues to be flexible so as to modify as the environment and the taste of consumers changes. It would be therefore recommended for the Uni-president china holdings LTD to observe the changes and include them in the planning efforts of the company. Impacts of strategic issues can be divided into two types (David, 2011). There are external impacts and internal impacts (David, 2011). When talking about external impacts, they include the ways through which external issues can affect business operations. They include the emergence of new competitors for instance foreign investors like the McDonalds, as new competitors will be coming into the market some of the existing competitors will also be leaving the market. Another thing is that population increase will also lead to change and either increase or decrease in the product’s demand. There is also the alteration in economy either positively or negatively this forces the Uni-president China Holdings LTD to be flexible to handle these changes. Internal environment can also affect strategic planning of a company (David, 2011). For instance, the resignation of employees can lead poor planning. Every company must have a planning team that analyzes strategic issues and then offer possible solutions. Recommendations for the Strategic issues Following the issues that of Uni-president China Holdings LTD are currently facing, it would be therefore appropriate to come up with strategic measures that would help in the smooth operation of the company. The company is carrying out their operations in an environment that are popularly known for producing counterfeit products. Most of the Chinese foodstuffs and beverages are believed to be counterfeits, and most of the consumers prefer food products produced by foreign companies (Lang, et al, 2015). It would be therefore ideal for the company to sell their brands through advertising using every available media platform to convince people that their products are of high quality. The company is believed to have the ability to produce fertilizers; this can help them in making negotiations with farmers who supply them with raw materials so that they have a win-win situation. The agricultural workforce has been reported to be decreasing in China due to the rural, urban migration (Thoumrungroje, et al, 2013). The company can take advantage of this through hiring farmers to work for them and paying them handsomely to have a consistent supply of raw materials for the manufacturing (David, 2011). The company’s managers should emphasize on following business ethics and the company’s culture. In most occasions, if companies follow the ethics and culture the quality of the products that are produced are always good. Another thing is that following the introduction of poor quality foodstuffs and beverages; it would be appropriate for the Uni-president China Holdings LTD to follow a different route from their competitors. Popularizing a brand is one of the major ways of marketing a product internationally (Douglas, et al, 2011). With the emergence of competitors like McDonald's, the company should put a lot of efforts in trying to sell their products globally (Yu and Zhang, 2015). It can be done through investing on researchers to know the market demand in foreign countries. Gaining trust from the locals is also another strategy of beating competitors especially the ones from foreign countries. Most of the foodstuffs and beverages that are being produced are known to be perishable. Therefore other than emphasizing on the quality of the products only, they should introduce frozen food alongside fresh foodstuffs and drinks. Following health concerns being experienced all over the world, most consumers prefer healthy foodstuffs and drinks; the company should take advantage of this opportunity thereby producing healthy food (Yach, et al, 2013). According to recent research, it showed that the population structure of Taiwan where the company is established has changed in that the elderly are the main consumers. It would be appropriate for the company to market their products as they make the qualities of their products also known to the young. In every competition, it is a requirement to study your competitors and learn their weaknesses and use it against them. Uni-president China Holdings LTD faces stiff competition from their local competitors like Nissin Food Holdings, Tingyi Holding, and Lian HWA Corp; the company, therefore, should make use of their competitors’ weaknesses to be on top of the game. The last thing that this company should do is to organize with their country’s diplomatic relation officers in foreign countries to assist in the marketing of their brands so as to compete with the global market. If all the recommendations are followed then, Uni-president China Holdings LTD will be able to meet the world market for food and beverages. Another thing is that it would have set a record in the local market that would take their competitors a long time to beat. There are a lot of opportunities that the company can explore to meet the expectations of the consumer's demands. If the company put a lot of emphasis on the quality of their products, then they will enhance the competition (Yu and Zhang, 2015). To increase their financial performance, the company should increase their target market to include even tourism, entertainment and other sectors that deal with hospitality. According to the SWOT analysis study of the Uni-president China Holdings LTD, there are several threats that the company is likely to face they include, the exchanging rates that are likely to change and is always unstable in the market. The issue of currency can affect the company badly especially if they start operating in international markets. In case there will be unpredictable worldwide weather that leads to the increase in the demands from the markets that are currently emerging plus the fluctuation of the international capital movement, it might lead to a low opportunity for sales at a higher cost that would eventually lead to low profit. Therefore the company should study their SWOT analysis keenly so as to be successful. Conclusion Strategic issues have various impacted which are subdivided into namely internal impacts and the external impacts that the strategic issues have on a firm. All the issues when studied keenly and possible solutions are provided then a company may strive so well. The best way to provide recommendations is through SWOT analysis study so as to understand the weaknesses, threats, opportunities, and strengths. After the study, the analysis can be drawn to benefit the company, in this case, Uni-president China Holdings LTD (Ito, 2012). Uni-president China Holdings LTD being a company that deals with food and beverages from China, there are many strategic issues that it faces which are hindering them from being on top of their competitors. As much as the company would strive to reach the international markets, there is need to establish the local market. The various strategic issues include quality of foodstuffs and beverages that are in the Chinese markets. The poor quality foods and the counterfeits that are in the market have made the local and international consumers go for the foreign food manufacturers (Yach, et al, 2013). This has led to low sales made by the local companies. To deal with the issue, Uni-president China Holdings LTD decided to promote their brand and make more popular in the local market. The company is advised to use government’s diplomatic officers to help them market their products internationally so as to have a market base for their products. References David, F.R., 2011. Strategic management: Concepts and cases. Peaeson/Prentice Hall. Douglas, S.P., Craig, C.S. and Nijssen, E.J., 2011. Integrating branding strategy across markets: building international brand architecture. Journal of International Marketing, 9(2), pp.97-114. Ito, S., 2012. Japanese—Taiwanese joint ventures in China: The puzzle of the high survival rate. China Information, 23(1), pp.15-44. Lang, T. and Heasman, M., 2015. Food wars: The global battle for mouths, minds and markets. Routledge. Roth, A.V., Tsay, A.A., Pullman, M.E. and Gray, J.V., 2008. 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