The Concept of Corporate Strategy of Apple - Research Paper Example

Topic: SWOT ANALYSIS ON APPLE IPOD SHUFFLE 2 GB IN UNITED S OF AMERICA. Insert Insert Insert Contents Executive Summary_________________________________________ 3 Product Analysis____________________________________________ 4 SituationAnalysis____________________________________________4 Market Analysis_____________________________________________ 5 SWOT Analysis_____________________________________________6 Conclusion._________________________________________________8 Refrences___________________________________________________9 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: SWOT stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities & threats. It is an analytical device used by any organization for the purpose of auditing. It is the first stage for scheduling and helps managers to plan a strategy to accomplish any new task. It is basically a review of overall situation to make a market strategy. Strengths and weaknesses in this tool helps managers to focuses internally what their company or business can do. Same as Threats & opportunities shows the outer picture of the company. It focuses on the condition of the market. It helps manager to see what opportunities are available for them and how to earn more from their strengths (Keegan W & Green, M. 2005). Since long, A Company known for inventing the personal computer range on this earth is APPLE COMPUTER. This company has begun a revolutionary raid into personal computing with Apple II. It is highly accredited to help people how to use computers with its accomplishment of the graphical user line in Apple Macintosh. All markets of personal desktop computers & related software are served by Apple. Currently Apple maintains the highest contribution within the creative and multimedia industries. This reports focus on the SWOT analysis of the Ipod Shuffle 2 GB of Apple in the United States of America. PRODUCT ANALYSIS: Every single product / service is designed in a different way. Product analysis enables us to see the different features of the product, how different it is in appearance, its feature, its price, its demand and other factors which are required to be considered before its production. A critical review of such points helps management in designing and selling products. The Ipod shuffle has distinctive features. It is the world's smallest music player. Ipod shuffle has two amazing features that make it a best device. First the song capacity is 4 minutes per song and 128 Kbps AAC encoding. It has a capacity to save songs up to 500. It has a very small size and easier to use. It dramatically allows the users to control all its functions quickly. The music library of Ipod shuffle can save 1000 songs. And has a plenty of space to store multiple play lists. Ipod Shuffle is also considered a fashionable accessory which is very famous these days. The voice quality of ipod shuffle as per musician is very huge and dramatic. Moreover it has a huge library in 14 different languages. Situation Analysis: As per market share, Apple at present maintains the most minuscule worldwide user base which is merely 2.5% of any operating system. The Microsoft Windows dominate by 92% in this race. What makes Apple exclusive is its capability to offer inventive and dependable hardware along with trend-setting & consumer responsive software. No other company does so. Amazingly this enabled Apple to ingeniously mingle its strengths in these areas to give fresh solutions to users. Market Analysis: i. Management: In order to persistently innovation of Apple Ipod & retaining enough funds, during competitor launching new product, valuable management is needed for the training & development of employees (JWT, 2008). ii. Capital Accessibility: Calamity of cash flow may be happen cause of heavy competition. When competitors capriciously launch their product in the market, adequate funds must be on hand. iii. Adoption of New Technology: In order to progress overall competence latest technology must be adopted. In order to increase productivity, it must be incorporated directly into operation as well as keeping the amounts of orders, production and delivery of Ipod. EXTERNAL FACTORS: iv. Competition: Competitors are very much active adopting new strategies to launch a new product. This introduction of new product to consumer may heavily affect the sales of Apple Ipod. v. Global Influence: Globalization of the world has outstandingly increase the sales of the new Apple Ipod, as the customer of the Ipod can purchase a new and fresh line of Apple products from any means including online purchases. vi. Patterns of Demography: Irrespective of gender and age, this product is attracting to all males & females of age of more than twelve years. This is because of its fresh innovations which not only allow users to play music, but has other features as well which includes literature and books which is very much luring them. SWOT Analysis The following strengths (S), weaknesses (W), opportunities (O) and threats (T) have emerged. STRENGHTS: Any company's strengths are its capabilities and resources that a company can use to develop a competitive advantage. It can be a good reputation, any cost advantage in any form, brand name, accessibility to distribution network, product or service exclusive features. Apple is a highly flourishing company. In its second quarter the sale of its Ipod Music player has increased enormously up to $320. This has not only increased the sale of Ipod but also of Macintosh computers. So Shuffle Ipod gives the company a boost which enables its sales team to sell its other products as well. Sales of Ipod Shuffle in US are very high and represented a massive part of revenue to the company (Menzies, D. 2004). Apple brand is one of the most well-known and vigorous IT brands in the whole global market. The customers of Apple are very faithful and devoted towards the brand. It means a company which owes loyal customers has no need to spend much on advertisement. It not only attracts new customers but also retain the old clientele who come again and again to purchase new line of Apple products. WEAKNESSES: The absence of all those above mention strengths in a firm is its weaknesses. It could be bad reputation among customers, high production costs structure for example, lack of access to supplying network, lack of access to best natural resources etc. In some cases it is totally opposite to strengths like in a case where a company has a high production capacity. In normal circumstances it is strength, but it can be a weakness if a company has done huge investment to raise the capacity and cannot change the production strategy in this situation (Barney, Jay. (2002). As per reports, the screen of Ipod shuffle has been found little bit defective. Further more the batteries are also found faulty. The company in return offers its valuable customers replacement of faulty screen and batteries free of cost. Furthermore Apple Company is facing an immense pressure from the music industry to increase its price of music download file. Many of such companies makes huge profits from such downloads instead of sales of their original and authentic CDs. But if it gives to the music producers, the company may recognize commercially weak. OPPROTUNITIES: Opportunities mean those external factors which bring chances for high yield and expansion chances prevail. This could be any unexpected order from any clientele, introduction of new technologies, removal of any regulations or bans. The biggest opportunity of Apple which it has already followed in the making of IPhone is to develop a mobile phone along with music player technology. It could be same like mobile phone device developed by Motorola i.e. Rokr. Another opportunity for Apple is that it provides Pod casts to their consumers. It is downloaded able shows of radio that can be saved in IPODS and MP3 devices for the convenience of the clients. Such Pod casts can be downloaded from the internet on subscription. This generates revenue for the company in the form of paid subscription and through the sales of other kind of downloads (Jackson, Susan E., and Randall S. Schuler., 2000). THREATS: Simply opposite to opportunities, threats are the biggest hurdles in the expansion of any business. These threats could be change in the taste of consumer, introduction of substitutes, implementation of any new regulations or incline in trade barriers. One of the biggest threats to a company is very huge competition in technology markets. Being successful by such companies needs to work very hard and rigors on research and development and advertisement should be strong in order to retain its precious clients. If economies begin to weaken then the demand of such products can decline which can affect the overall productivity of the company (Thomas, 2004). Change in technology is another threat for Apple Company. Wireless technologies are a real threat as they create a possibility of replacing physical music player. In the rapid changing IT environment, there are high chances of product substitution. Today Ipod and MP3 rules, as CD, DAT and Vinyl ruled in past. CONCLUSION: Apple is an IT company engaged in development and marketing of PCs and other software and hardware. The distinctive feature of this company is it is selling the music related devices at tremendously high rate with ever passing day new technology which lure most of its clientele (JWT, 2008). Apple Ipod sale has been tremendously increased at about 20% and it is expected that there is 10% net increase in over all sales of Apple because of Apple Ipod. Further it is advised that a company should change its market strategies to boost up its sales. It is further advised that Apple Company should introduce a public relation scheme to improve its market. It would not only improve its image but it helps in curtailing its advertisement expense as well. Further more in order to gain more Apple company should research more to improve its products and to boost up its sales. The result of Apple Ipod shuffle is tremendous in United States of America. There is a huge potential for the company to sale its products because of its distinctive features. References: Andrews, K. (1971). 'The Concept of Corporate Strategy' Homewood, IL: R.D. Irwin. Barney, Jay. (2002). 'Gaining and Sustaining Competitive Advantage'. 2nd ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. Fleisher, Craig S., and Babette E. Bensoussan. (2003). 'Strategic and Competitive Analysis: Methods and Techniques for Analyzing Business Competition'. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. I Doole & R Lowe (2003):'International Marketing Strategy - Analysis, Development and Implementation Jackson, Susan E., and Randall S. Schuler. (2000) Managing Human Resources: A Partnership Perspective. 7th ed. Cincinnati, OH: South-Western College Publishing. JWB. 'Journal of World Business'. (2008). Published by JAI Press, 2004. v. 39. Original from the University of California. Digitized 14 Aug 2008 Keegan W & Green, M. (2005)'''Global Marketing' Prentice Hall Menzies, D. (2004). 'Duke to give Apple iPods to first-year students for educational use'. Retrieved April 22, 2009, from http://www.dukenews.duke.edu/news/ipods_0704.html Thomas, D. (2004). 'Mobile threat to company data exposed by security experts'. Retrieved April 22, 2009 from http://www.personneltoday.com/pt_news/news_daily_det.asp'liArticleID= 25477 Read More