MGT406

2006-04-30T11:12:00.000-07:00

Costa Coffee outlet opens at Dubia International Airport's Arrivals hall

I like to go to Heathrow airport in London just to drink hot coffee and eat the turkey sandwiches in a Costa coffee shop. To be honest it tasted different than other coffee shops and I was more than happy when I saw they had started to open more outlets here in UAE because I really appreciate their high quality of service and the food quality too.

I read an article about Costa coffee shop opening outlets at Dubai International Airport's arrivals hall and I think that Hamel's Business Concept Innovation is best suited to this article.

Business Mission: The success of Costa showed how Costa had satisfied its consumers who love Costa by opening new branches that deliver the good quality. Costa mission is "to make Costa coffee accessible to customers across the country through seeking out and developing sites in the best locations"

Product/Market Scope: The new opening at Dubai International Airport, one of the best and busiest airports around the world is considered to be a new expansion for Costa coffee and they are looking to open 20 more stores in the country in the next 24 months that will be added to the 26 stores that have already opened .This showed how Costa is expanding in the market to reach the globalization market.

Basis of Differentiation: As I said before Dubai international Airport is one of the best airport around the world and it always looks for good reputation for the services it provides.Huraiz Bin Huraiz.Director Commercials, Department of Civil Aviation said that "we insist on bringing in major branded outlet such as Costa in order to provide our valuable customers with the best service all over the airport premises".This reflected how Costa coffee provides the best services and the airport is always looking to provide its consumers with the unique quality of service which can be seen in Costa .

2006-04-21T06:55:00.001-07:00

Coca-Cola to launch new global ad campaign

Coca-Cola is a very well known soft drinks company that is facing a great competition with Pepsi Cola. Its a big competition, first we saw Pepsi sponsoring a very well known real TV show called Star Academy and promoting an ad that shows two very well known singers Elissa and Christina Aguilera .After that We saw Coca -Cola on the TV doing its best in order to have the best and most attractive advertisement. One of the best advertisement in the Middle East was with Nancy Ajram (a very well known Lebanese singer) dancing to promote Coca-Cola.

I found an article about Coca-Cola to launch new global ad campaign which was very interesting. The “The Coke Side of Life campaign” is a new global marketing platform for Coca-Cola, which launches in USA and in other markets. I think the Barney’s VRIO framework best suited for this article.

Question of Value:
it’s mentioned in the article that “the company is using its global resources to drive a multi-media, multi-cultural platform in the markets across the world” which reflects how the company is using its resources and capabilities in order to add value for its product. In addition, through this campaign, they wanted to support the people with all the pleasure and happiness through creating for their people a positive atmosphere and listen to their hearts and live in full color as its mentioned in the article.

Question of Rareness:
In order to support their campaign, Coca-Cola has applied many adds in the USA in order to reminded the people why they like or love Coca-Cola, its not only mentioning the product it self or its benefits, its about why the people love Coke which can be different than other products that just look forward to applying the product only on the ads and the audience should recognize what the message of the ad is. Through this campaign Coke is looking to create some thing unique that will provide the people with pleasure that they are looking for. For instance, the fans that attend the free event will experience the top musical talent and other entertainment and will enjoy the performance of very well known singers such as Chris Brown and other collectives. This is will be a very big achievement in soft drinks industry especially nowadays that people will drink Coke because their famous singer is promoting for that drink.

Question of imitability:
I don't think that it's easy for other firms to imitate what coke is doing. For instance, by having a famous singer promoting for Coke, they will make it difficult for other firms to imitate them since the singer will exclusively promote for Coke.

Question of Organization:
Coca-Cola is also “collaborative co-authored an integrated creative platform that can be adopted to fit different market needs. And inviting countries to add to the effort through joint global initiatives”, this shows how Coke is organized to exploit a full used of its resources that its looking to fit different customers need and expand more globally in order to make the company a great ,unique one that satisfies its customers’ needs and bring happiness to them.

2006-03-20T07:27:00.000-08:00

Al Arabiya extends its lead in Saudi Arabia.

A very famous Arabic news channel that takes Dubai as a head quarter for its Organization is Al Arabiya News Channel. The Official head quarter is in the Media city.Al Arabiya and the MBC channel is under the same management. Al Arabiya is an independent, self empowered and free informative satellite channel. It's located in Dubai and started from three years. Its aim is to deliver information and content that relevant to the Arabs.

Regarding Al Arabiya image,"Al Arabiya's interest is to remain true to the voice of the Arab World, to the world, on a Regional and International level".In addition, It provided its target customers with all the update information and news using the latest technology to keep their viewers updated and satisfy the Arabs' viewers needs and ambitions. I found an article about Al Arabiya extends its lead in Saudi Arabia. I think Barney’s VRIO framework best suited what the article explained.

It’s mentioned in the article that “the Dubai –based news provider has extended its lead as the most trusted source of political and business news in Saudi Arabia”. This showed how Al Arabiya is developing (Value) in order to take the competitive advantage of the opportunity which is being the most trusted source of political and business news in Suadi Arabia ,and this is what the Arab viewers are looking for the accurate information that is delivered with all the trust ,and unfortunatly this is what most of the media don't do.

Also Al Arabiya is not only extending in the news segment, but also its as mentioned in the article “It is expected that Al Arabiya will enhance its position in the months to come in the light of the breakneck developments witnessed by Gulf stock markets” This explained Al Arabiya (rareness) of being unique that’s its not only an Arabic news channel. It’s also reaching the Gulf Stock Market which reflects how Al Arabiya gained a substantial voice share in the market by its unique coverage of the business issues and interests.

I still remembered (America War in Iraq), (11 0f Sept tragedy), Al Arabiya was one of the most channels that delivered the pictures immediately and live in addition to CNN and Al Jazeera news channel.Al Jazzera considered as the closest competitor to Al Arabiya .Al Jazeera is established in Qatar.”Al Arabiya enjoys a 6.13% jump in viewership since January, bringing the channel to a current rating of 30.34% in KSA, Al Jazeera –its closest competitor in the news segment –stands at 21.43”.Also it’s mentioned in the article that Al Arabiya is gainining popularity in Iraq as the first in obtaining news some ways ahead from its closest competitor and second only to Iraqiya .Al Arabiya is extending in KSA and also expanding in Iraq too with all political and dangerous conditions that Iraq is moving through .Also I remembered in the last few months ,Al Arabiya is grabbing the audience empathy ,this was one of its reporter get killed in Iraq when she was doing her job. Every viewer is conscious of what happening in Iraq since it’s the most important event now a days! This is all about Al Arabiya strategy of being (rare) and (difficult to imitate).

In addition, As mentioned in the article “The channel’s up-to –the minute updates, intelligent analysis and comprehensive coverage of the latest market trends throughout the region have been instrumental in cementing the channel’s success in Saudi Arabia”.Al Arabiya gained its popularity and good performance from its management good standing and strategy with having the well qualified reporters and delivering the trusted message. Also it has managed to create brand awareness and has managed to build high loyalty among its viewers.Furthermore, Al Arabiya designed to attract different segments, with different interests, at different times this include young or old, males or females, interestd in politics, economy, finance, sports, science, technology, and so many other areas. This reflects how as Al Arabiya is( organized ) as a company and exploited the full competitive potential of its resources and capabilities.

Al Arabiya is gaining alot of popularity in Suadi Arabia as i mentioned before, and in my opinion it's moving to globalization in order to reach more audience and this is a very strong step that will let Al Arabiya reach a competitive advantage.

2006-03-07T11:14:00.000-08:00

In our management strategy class, we have discussed yesterday an article about easy jet which is an airline company; the interesting discussion in the class gave me an idea of how the airline industry is facing a significant development. Due to this I started to search in the web to find an interesting article about the airlines industry. I found an article about Virgin Atlantic Airways in http://www.strategiy.com/feature.asp?id=20060302133020.

VirginAtlanticAirways http://www.virginatlanticairways.com was found in 1984 and considered to be the britain's second largest carrier serving the world’s major cities. In addition, Virgin is setting a new standard of quality and won the top business, consumer and trade awards from around the world. Virgin is moving step to globalization and expanding its locations which is called according to (Hamel's Business Concept Innovation) ,The (product market scope) ,They are moving to one of the largest trade city which is Dubai.Mr Andrew Fyfe, Regional Manager for the middle East&Indian Sub-continent, who was previously based in newDelhi, India as general manager for Virgin Atlantic Stated that “we are delighted to have set up our office in Dubai and are ready to begin flights on the 28th March2006, 4 times a week to London non-stop and then build up daily from 2nd June 2006” so we can see how the company is entering the UAE market and begin its own strategy and offer a lot of options in order to satisfy its customer needs. For instance, for Heathrow and Dubai route, Virgin will offer three classes,travel economy, premium economy and upper class and these classes will follow the good quality service ,of course each class will has its own options based on the price paid, for example, in the upper class, Virgin will offer the longest fully flat bed flying with mattress for sleeping on, meeting area with a bar and inflight beauty treatment as stated in the article. Moreover, the virgin upper class experience also includes a limo service to and from the airport. The clubhouse at Heathrow offers a business centre, the Bumble and bumble salon and cowshed spa and much more.

According to this, we can view the (Question of rarness) as mentioned in (Barney's Framework) that how the firm started to make it self as unique and this can noticed by Virgin Airways with all the services that it offers in order to give the customer the home feeling and the satisfaction.

Finally, I would take the other side of the article which is the competition side. Virgin Airways is ready to take off in Dubai, but what about the high rivalry in the market which is relating to (Porter’s Five Forces).Al Etihad airline which is an emirate Airline and British airways are a very strong airlines companies that also offered a very special and luxury services and considered to be a strong competitors with their good reputation and standard in the market. So the competitors are numerous and equal in some how in their strategies and size ,which can considered as( barrier to entry) for Virgin.

According to (Barney's Framework), Virgin Atlantic is moving to a temporary competitive advantage in the market, this is because Virgin is valuable,rare,but not costly to imitate by other firms as it mentioned in the article “the airline has pioneered a range of innovations setting new standardsof services, where its competitors have subsequently sought to follow” which reflect that althought virgin is offering a unique and good guality services ,but it can be imitated by others.In addition,As mentioned in the article that"we fully anticipate and expect our competitors to come out with an ad campaign perhaps a week before our inaugural flight, as we have seen in other markets"so they expect the hight competition in the market from their compititors.

In my own point of view, I think that Virgin will maybe satisfy in Dubai because Dubai is a big city and tourists come all over the world to visit it.Also Virgin is a very well known airline company, but ist going to survive with all the competitors ,I think this is all about customer loyalty and services, offers ,discounts ,packages that the airline offers in order to attract customers.

2006-02-15T12:36:00.000-08:00

The New School:
It was useful reading the article (The New School) that discussed the poor employment issue which lead the fresh graduate to complete the MBA degree in order to find better jobs.As its mentioned in the article that "many anxious job seekers view a second degree simply as a resume enhancer"which is wrong. Also according to Tony Lee ,editor-in-cheif of the college Journal about the primary concerns of employrs today that "Even if the applicant has an MBA,does the job seeker really have the aptitude to do well in the job","Was the MBA received at top-tier business school?".This showed that the MBA student doesn't nescessary know how to do the job perfectly,therefore it explained that the organization when it comes to recruit new employess ,it doesnt necessary asked for a high degree,rather it takes in its accounts other principles for instance any previous work experiences that the employee has joined or any useful training programme .Here we can see what the organization or a firm is looking for which is the emloyers when it comes for recruiting.As mentioned in Barney's Case"Gaining and sustaining competitive advantage",There are few questions that is important when it comes for analysing the firm strenghts and weakness which is in our case the employee.First of all,the value of these employee,or in other ward what can this employee by his year of experiences add to the organization.Second,rarness,which reflect what make the chosen employee unique or differnet than others,it doesnt necessary be the MBA degree,it can be the training progrmme that he has joined.The last question is the question of the organization,which is, can the chosen employee exploit the full competitive potential .This reflect how the chosen employee can work positively toward the organization goals and deal with it by his experiences .These all questions are so important for many organizations when it comes to recruit an emloyee.

On the other hand,As stated in the article by the associate dean Bill Lawler,PH.D of Bobson college that"we've made arrangements with certain companies to enable our students to go right into their indusry as a a part of their first-year curriculum.This strategy ensures that {student} receive a hand-on approach to learning."This reflect how many schools prepare their students for better experiences and make them ready for any threats which is really a good strategy that will help to enhance the students work and make them involved in the business.In addition,he added that most of the MBA students at the business college joined because they are ready to move beyond their chosen field and toward the business vision which also reflect how they are hard workers and optimistic about it.Its a very good strategy to implement training programme that will help the MPA students for the work enviroment and enable them to gain more experiences.

In UAE,We also suffered from unemployment and lack of the work force options that both fresh graduates and MPA students sometimes failed to find jobs especially the local.I know many students that graduated from AUS and they are still looking for jobs althought AUS considered to be a very well known university with its good standing and teaching style. What could be done in order to recuit them.Also when it comes to an organization to choose ,it will choose the fresh graduate or the the student with the MPA degree.In my opininon and if I was at the position to choose, i won't look at the degree,I will look at their experiences and if they joined any training programme .This will help me more to distinguish between them to find the appropriate one.

2006-02-07T08:23:00.001-08:00

By reading the article "Effect of Danish Boycott Patchy", I have noticed few elements that Gary Hamel has discussed in his leading the revolution case. Boycotting the Danish products have effected negatively on the Danish market and they started to lose their customers, which is the market located in Saudi Arabia. We noticed how the Customer Interface dimension work here which is the relation ship between the producer and the customer and how the Relationship Dynamics has effected the supermarkets in Saudi Arabia that started to boycott the Danish products , one of them is the flagship supermarket ,this all in order to satisfy their customers' needs and respect their wants as they are in a muslim country and these pictures are offensive to their prophet and religion.

In addition, I have noticed one of the five frameworks that porter has discussed which is the Buyer Power and how it affects both the suppliers and the buyers. The Danish markets is considered as the supplier to the supermarkets in Saudi Arabia which is the buyer and by boycotting the Danish products they are shifting the Buying Power now from the supermarkets that sell the Danish products to the local Saudi Arabia market such as (Al Maraai Diary products) who will benefit from the Danish boycotting products because their sales will increase Basiclly, this kind of marketing strategy may change the economy for both the Danish market as a loss of its customers,but on the other hand, it will enhance the local Saudi Arabia market as an alternative for the danish products and this will influance consumers'purchasing decisions.

2006-01-31T08:18:00.000-08:00

It was so interesting reading the article (Google Is Destined To Fail In China) and noticed how a powerful searching website like Google failed to enter one of the biggest markets which is the Chinese market. According to the five forces framework by porter, I noticed some of these forces applying in our article. One of the forces is the intensity of rivalry among the competitors. There are numerous competitors that are equal in size and power like Sohu, Sina, and Neteasa and they considered to be a very big Chinese companies that provide the same services that Google do, so by this there can be a high rivalry in the market that the Chinese don’t accept any foreigner like Google to enter their market .In addition, There are barriers to entry for Google to enter the Chinese market. One of them is that Google has adapte it service in order to meet the requirements of the Chinese market. Google needed more credibility to be able to fight against the competitors in the Chinese internet market, therefore; they have hired Chinese employees to gain from their experiences, skills and know ledges and in order to create a better image .As a result of the high barriers to entry Google needs to obey and follow the rules and regulations are given by the Chinese government.