Apple inc. keeping the 'i' in innovation - Case Study Example

of the of the number Apple inc. "keeping the 'i' in innovation" Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 Executive summary 3 Analysis of the internal environment of the company 3 Strengths 3 Weakness 6 Analysis of external environment of the company 8 Opportunity 8 Threat 12 Current strategies of Apple 15 Strategy alternative and recommendations 17 Corporate governance 19 Case update 20 Executive summary Apple is a pioneering company in the field of high end gadgets. The company lays its foundation on the pillars of innovation and development of new products. The company has invented the products such as, iPhone, iPad, iPod and the Mac and is one of the most admired brands in the whole world. All its products have seen tremendous success in the recent decades. However the company focuses mainly on the niche market and is facing a tough time in the gaining revenue through sales of its products. The company although, is one of the top companies selling mobile phones and laptops, there is scope of further improvement in the business strategies of the company. Analysis of the internal environment of the company Strengths High tech products Apple is the pioneer in the production of innovative high tech products. Apple is the inventor and producer of iPhone, iPad, iPod and the Mac. Apple is one among the most admired brands in the whole world and holds the 6th position in the list of Fortune 500 companies (O'Keefe). Every new product launched by the company is awaited fervently. Last year (in 2012) the company had launched the iPhone 5 as well as the iPad mini, which saw tremendous success. It brought record sales for the company in the last quarter of the year and brought huge sales revenue (Akhtar). Charisma of former CEO Steve Jobs Steve Jobs was a charismatic visionary who had a strong admiration towards constant innovation and was a genius leader. Technology, according to Steve Jobs, was a means of enhancing communication among people and bringing them together. His personality attracted employees within the company and also fans among the external stakeholders. He had the capability to give a new shape to the perceptions of people; which at present stimulates their level of acceptance about the company’s products (Razin and Kark 241). Brand name Apple is a brand name that is globally recognized. This brand has a clear and distinct identity. Any good brand has four dimensions, such as, brand name, trademark, visual appearance and brand communication. All these dimensions can be recognized and identified with the brand Apple. This allows the brand to maintain its quality level at a high position, perform better than most other companies in the industry globally and embody those values that help the brand to win its customers’ admiration, respect and loyalty (Danciu 3). Large segment of loyal customers This brand success of Apple Inc. has not resulted from some luck factor or forces beyond the control of the company’s marketers or its leaders. Apple’s success is a part of its well-thought-out plan to attract customers. The plan is two-fold; the focus lies on innovation as well as marketing by keeping in minds the preferences of the customer and background of the market in which it makes the campaign. Therefore, a keystone of Apple’s plan is “to deliver ‘strong products’ and create an ‘Apple culture’” (“12 Effective Strategies Apple Uses to Create Loyal Customers”). These strategies help Apple to attract customers and achieve remarkable customer loyalty. Strong research and development department The amount of money spent on the research and development division of Apple has been increased in 2012 from the previous year. The company believes that “focused investments in R&D are critical to its future growth and competitive position in the marketplace” (Lowensohn). The R&D of the company is directly related to the timely maturity of new products and enhancement of existing products. These are fundamental aspects of the core business strategy of the organization. The company has planned to invest further in R&D so as to continue to be competitive. Attractive retail stores Apple has shown many instances of being a successful performer in the market over the last decade. The company has been witnessing astounding success in its retail stores. This can be found by the phenomenon of 2009 during the global economic slowdown; retail sales around the world across all sectors declined in that year approximately by 2%, but retail sales of Apple’s products increased nearly by 7%. Immediately in the next year, Apple’s retail sales (excluding online sales) was kicked to US $11.7 billion, which accounts for almost 15 percent of its total revenue of US $76.3 billion in that year (Denning). Retail stores play an important role in attracting customers and sales service, including knowledgeable sales persons, good counter service, assistance and demonstration, along with attractive store layout are a key element in building customer loyalty to a brand. Strong presence in education field Apple has a strong presence in the education sector. The company offers to the world technologically advanced products, but these are not cheap. Hence, it offers special discounts on products that are purchased by college students, teachers, parents buying such products for a student, administrators in educational institutions and staff of all grades in these institutions. Students are therefore a significant part of the customer base enjoyed by the company. Such irreversible presence in the education sector makes apple and strengthens apple’s base in the industry and improves its competitive positioning in the market. Weakness Failure of Mac Mini and Apple TV Apple is a fundamentally a software company and monetizes the software products developed by them by selling hardware. The Apple TV is one instance of the company that has failed miserably. The TV is a hardware product, which is monetized by streaming media services form the individual’s desktop, such as, photos, music and videos. However, the product has not been accepted very well in the market since there are a number of cheaper substitutes for this product. Also the Mac mini launched by Apple has brought negative feedback from the customers due to the failure of its booting. Therefore the failure of Apple TV and the Mac Mini is a warning to the company that not all products would be devoured by the market just in the magnetism of the Apple brand name. High price The products offered by apple are available at a very high price. The prices in Australia are particularly high for most of the products offered by apple. Such high prices cause financial problems that the company is facing currently in the race to attract new potential customers (Ogg). The products are more expensive than the products of other industry competitors such as, Microsoft, Asus and Samsung and several other Asian companies like, Hewlett-Packard and Toshiba. These companies are increasing their market share by making greater amount of sales of their products. Low market share The market share of Apple in the overall global market for smart phones is quite small (Yarow). In the smart phone industry there are several other competitors, such as, Fujitsu, Acer, Lenovo, Dell Samsung, Asus, Microsoft, HP and few others that own good market share. According to a research by Strategy Analytics, the global shipment of smart phones rose by nearly 43 percent in the last year (2012) and reached a record of 700 million units. The highest number of smart phones was shipped by Samsung, and the company was named the star performer. The company captured 30 percent of the total international market share and extended its lead over Nokia and Apple (McCue). Apple is said to cultivate “a loyal tribe” (McCue) of fans and customers that are satisfied with the products of the company. Decision about restricting the iPhones to a single operator Apple stuck an agreement with AT&T under a new pricing strategy. AT&T is one of the mobile service providers in the USA and the iPhone was decided to be restricted to the single serviced provider after the second model of the iPhone was launched in 2008 (Yoffie 8). This decision sparked discontent among the potential customers and the users. While the provider enjoyed the exclusivity of being the only carrier for the iPhone, the customers expressed discontent since the users of other operators could not possess and use the iPhone without changing the operator they used. Excessive dependence on the former CEO Steve Jobs has been a proven pioneer in the pricing tactics of the company and it is the leadership charisma of this single personality that has lent a strong stand to the organization and helped it to glide up the success stairs. However, the company depends far too much on the former CEO and this is a risky stature for the company. Apple is the topmost company in the industry in terms of innovative products and also sales revenue generation. However, as Steve Jobs himself acknowledged that any company in this industry is bound to face the challenges posed by time. Technological advancement would make the lifecycle of any gadget limited and any firm that is willing to survive in this industry has to continuously update themselves with the needs of time. This shows that Apple has to modify its strategies and products in order to maintain its luster and competitiveness in the market. Hence the company has to move ahead and think ahead of time maintaining the legacy of its founder and former CEO. Too much dependence on his strategies and thoughts might hinder the progress of the company and stop it from making moves with the pace of time. Analysis of external environment of the company Opportunity Production of lower cost devices According to a research report by IDC, the smart phone market is identified as a high-growth sector and although it is dominated by Samsung, it still represents generous growth prospects for Apple. (McCue). Since prices of apple’s products are high, production of devices produced at lower cost would rapidly gain market share. This would primarily be the strategy to capture and increase market share in the emerging economies in the world. Since apple is technologically advanced, it is capable of producing cheaper devices that are loaded with advanced features. Joint venture with other big market players Joint venture with the other players in the market would open up new channels for growth for the company. Apple is basically a software company that sells the hardware products and makes money. An incredible operating system launched by Apple is the Mac OSX, which the company monetizes by selling premium desktops and laptops. The iPod OS and the iTunes are grand software pieces developed by Apple that the company monetize through sales of iPods. The mobile operating system developed by Apple (iOS) is a grand mobile OS and the company monetizes by offering to customers high margin iPod Touches and iPhones. Therefore the company can strike deals and make joint ventures with other companies operating in the global market that deal in hardware, so as to specialize only in software and sell the products through the hardware devices of the partner company. Specialization would help the company to operate in large scale by focusing only on the development of software, thereby, reduce cost of production. It would allow the company to beat pressure from competitors regarding the exorbitant prices of its products. Constant growth for PC and mobile industry The twenty first century is marked by the development of modern technology and rapid advancement of the same. The computers and mobile phones are based on advancement of the technology and also upgrading the devices through constant modification. These modern day gadgets are not only being consumed by the rich class, which was the only section of society that could afford these costly gadgets one decade ago, but are now entering the common households and are becoming items in the purchasing basket of the average middle class consumer. The computer industry is also undergoing a major change with the inventions of the Mac mini and the laptops offered by Apple, Dell and other competitors. The mobile industry shows higher growth trend than the personal computer industry. According to a report by Cisco, in the coming five years, subscriptions for mobile devices are projected to reach 7.1 billion in the whole world and the number of mobile phone devices (including sophisticated smart phones and high end tablets) would exceed the 10 billion mark in 2020 (Basenese). Total sales annually for mobiles and related devices are set to cross the $1 trillion limit (Basenese). All these act as encouragements to make greater amount of investment in this industry. It would be made with the expectations of yielding higher profits. Opportunities for international expansion in Asian emerging economies The mobile phones and personal computer industries are widely in business in the western countries. The developed countries in the west are host to big software companies like Apple. In the east, the technologically advanced countries, such as Japan and Korea, form only a fraction of the global market for modern gadgets. However, the Asian countries project huge growth in population and therefore comprise an emerging potential customer base. Hence there is huge latent opportunity for Apple to expand its operations to the Asian countries. The company has already spread its business to emerging countries, such as, India, and has received encouraging response (Kumar 549). The country is blessed with a burgeoning middle class and foreign investors are accepted with glee into the country. China is also a very lucrative opportunity for international expansion. China produces a good number of software engineers. They can be trained under the company’s pioneering training schemes in order to make them adapt with the company’s growth objectives. Given the level of skill possessed by the labor force in the eastern countries they are estimated to be capable of producing valuable intellectual property (China Briefing Media). These would be of great value for the company since these would be the cornerstones for innovations and future growth. Increasing demand for online music and cloud based services Apple has responded positively to the growing demand internationally for cloud based services. Apple has made the visionary development of the iTunes by using the iCloud infrastructure of the company. The iCloud is an envelope term used for the array of services offered by the company for cloud computing for the iOS and Mac based devices (Meyers and Lee 245). The services allow the user to transfer data, such as, songs and videos, through wireless service. This can be done without the need for user interaction. These innovations are convincing for the customer to stay loyal to the company’s products and keep their expectations high regarding future releases of new products. This is a huge opportunity for the company to exploit the customers’ loyalty and build upon their expectations to expand their business. It creates a ready bed for the launch of new products that are awaited eagerly by the customers. Apple being one of the top companies in the world has a global presence and a very strong marketing team. A ready customer base is an added advantage for the marketers of the company. This would help the company to develop marketing strategies that would allow the company to enhance their profit conditions and successfully pave their growth path. Growing demand for energy efficient products Customers at present are aware of the environment and make purchasing decisions in accordance to their evaluation of the brand with regard to environmentally responsible behavior. Apple is already known to use a process of lifecycle assessment that helps the company to keep track of its environmental foot. It take steps to improve environment footprint and focuses on bringing the products to the market that are energy efficient. Toxic free substances are used in the production of its goods and their packaging. The products are also produced with recyclable materials as much as possible (Iannuzzi 68). Therefore it already sets the field for the company to make further moves towards offering energy efficient products to its customers and enhance its perception in their minds as being a very environmentally responsible enterprise. It is an opportunity for the company to make bigger profits and rule above its competitors. Threat Steep competition with other industry giants Apple is one among the competing firms in the PC and mobile industry. The product lifecycle for the products offered by Apple and its competitors is quite short; approximately 6 months to 9 months. This industry is growing at a very fast pace and the products offered by these companies are evolving rapidly. Hence the threat of rivalry is high in this industry. Each competitor in the industry applies diverse strategies and each of them holds important stakes in the functioning of the entire industry as a whole. In the market for laptops, Apple faces very tough competition from companies such as, Microsoft, Dell, IBM, HP Sony Ericsson and Sony, Samsung, Toshiba, Nokia and Sun Microsystems (Hamilton and Webster 67). In this competitive scenario Apple faces considerable threat to hold on to its competitiveness and increase its market share. The rivals of the company (HP and Dell) have occupied greater market share than Apple in the first quarter of 2013 (Campbell). Low switching cost Although the branded giants are numbered in the industry, the number is not very low. Customers are at the advantageous position since they have a number of options to choose from when making their purchasing decision regarding the modern gadgets like laptops, PCs, music players or tablets. There are several vendors that possess distinctive market advantages over these big players. Production of comparatively lower-cost devices is one of the advantages that allow these companies to gain market share rapidly. This thereat is especially felt in the emerging markets. Huawei presents a good example in this respect. Huawei has found its place in the list of top three vendors of smart phones in the world ranking made by the market research firm IDC (“Strong Demand for Smartphones and Heated Vendor Competition Characterize the Worldwide Mobile Phone Market at the End of 2012, IDC Says”). Huawei and ZTE are the emerging brands that are providing the price sensitive customers with low priced devices with operational capabilities close to the products by brands like Apple and Samsung. This effect is identifiable with the high product substitution effect of the high end technological gadgets available in the market. The following chart illustrates the position of the top smart phone vendors in the world in the last quarter of 2012. Figure: Top Five Smartphone Vendors, Q4 2012 (Units in Millions) (Source: “IDC Worldwide Mobile Phone Tracker”) Downloading of free media content Apple offers media files (songs and videos and movies) to its customers that they can buy from the online services provided by the company and can organize them using the iTunes application in their iPods. However, these media contents offered by Apple are quite expensive and iPod users have access to other sources to download free music files and videos. Often there are illegal sources to download this content that provide customers with the satisfaction of enjoying the contents without buying them from iTunes. Expensiveness of Apple’s products is posing a notable threat to the company to undercut Apple’s sales by low-cost imports. The lasting effect of the global economic recession is also expected to influence the company’s sales and revenue in the years to come (Albanese 64). Incompatibility with windows platform Windows is accepted world wide as the standard computing platform. Almost every type of hardware and just about every variety of software is compatible with the Windows operating system. It can be said that the globe runs on the Windows. But in contrast to this, the Mac designed and offered by Apple is a closed platform and limited to only those applications that are designed by Apple. The Mac operating system runs only on Mac hardware and the file formats used by Mac are also non-standardized. Therefore the Mac OS faces restrictions in acceptability by the customers and Microsoft’s Windows holds the upper hand in the market. This poses a threat to Apple and poses a challenge for the company to stand in the software industry. Current strategies of Apple Apple has a unique business model and uses business strategies very diverse from its competitors in order to maintain its position in the industry and remain competitive in the marketplace. Unlike many other sellers, such as Samsung or Nokia, apple launches just a few high end products, the releases of which are highly anticipated by the extensive loyal base. Under the leadership of Steve Jobs, Apple carefully followed long development cycles for its product releases. This increases the anticipation of the customers about the new innovations and the releases of the new products. Jobs’ strategy is imbibed in the business functions of the company; to develop new ground-breaking products that has a blend of art and modern technology and offer these products to the customers with the promise of providing a streamlined but simple user experience. This business strategy allows Apple’s performance to skyrocket to the front line of the smart phone market. It makes Apple to be considered as an important force by the time their first iPhone was released. Apple is stuck to the strategy of releasing at the minimum one ground breaking innovation in each cycle. Along with the release of these new products in each annual selling period, the company continues to market its earlier models at cheaper price rates. The current business strategy under the leadership of Tim Cook is modified over the earlier version. The major change in the current strategy of the company over the older strategy is that the focus of Apple’s business model has swung from the “Steve Jobs era to the Tim Cook era” (Apple Business Strategy under Tim Cook). Steve Jobs used to emphasize on the creation and development of brand new innovative technologies, while Tim Cook’s emphasis has been shifted to the production of slightly advanced versions of the existing products of Apple. The basis of the strategy is laid on the foundation of innovation and development of new products. Mr. Cook has emphasized on the utilization of the significant market size and share of dedicated customers enjoyed by the company. The company at present focuses on providing “only incrementally changed products” (“Apple Business Strategy under Tim Cook”) to the customers. They are keen to exploit the strong customer base of the company while knowing that the company’s large user base would upgrade their choices and keep at par with the innovative products being produced and offered by the company. The company has been focused on the up-gradation of the existing old products and churning out new versions. The earlier versions of the products are predestined to accomplish the maximum revenue to the company and concrete the company’s position in the competitive sphere in course of which they would reach their limits. While the strategy of Tim Cook is not centered on the launch of a new invention, which might strongly replace the older products such as the iPad, iPhone or the MacBook, the strategy closely follows Jobs strategy of price decoy. Currently, Apple has more focus on strengthening the products that it has already created by giving more attention to detail and being more disciplined in their offer of the new products. When Cook became the CEO of Apple it was a much different organization than when Jobs was constructing the company’s reputation from almost a phase of bankruptcy. At present Apple is a highly successful name in the tech market. Cook’s has concentrated on tightening up different attributes and features of the smart phone models already launched in the market by Apple. Under Cook’s guidance, the size of the iPhone 4 has been increased. This move has been made to make the product look better to the customers and prevent the product from exiting the market. The product (bigger iPhone) instead would become more powerful to compete with the other larger phones that are being launched by rival firms, like Samsung. Cook has also terminated Apple’s contract with another industry giant, Google, for Google Map service. Simultaneously he has replaced the map service with “a proprietary map system” (“Apple Business Strategy under Tim Cook”). This move is a milestone for the company, since, the action has permitted Apple to depend less on another company (Google) and shot up the service platform of the company that is expected to bring profitable returns in the near future. Competitive strategy of the company is based on the creation of strong brand image through new product design and improving the effectiveness of the promotional strategy. The company has been successful in creating a “loyalty market machine” (McCue) and can heavily rely upon it. The company has moved to the production of iPhoto, iMovie, iDVD and Garageband, as well as the updated version of the iWeb. The company has made efforts to differentiate the brand from the other products in the market and has reached the cult status in the tech field (Hamilton and Webster 67). While making effective promotions of these new versions of the existing products, the company is still very protective of its technological knowhow. Strategy alternative and recommendations The strategy of differentiation has been central to the success of the company since the 1990s. Apple used to boast for itself for being an organization that emphasizes on the quality of their products (including both software and hardware). Since the company has successfully practiced differentiation it has been natural for Apple to charge high price for the hardware products. However, they have kept important information regarding the software products, such as, the Mac operating system a top secret even within the employee ranks of the organization. The company’s management has however underestimated the market for personal computer, which has been a big cost to firm. In the process of following the differential strategy, during the 1990s Apple has stayed away from getting assimilated with the mainstream computer market. Therefore there has been low level of software as well as hardware development by the third party producers. This lack of hardware and software support reduced their general affordability to the common people, who shifted to the usage of WinTel machines that has flooded the PC market. WinTel is a personal computers based on Windows platform and powered by Intel processor. Gradually, Apple lost its shine in the PC market and people almost became oblivious of the Apple computers and laptops. In the 1990s Apple lost the major fraction of its personal computer market share to other PC manufacturers, such as, Dell, Compaq, and Lenovo. In order to facilitate the understanding of Apple’s convoluted business strategy and analyze the effects that these strategies cast on the market place for mobile phones, it is of paramount importance that one understands the overall business process of the company. The strategy alternatives that can be recommended for Apple in this juncture are mentioned in this section. Currently, Apple has revived and modified its strategies to make its position in the market more concrete. These strategies are bringing impressive results, but still there is space for further improvement via small modifications. Firstly, the company must keep unmoved focus on the niche market and their differentiation strategy must be accompanied by improvements in modern technology. It has to be considered that the Mac offered advanced graphics capabilities while the Windows platform also offered similar quality and equal level of performance. To remain competitive in the nice market Apple must devote higher amount of resources and maintain higher concentration on its strategies. Secondly, Apple has to fine-tune the minor points of marketing. All relevant information about the launch of new products has to reach the retailers well in advance of the actual point of time when the company makes the public announcement. Otherwise, short lead-time is an indicator of effective marketing and promotion, which hurts the sales proceedings of the products of the company. Besides, the company should relax the strategy of differentiation and reduce the price charged from third party developers. If the company does not reduces the price level, no third party manufacturer would be prepared to build hardware, such as, CD-ROMs and hard drives, using the technology offered by Apple. As an alternative, Apple can acquire a hardware company, as such, Western Digital or Maxtor and exclusively manufacture hardware peripherals. On following this strategy Apple would be able to earn higher amount of income than to obtain license for its technology. Finally, the company should also concentrate on the customer service process. By establishing them as a company dedicated to the customers, by solving their queries and easily providing them service facilities, Apple would be able gain loyalty of the customers and improve its perception in their minds. Corporate governance Corporate governance is a key concept in business operations. This concept involves the function of improving the direction of operations within the organization rather than controlling the operations (Solomon). Apple makes pioneering corporate governance which leads to the company’s success commercially as well as socially. The Board of Directors of the company oversees the senior management of the company as well as the Chief Executive Officer in the day to day operations of Apple. It looks into the competency of the functions and supervises the ethical values imbibed into the activities of the managerial personnel. All these are aimed at optimizing the long-term goals of the company and serving the interests of the shareholders. The company’s directors take an alert approach to their respective positions and remain proactive to fulfill their duties and maintain the company standards. All these ensure that the company stays committed to the business and bring assured success through preservation of company ethics, social responsibility and high standards (“Governance”). Case update At present Apple is highly successful as a technologically advanced company in the industry. It is considered a trend setter in the industry and is a leader in the development of most innovative products in the field of modern high end gadgets. In the competitive market, Apple mainly aims at maintaining its niche market share, and upholding its revenue from the sale of high priced products, rather than increasing the market share. In the competitive market, Apple faces steep competition from the other industry Giants, such as, Samsung and Dell in the PC market and Samsung and Nokia in the mobile phones market. Apple has faced a drop in the PC market share in the first quarter of 2013 while there have been improvements in the global mobile market share. Apple expects little sales growth in the second quarter of 2013 and net income of the company dropped by 18 percent in this quarter. However, the CEO has announced that the company is set to introduce some new hardware and software in the fall of 2013. This is expected to improve the company’s position in the competitive industry scenario. Works cited “Apple Business Strategy under Tim Cook.” The Pennsylvania State University. The Pennsylvania State University, 2013. 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