1. Centralisation-decentralisation debate. Identify where the various functions of management sit in terms of being upstream, down

• Post Date 2018-11-09T13:01:08+00:00
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1. Centralisation-decentralisation debate. Identify where the various functions of management sit in terms of being upstream, downstream, neither, or both, and how developments in technology may affect these functions in the next 10 years.

International Business 

Overview

Must appraise, analyse and evaluate the pervasive issues – including sustainability, globalisation, corporate social responsibility – a small business faces after internationalisation; and appraise, analyse and evaluate new business/product opportunities within a range of sectors.

The question will be formulated “in the case of a SME” and must apply theory throughout in relation to a chosen country, America. Please fine the case study below;

The SME is a (fictional) Japanese SME, based in Tokyo, which started in 1990. Having grown from five workers initially, it now employs 100+ staff, producing a range of consumer electronic products such as televisions, DVD players, MP3 players, hi-fi equipment etc using technology licensed from a number of multinationals.

Currently it supplies only the Japanese market, and only purchases from local suppliers in and around Tokyo. TAKIMAKI had initial success in competing on price. However it has failed to grow its sales in the past two years and is finding it increasingly difficult to compete, given its need to pay for the licences, its high wage rates relative to China and Eastern Europe, and the near impossibility of hiring research graduates (who prefer to go to better paid jobs with Japanese multinationals such as Sony and Matsushita). It is therefore in a situation where its profits have been steadily reduced and it now faces the prospect of making a loss in the next financial year (its first loss since it was started).

TAKIMAKI as a company has never had contact with overseas markets. However, all of the top management team have learnt English, and several of them have studied abroad (in the USA, Canada, France or the UK).

The TAKIMAKI management team contemplating the possibility of internationalisation are doing so mainly in order to obtain production cost reductions, access to technological expertise (to allow them to avoid reliance on large multinationals), access to new markets, and ease of creating and managing an international company. They recognise, however, that they need to examine all the options available, and the requirements for a successful strategy.

There will be 2 questions to answer;

1. The first is on Sustainability and CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) – requiring elaboration.
2. The second is a sector related question on the Car industry and Agrifood.

Question 1

The essay should contain relevant theories of sustainability and CSR - definitions, models and related practical examples from the United States of America. Understand, analyse and synthetize the information gathered for a newly internationalised company on one of the following sets of issues;

1. Centralisation-decentralisation debate. Identify where the various functions of management sit in terms of being upstream, downstream, neither, or both, and how developments in technology may affect these functions in the next 10 years.

2. Social innovation and networking. Undertake an analysis of the social innovation based opportunities that have/might develop for a newly internationalised company in different sectors (health and education) over the next 10 years.

3. Sustainability and the potential impact of related issues on the company’s innovation, production and/or logistics functions. Analyse the sustainability based opportunities that might develop for a newly internationalised company over the next 10 years and evaluate the potential impact of these on the company’s innovation, production and logistics functions.

4. CSR, including 5 key CSR related issues, Pyramid of CSR. Evaluate the issue of CSR using the “pyramid of CSR framework” and analyse 5 key CSR related issues or factors that you think a newly internationalised company should focus on as an international business over the next 10 years.

5. Using the relevant framework. Identify the economic, social and  environmental aspects of the issues chosen, what strategies an internationalised company might therefore set, and how it would measure success in meeting these objectives of these strategies. Critically discuss the problems that international companies may face when they have multiple objectives (considering economic, social and environmental aspects) and the use of the balanced scorecard approach for making strategic decisions.

Advice:

The question should be split broadly;

1. Introduction (including the choice of issue and why is it important) (10 lines)
2. Describing and discussing the issue in terms of economic, social and environmental factors (40-60 lines)
3. The range of objectives and strategies the firm might set itself to meet because of these issues (profit maximisation, sales maximisation, growth maximisation, sustainability, csr) and how it might balance the different objectives (balanced scorecard approach, triple bottom line) (30-60 lines)
4.  

Marks available

Question 2

Answer all 3 questions.

1. Agri-food industry (Evaluate the potential over the next 20 years for the agri-food industry to provide a newly internationalised company with new electronic materials for use in its products or new markets for its specialised products.)

2. Automotive Industry (Analyse the importance of the automotive industry as a potential market for newly internationalised electronics company both currently and over the next 10 years)

3. For any potential new electronics products you identify, analyse how an electronics company could choose which of these products to focus research and development upon, and use this to decide which products YOU would focus on developing (Evaluate the various frameworks that could be used by a newly internationalised company to choose which products to spend Research and Development resources on, and determine which you would use and why.)

Advice:

The question should be split broadly;

1. Introduction (importance of New Product Development in electronics - with examples) why you chose the industry you did, brief discussion of why you will look at demand and supply side opportunities, and that this will produce a range of opportunities that will need to be decided between. (10-30 lines)
2. Issues for the selected industry, demand side new product opportunities, supply side new product opportunities. (all together 40-60 lines - 10-20 issues + 20 -40 product opportunities)
3. Choosing products (discussion of factors to take into account - resources, market factors) (40-60 lines)

Marks Available

Helpful Resources

Agrifood Industry

—  Increasing consumer concerns over food safety and reliability

—  Increasing focus on animal welfare

—  Consumer desire for reducing environmental impacts and increasing purchasing of locally sourced food and more organic food

—  Increasing focus on using sustainable products in production of goods more generally

—  These challenges can be seen as intertwined with changing use of communications technology in purchasing (online issues)

—  Also uses of technology in supply chains (e.g. sensors) and through production and farm management

—  Agriculture also offers potential to develop new materials for other industries or to use older materials in new ways

Car Industry

—  Increasing consumer concerns over environmental impacts and congestion

—  Increasing push for safety and reliability

—  Increasing focus on sustainable power source as oil becomes more costly

—  These issues overlap those of an industry with global supply chains, outsourcing of key components and mergers and alliances between main assemblers

—  This industry has provided increasing market for electronics particularly in terms of micro-processers and computers in engine management, which is likely to grow as engine technology becomes ever more important, with potential for all electric vehicles

—  Also uses of technology in supply chains (e.g. tracking (RFID) sensors) and selling product via e-commerce

Methods that could be used to analyse

—  Financial methods (economic value)

—  Strategic approaches (buckets)

—  Scoring models

—  Bubble diagrams

—  Check lists

Why new products may be of an advantage

—  Maximise financial returns

—  Improve the competitive position of the business in terms of sales and/ or  market share.

—  Efficient allocation of R&D resources.

—  Link between new product and overall business strategies, including those for social innovation, sustainability and corporate social responsibility 

—  Maintain focus by minimising the number of new products that we need to create given our limited resources

—  Create a balance between long term, medium term and short term and short term product development to assist allocation of resources

—  Create a risk-balance between high, medium and low  risk products 

—  Ability to amalgamate these issues within an overall framework capable of being used to explicitly and clearly communicate the reasons for our decision to our key stakeholders

Please use/mention the following frameworks where possible;

Porter (1986). Value Chain

Maslow’s Hierarchy

‘Greenwash’

‘Triple Bottom Line’

‘The Pyramid of Strategic CSR’ Carrol, 1999. Visser, 2006.

Coherently Formula and International Strategy (Balance Score Card)