Forum Discussion Activities Essay

Please post your response to ONE of the following questions in the Forum by Wednesday, midnight, of Week 3. Then please post at least three responses to other student’s postings by Saturday, midnight, of Week 3. * You are the Vice President of a US based software company. You have been tasked with exploring the possibility of setting up a software development operation in India. You have heard that the rigid caste systems can affect business operations. Do you think it is possible to use a typical US management style in India or should you adjust to the local Indian managerial style and employment practices? Explain. Forum Discussion Week 3 – Question #2 Businesses create strategies for setting up relationships with other countries based upon the type of product involved and whether their entry is in the product market or the resource market. â€Å"Strategy† within this global framework most closely resembles a ‘marketing strategy’ that addresses target markets, segmentation, positioning and allocation of resources. Discuss the various strategies outlined within the text reading and which one or two seem to fit your final project country and product best. Provide a glimpse of your final paper by discussing the product and country you have selected and post and respond to students related to what product you have chosen and whether you are entering in the product or resource markets. Written Assignments Case Study 2 Write a 2-3 page analysis of the Case Study entitled, â€Å"Argentina’s Monetary Crisis† located in Chapter 10 of the text. Upload the paper to the Assignments Drop Box by Saturday, midnight, of Week 3. Course Project: Market Entry Analysis You should have by selected your country and product and begun your environmental research. A learning objective this week is to move from environment to strategy. Outlining your country and product choice, begin a thread on the Forum related to entry strategies as outlined in the text. Elicit comments from your classmates on your choices and begin to formulate your strategy. Learning from this milestone can be incorporated into the final paper due Week 5. * You are the Vice President of a pharmaceutical company that makes anti-malarial drugs. You are looking at the possibility of opening up a factory as a JV with the local government in an African country with high levels of malaria. At present, the majority of people in this country cannot afford the high prices of anti-malarial drugs from outside the country, but by building the plant locally, you would not only provide jobs but also your company could supply anti-malarial drugs to the local population at half the current price. In a meeting with a local government official, you are told that the plant can go forward if you pay the official $100,000 in cash. What are your options and what would you do? My options are to pay the $100,000 or not to pay it based on the company policy. Facilitation payments are still permitted by some countries. We would give the $100,000 to the officials in cash, and then we would also try to negotiate a 5 year tax break. And to recover the $100,000 given to officials, we would charge an extra 15 cents per vaccine sold to recoup the $100,000. We would say the fund is just the price of doing business and setting up relationships outside the US. This bribery is similar to what some city inspectors do when they want to give you a hard time. There has been times where if you didn’t have a nice hot cup of coffee with a $100 bill under it that the inspector would fail you just so you would have to pay another $250 for another inspection. The $100,000 that we would pay as a company could negotiate a vast amount of things per the article below. Interestingly, when the FCPA was initially passed in 1977, the facilitating payment exception was found under the definition of foreign official. However, with the 1988 Amendments, a more explicit exception was written into the statute making it clear that the anti-bribery provisions â€Å"shall not apply to any facilitating or expediting payment to a foreign official, political party, or party official the purpose of which is to expedite or to secure the performance of a routine governmental action . . .† The statute itself provided a list of examples of facilitation payments in the definition of routine governmental actions. It included the following: * Obtaining permits, licenses, or other official documents; * Processing governmental papers such as visas and work orders; * Providing police protection, mail services, scheduling inspections; * Providing utilities, cargo handling; or * Actions of a similar nature. http://tfoxlaw.wordpress.com/tag/facilitation-payments/ You are the Vice President of a US based software company. You have been tasked with exploring the possibility of setting up a software development operation in India. You have heard that the rigid caste systems can affect business operations. Do you think it is possible to use a typical US management style in India or should you adjust to the local Indian managerial style and employment practices? Explain. I would say yes I would use a typical US management style in India. I agree that adapting to India’s culture, managerial style and employment practices are great and would probably be best. But for the very same reason we are expanding aboard and going to India is because our business model has already been accepted by the culture. You only expand to markets if they are the right fit for the company. Bringing something new, innovative and showing India the way that our US company does business may just be intriguing to the country and accepted in ways never seen before; the only thing that matter is if the product sells. McDonalds is a great example; McDonalds is everywhere and consumers shop with McDonalds because the golden arches are known globally, and the business model is a cookie cutter from store to store, nothing changes. Understanding how cultural differences can affect the way in which a business is practiced, Employing local citizens, mixing managerial staff ,educating ourselves about the culture are great and must do’s, but keeping the company’s business model intact and adjusting to the environment is the key to protecting ourselves from the danger of being ill-informed. Business and money are both universal languages and there are more ways to make it work within a proven system than not. Businesses create strategies for setting up relationships with other countries based upon the type of product involved and whether their entry is in the product market or the resource market. â€Å"Strategy† within this global framework most closely resembles a ‘marketing strategy’ that addresses target markets, segmentation, positioning and allocation of resources. Discuss the various strategies outlined within the text reading and which one or two seem to fit your final project country and product best. Provide a glimpse of your final paper by discussing the product and country you have selected and post and respond to students My product selection is infection prevention, innovative sterilization, disinfection and hand hygiene products that will be sold in Canada. * The â€Å"International Strategy† I think would work the best for my product. Medical products and medical technical equipment accounts for $8.8 billion in US export revenue which is ranked number 6 on the list of top exports to Canada from the US. Infection prevention, innovative sterilization, disinfection and hand hygiene products are produced in the US but, are needed worldwide. Currently the US is the major exporter Medical products, medical technical equipment to Canada; also Leading US pharmaceutical companies have production, R&D facilities, and distribution offices in many locations across Canada. Among them are Abbott Point-of-Care, Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, Novartis, and others. The medical devices industry in Canada is also among the largest in the world. Medical device companies operating in Canada incorporate advanced technologies and the newest discoveries. Our main focus is on helping to ensure the safest possible environments for patients and their families, healthcare workers, providers and communities. Our quality infection prevention products help care for both the people and the world we live in. * The Global Standardization stratedgy is great because the pro that will be sold are all relatively standard, and will be distributed the same way. Customization is not needed to the products themselves, the only thing that will need adjustments is the language, all sterilization equipment, solutions, and products are manufactured the same and have the same technology. http://www.jnj.com/connect/about-jnj/company-structure/medical-devices/ http://www.aspjj.com/us/about/asp-mission-vision http://www.jnj.com/connect/about-jnj/company-structure/medical-devices/ http://www.worldsrichestcountries.com/top_us_exports.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnson_%26_Johnson http://www.canadafaq.ca/what+are+the+top+industries+in+canada/ I am selling a pacemaker in Australia. The â€Å"International Strategy† would be the best for my product. It is produced in the US currently and does not need customization to sell in Australia. Pacemakers fulfill a universal need. Australia imports 85-90% of medical devices. Currently the US is the major exporter of medical supplies to Australia followed by Germany, Japan and the EU. There is no pressure to reduce costs. A strategic alliance may be needed down the road if a strong competitor does start to emerge. It is important that the pacemaker evolves over time or competitors will develop a better product. â€Å"Global Standardization† may be an option because customization of the pacemaker is not needed. It is a universal product. Costs will be low. Aggressive pricing can be used. The drawback is a competitor may create a better product through evolution. â€Å"Localization† would not work because customization is not needed. Consumer tastes and preferences do not come into play for this product. â€Å"Transnational† is also not needed at this time because cost is not a factor and customization for local demands do not exist. This is a complex strategy that I will not need to apply. Because of local culture, I will need to find a local agent to work with in Australia. The aging population, demands for a higher quality of life and increasing affluence have created a demand for quality medical devices. Reference: Global Business Today My project is to import car care and weather resistant equipment into Canada. This is not a new idea and it is not a product that cannot be found really anywhere in the world. The strategy that seems to fit my project best is the international strategy. The reason is that it is not unique in idea. The vital importance is expanding the market for the product. There will be minimal change to the product and with the non existent trade barriers of NAFTA importation will go smoothly. Since the majority of the Canadian population lives so close to the US borer transportation costs will not extend far beyond deliveries to the NorthEast/NorthWest. The other option would be a Localization strategy as we could focus on specific markets such and alternative transportation vehicles equipment that are used in the snowbound areas. The Localization strategy is the most important in the marketing aspect.The localization and transnational strategies are the best matches for my proposed product which is a UK-based channel on YouTube that is mostly ran from the United States. My product is based on my current occupation and we have several international channels that have launched with steady success. There are four major international business strategies: globalization, transnational, international, and localization. Globalization strategy occurs when a firm focuses on profit by utilizing economies of scale, localization, and learning efforts. This strategy is the most helpful when firms are pressured to reduce costs and local responsiveness is low. International strategy occurs when a firm creates value by selling products internationally that were created domestically and do not require significant customization. Transnational strategy occurs when a firm tries to achieve lower costs by economies of scale, localization, and learning efforts and also focusing on products that are tailored to local markets. Economies of scale and learning efforts will not be factors within my strategy, however localization plays a large role. Because some of the content on the channel will be created in the UK to create a sense of community, creative contractors will create the content which lends itself to a more identifiable relationship with consumers. Expanding a content-based business from the United States to the UK benefits best from concise localization strategy. Content that is tailored for a consumer in the UK adheres to high local responsibility. Because both countries are English-speaking, content can be shared by both venues and avoid translation costs or and also reduce cost of creating content. This may help alleviate the localization strategy’s characteristic struggle to lower the high pressure for cost reductions. References: Hill, C. W. (2011). Global Business Today (7th Edition ed.). New York, NY, USA: McGraw-Hill. I am selling a pacemaker in Australia. The â€Å"International Strategy† would be the best for my product. It is produced in the US currently and does not need customization to sell in Australia. Pacemakers fulfill a universal need. Australia imports 85-90% of medical devices. Currently the US is the major exporter of medical supplies to Australia followed by Germany, Japan and the EU. There is no pressure to reduce costs. A strategic alliance may be needed down the road if a strong competitor does start to emerge. It is important that the pacemaker evolves over time or competitors will develop a better product. â€Å"Global Standardization† may be an option because customization of the pacemaker is not needed. It is a universal product. Costs will be low. Aggressive pricing can be used. The drawback is a competitor may create a better product through evolution. â€Å"Localization† would not work because customization is not needed. Consumer tastes and preferences do not come into play for this product. â€Å"Transnational† is also not needed at this time because cost is not a factor and customization for local demands do not exist. This is a complex strategy that I will not need to apply. Because of local culture, I will need to find a local agent to work with in Australia. The aging population, demands for a higher quality of life and increasing affluence have created a demand for quality medical devices.