Sport Team Brand Identity Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2750 words

Sport Team Brand Identity - Case Study Example Brand identity takes on a more specific meaning when relating to sports team brands thanks to the degree to which individuals tend to identify with their favorite teams. As is suggested by Birrell (1981), sport in today's society has, in many ways, taken on the importance of ritual from ancient societies and provides the individual with a means of connecting with the rest of the community, something that seems increasingly lacking in other areas of postmodern industrialized life. While brand identity is an integral part of the branding concept and of the business as a whole, much of the existing research regarding this issue has focused on the ideas of brand association rather than identity. Brand associations are essentially the component parts of brand identity. They can include various attributes, such as 'consistent', 'fun' or 'trustworthy', particular images, such as the brand logo, a particular jingle or any number of different means by which individuals begin to associate with the brand. Numerous theories have been brought forward regarding the particularities of brand identity in the sport team setting, several of which will be examined. By examining the relationship between brand identity and brand associations, it is possible to trace how brand associations contribute to and become a part of brand identity. By measuring brand associations in team sport, elements of brand identity can be discovered. Branding ha... 194). The term itself has undergone an extreme transformation in recent years. Although once identified as simply the swoosh on the side of a Nike athletic shoe, the term 'brand' has grown to encompass many aspects of a company. "Brands are not simply products or services. Brands are the sum totals of all the images that people have in their heads about a particular company and a particular mark" (Scott Bedbury, CEO of Brandstream, a Seattle-based marketing consultancy, quoted in Kalin, 2001). The term has come to refer to not only the images a company produces in order to call their product or services to mind, but also the products sold, the services rendered, the building in which the company is headquartered or even the country in which it originated as well as the methods used to project these ideas and images to the broader public - the brand identity. To remain competitive in the world today, just about anything can be identified with a brand if it is so chosen - companies, mu seums, hospitals, even individual people. According to Aaker (1996), strong brands work for the company to help them develop a strong consumer base through broad recognition of the brand identity. This recognition then further works for the company by serving as a weapon to counter growing competition in a shrinking market (Barwise & Robertson, 1992). Corporations can then further use this position to help launch new extensions, such as a line of athletic clothes for Nike or a new flavor for Toblerone (Aaker & Keller, 1990). However, this kind of recognition has also come to imply a much greater responsibility on the part of the company to ensure all aspects of their business are strong. There are four

Racial Relations in the U.S Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Racial Relations in the U.S - Essay Example Another thing that became a major hindrance in the community is racial abuse. Racial abuse has resulted in diversified and serious effects on adolescents and adults. The effects of racial harassment have long-standing issues and may stretch through out the life span. Short term or long term bullying tend to have serious mental difficulties on adults. Adults who continue to bully get into serious troubles and commit crimes like, marital violence, child abuse etc. It also affects the cordial relationship between the family members and friends. Though inequalities still exists, it doesn't mean that there shouldn't be any racial and ethnical categorization. In the present world scenario utmost importance is given to human rights. Under United Nations resolution human rights to every citizen of every country should be considered as an important factor. It's every country's responsibility to protect its citizen's basic human rights. Human rights violation should be considered as a serious offence, legal and appropriate action should be taken against those who violate these rights Assessing student's abilities and disabilities is the major factor and teachers should strive to identify these issues. By identifying their strengths and weaknesses one can easily work on these issues. Self-confidence plays an important role in everyone's lives. It is the deciding factor that decides a winner and a loser. In US the Blacks are the largest immigrants. They migrated from the far lands of the black continent Africa. In the past, since these countries were not as developed as US and their socio-economic structure was on decline, many of the citizens were forced to work as slaves and have to migrate to US. In US, Black immigrants have less education and less skill set, even among Black women also. Apart from other groups these Blacks have less human capital, so they have very less employers in their group and it is indirectly affecting their economic status and social environment also. Gender inequality was always prevailed among the Blacks. Since they were not the major community and further more they were immigrants, they had to face the brunt of racial abuse. One of the reasons of racial abuse was, fear among the US citizens was losing the jobs to these immigrants. Since the Blacks were ready to work for fewer wages there always lies the danger of losing jobs. Most of the Blacks were more or less unskilled or semi-skilled. This makes them of losing jobs very often. This brings more responsibilities on average Black women. Now she has to work outside to meet the daily requirements and look after the family. Journal 2 Bullying and racial harassment were the most dreaded things that most of the blacks and their children experienced in the pre and post civil war. The major reasons to start bullying and racial abusing depends on the characters surrounding the respective environment (like parents, neighbors, etc.,), children will face the immediate effect since they are the immediate guardians to the children, if not this parents or teachers at school whoever are close to the children with respect to time get to influence them. Human beings develop or grow by observing the surroundings and so they are called as social animals. The madness of depression is the antithesis of violence. It is a storm indeed, but a storm of murk. Soon evident are the slowed-down responses, near

Condition vs. Statement Analysis Coursework Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Condition vs. Statement Analysis - Coursework Example Horizontal analysis makes use of comparisons over two or more years in both currency and percentage forms. Vertical analysis on the other hand, takes into account entries of the balance sheet and presents them as percentages of the total. Finally, ratio analysis is used in financial statement analysis to show the statistical correlation of data (Finkler, Purtell, Calabrese, and Smith, 2013). The use of financial statement analysis is primarily aimed at informing effective decision making process. While financial statement analysis evaluates the financial performance of an organization from its financial data records to showcase performance, financial condition analysis on the other hand, aims at measuring the position of the business or entity at hand. Two considerations under financial condition analysis include resource flow, and resource stock (Studenmund, 2011). Under resource flow, financial condition analysis takes into account financial indicators such as total margin, charge to expense, and debt service ratios. It also considers financial performance through change in net assets (Finkler, Purtell, Calabrese, and Smith, 2013). Under resource stock, financial condition analysis takes into account financial ratios (indicators) such as quick for testing liquidity, net assets for measuring solvency, debt to asset for measuring leverage, and capital assets condition for measuring capital (Finkler, Purtell, Calabrese, and Smith, 2013). The use of financial condition analysi s is primarily aimed at acknowledging the performance or position of the entity at hand. Finkler, Purtell, Calabrese, and Smith (2013) points that external factors have impact on an organization’s financial performance. In this case, financial condition analysis considers external factors such as competition, market stability, exchange rates, and market volatility. Under these factors, financial condition analysis aims at testing how much the business is able to

Evacuation Sources Questions Essay Example for Free

Evacuation Sources Questions Essay Well, to answer this question I must first analyse both the sources, source B is a picture depicting what seems to be a class of evacuees and their teacher walking down the road, probably to the train station to be evacuated. The picture shows many of the children waving and smiling, and what seems like a lot of them skipping, showing them being happy about being evacuated. Being a photograph, it is quite unlikely that it has been changed in any way, or staged to show the children being happy, as the scene seems quite natural. However it is still possible that it was staged by the government at the time to encourage people not to resist evacuating their children, this would be done by showing the children happy and carefree, not afraid or worried about it. Also the picture was taken at the start of the war, when not many people had been evacuated, at this time the children and their families may not know exactly where they were going, and may have treated it like a holiday, so therefore they probably wouldnt be to afraid about what was happening. So, overall this source is quite a useful source, but that of course depends on what for, it is useful for showing childrens reactions to being evacuated at the start of the war, however this wouldnt be useful for any time before or after this, limiting its usefulness. This also could, if it was a staged photograph by the government, be useful for showing what the government wanted people to think. Source C however is quite different to the previous source, this is an interview with a school teacher during the evacuation, in 1988, in this source, it offers a different view of the childrens feelings about being evacuated, in this source, it tells us that the children were afraid to talk, showing that they werent care or worry free about the situation. This source is primary evidence, as the person was there at the time, however this is taken in 1988, and the person could very well have forgotten some of the details of the evacuation, and therefore their memory of the event could be unreliable. However this might not be the case, and therefore it could be quite reliable. Overall, I think that source B is the most reliable, as it is a photograph taken at the time, and therefore the details of the situation would nearly definitely be correct, source C however is an account from memory and therefore the details could be wrong. Source D is a photograph taken by the government during the war of evacuees being bathed, it shows three bath tubs close together with all the children washing and laughing, this scene would be likely to give the impression that the children, and the places they went to were hygienic, this would lessen the worries of the childrens families, and also may convince more people to become host families, because the children here seem healthy, clean and happy, not dirty smelly children with bad manners, as was many peoples views of them. Also this may convince people to evacuate their children, as many families living in the cities were to poor to even bath their children, so this would be seen as an improvement in their lifestyle and living conditions. Also, if this picture was taken after around January 1940, when many evacuees returned, many of their reasons being that they felt they were better of at home, and that life with the host families was unhappy, or the parents believed this to be so, then this photograph could be being used by the government to convince families to keep their children with host families, that life out there wasnt as bad as it was made out to be. So overall I think that it really depends on when this photo was taken, which would determine why it was taken.

The Customer Segmentation In Indian Banking System Business Essay

The Customer Segmentation In Indian Banking System Business Essay About two decades ago, when private players started rolling out their services, the state-run banks, who had in their grip almost entire retail customers in India, sensed it could be the beginning of a change, but probably never realised it would come with so much force and hit them hard. And they sure had no idea that after moving at an elephants pace for so many decades, they might be forced to change quickly and probably beyond recognition. The arrival of private banks, and in a limited way the foreign banks, changed the way banking was done in India. They changed retail customers expectations and the preferences and now in a fiercely competitive space, every bank wants to get a handle on the rapidly changing consumers taste and raise its service to retain and gain the market share. Our study conducted on educated middle-class working professionals in New Delhi offers an insight into how todays customers are picking their banks and ending contacts with those, which fail to satisfy them. The surveys findings underline the traditional services such as prompt and courteous services at branches are still important for bank customers. The study clearly highlights that customers value banks with bigger network of branches and ATMs as they consider it more reliable. Customers do prefer to have an account with a bank where their family members already have one. They also put a premium on a range of so-called new range of services: lower call waiting and the ability of the customer care staff to quickly understand their problem and connect them to the right executive.   Another interesting outcome was that most customers had more than one bank account and thus could pick bank for specific services. Introduction: India is on the path to become a global economy. Financial Institution specially banking industry plays a very important part in Indias growth. Banking in India originated in the last decades  of the 18th century. The oldest bank in existence in India is the State Bank  of India, a government owned bank  that traces its origins back  to June 1806. Central banking is the responsibility of the Reserve Bank of India, which in 1935 formally  took over  these responsibilities from the then Imperial Bank of  India.  After Indias independence, the Reserve  Bank was given broader  powers. In 1969 the government nationalized the 14 largest commercial  banks; another six banks were nationalised in 1980. Currently, India has 88 scheduled commercial banks  (SCBs)- 27 public sector  banks,  33 private  banks and 38 foreign  banks. They have a combined network of  over 53,000 branches and 17,000 ATMs network. Banking In India can be divided into three distinctive time period as described below. Pre-Nationalization Era: Private banks with individual holding were present in pre-nationalization era and Lockout of Banks were the reality in those days. With very little security regulatory mechanism Banks were functioning as discrete assets and there is very little presence of consumer services and security of assets. Post-Nationalization Era: With the backdrop of large no of incident regarding lock out of banks, Central Government had to take a drastic step and they had done the same by nationalization of Banks. Due to involvement of the Government, credibility of banks increased many fold and banking as a sector has started to grow in India. Due to very low or no competition at all government owned banks had started to function like monopolistic services with very little focus on customer services. IT-enabled era: After 1991 private banks with sound security mechanism were again allowed to enter into the banking segment. ICICI Bank, Axis Bank, HDFC Bank started their operation with state of the art IT infrastructure, which enable them with better service delivery and meet consumer expectation. Following the same trend and due to Government regulation Government owned banks like SBI, PNB, BOB had also started providing customer services through IT enablement. Due to some recent development like non-regularization of interest rate some banks had also gone ahead and started to offer differentiated product to make the banking more interesting. Recently government has started to think for allowing business houses for having the banking license. This can really be a game changer for Banking industry as more no of bank will open and try to fetch customers from the competitors with focus on customer preferences. As far as the customer segmentation in Indian Banking system is concerned, it is divided into three broad segments. Corporate: B2B transactions are covered in this segment Mid-Corporate: Transactions with SME is considered under this segment. Retail: Small individual customers are covered under this segment The opening of the banking sector to the private players and Indias rapid economic growth in the past decade has dramatically changed the financial sector landscape in the country. The keen competition brought customers to the centre-stage something unimaginable till about two decades ago when the state-run banks held monopoly and customers convenience was barely on their agenda. The power has now clearly shifted from banks to the customers, as private players scrambled to gain market share by raising service level, introducing innovative products and deploying technology at an unprecedented scale to woo customers. The expansion of foreign players, though limited, raised the consumers expectation and fuelled further competition. To match the private players, leading state-run banks initially, followed by regional banks, have raised the game and now probably every player is willing to give an arm and a leg to get an insight into the consumers behaviour. We have limited our research to educated working middle class in New Delhi a retail sub-segment that is attractive to banks because of paucity of time and resources. The findings cannot be generalized for the entire country. Review of Literature The Ernst Young Global Banking Consumers Survey 2011 has highlighted how customers were increasingly switching banks and preferring transparency to loyalty. The report said pricing was critical to customer satisfaction, although most customers had no idea how much they pay each year for services. Transparency over pricing and service promises is vital if banks are to deliver something customers value. An under-delivery of promised service was a big turn off for customers. Uppal, R. K. (2010), analysed in his study the complaints against Indian Public sector, private and foreign banks. The majority of complaints received were against the public sector banks and the complaints were related to deposit, credit cards and housing loans, clearly showing how state-run firms were unable to raise the quality of services. The study recommends the strategy to mitigate the complaints. RBI Report, Committee on Customer Service in Banks (2011), analysed evaluation of customer services in Indian Banking History. The main objective of the study was to find existing customer services in the Indian Banking system and future roadmap on the same. Authors have emphasized on customer education, involvement of stakeholders for launching any new services, comprehensive banking regulation. Focus on technology will also become major indicator for rolling out and success of services such as Internet Banking. Performance Assurance scheme for enforcing the banks to follow strict performance guideline is also mentioned in the report. Various other improvement aspects like issuing Photo ATM card and fraud detection procedure were also listed in the report. In his research on customers preference (2012), Md Nur-E-Alam Siddique of ASA University in Bangladesh has concluded that the most important factors influencing customers in selecting a private banks are speed and quality of customer services, image of the bank and quality online banking facility. The customers, however, chose a nationalized bank mainly due to low interest rate on loan, safety of deposits and convenient location, the report said. Mosad Zineldin, an Associate Professor at Stockholm University, brought forth some interesting trends in his research on bank customers preferences. The study said the price and advertising had a minor effect in a bank selection, while functional quality such as friendliness and helpfulness of staff, accuracy in account transaction management, efficiency in correcting mistakes were the major determinants of bank selection. Kannan. P., et al. (2012), emphasized in their study that service quality was an interesting field to evaluate the customer satisfaction. The main objective of the study was to examine the consumer preference towards the banking services in rural areas on the basis of (i) demography (ii) type of banks (public, private and cooperative bank). (iii) customers preferences. This study concluded that the satisfaction level of the rural customer was good. Research Methodology: We have adopted Descriptive Research Design for conducting the Research. Under Descriptive Research design we have conducted cross-sectional design, where data have been collected only once from the target audience. Another important point for emphasis in the research design part is that Indian Banks segment its customer mostly in three major category i.e. Retail, Mid- Corporate Corporate. For the purpose of this research project we will only consider the retail segment or the individual customer. As we have only followed the Convenience Sampling method for collection of data that too only for a segment of consumers, so it will not be possible for generalizing the result across the other segment. After reviewing the literature we have segmented customer preference in five key segments as shown below in the picture. Skill, responsiveness, friendliness Variety, cost, suitability Credibility, Technological efficiency Processes, Rules, Waiting time, Speed Network, location, phone/online Among the 5 segments shown above, image and personal of a Banking System is very difficult to change. Access of the banking system is majorly related to the investment that the Bank can undertake for improving its IT backbone. Product and services are can easily be changed if the entire infrastructure is already available with the bank. Survey questionnaire was designed based on the five key factor of customer effectiveness, as shown above. Flow of the questionnaire is described in the diagram below. Questionnaire was designed in the Google spreadsheet and link of the survey was shared in the mail for the sake of convenience. Another important aspect of data collection through Google spread sheet is that, a high amount of data integrity check is already built into the system as user can not pick up any alternative other than mentioned in the web format. Conclusion:- The research findings have brought good news for the banks. Most respondents (81 percent) are happy with customer services at banks, thereby giving the existing banks a pat on their back, while signaling that new entrants will find it extremely difficult to find a toehold in the fiercely competitive banking market once the RBI were to issue new licences. Family again has come to the rescue of the banks in India as majority of our respondents prefer a bank if their family members already have an account there. Banks with greater network of branches and ATMs are preferred over those with smaller networks. Customers see high value and reliability in dealing with large-network banks. Customers naturally also value lower service charges. So for any new entrant in the Indian Banking Sector has to offer low cost services to consumer for attracting them in their fold.

Gene Therapy :: essays research papers

In the world today, medicine brings together science, faith, and values most clearly in its complexity and necessity. An example would include homosexuality. Science has developed over the years and is now starting to manipulate the human mind, body and spirit. Scientists that are now working with DNA and gene therapy have identified the genes for homosexuality and have also discovered a way to eliminate it from fetuses by altering genes before birth so that homosexuality can be eradicated from humans eventually and permanently. Many different religions see homosexuality as a sin, psychologists see it as abnormal behavior and many governments have declared it illegal and punishable. I myself do not believe in changing the human genes to eradicate a sexual preference. I would not advocate this procedure for members of my family or friends who are having babies, and/or for a society as a whole. There are many reasons as to why I do not agree to the procedure of gene therapy eradicating homosexuality from humans eventually and permanently. One reason that I do not agree with the procedure is because I believe it would eliminate the freedom of sexual preference throughout our society. As Thomas Jefferson stated in "The Declaration of Independence," "We hold these truths to be self- evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness"(314). If we are told that we have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, then we should have the right to live with the homosexuality gene and have the right to sexual preference. No one should have to give up that freedom. A freedom that homosexuals would most likely consider a source of happiness. Homosexuals are happy with their sexual preference and should not be condemned fo r it. Sexual preference is not showing good or evil. It is a way of life. Another reason is that by finding a gene for homosexuality and eliminating it from fetuses and from humans is a way of tampering with nature. I believe that if the gene was put in a human, it was put there for a reason. God and nature placed it there. By taking the gene out you are changing life from the way God made it. I think that this is morally wrong.

Geely Company Analysis

Geely Company Analysis When globalization becomes a circumstance, many companies try to open oversea market. Here, we’d like to take a look at a Chinese private-own automobile company Geely. As china’s top car maker, Geely abstracted the world’s eyes recently. In 2004, Geely plans to export 5,000 vehicles to the Middle East, South America and North Africa after shipping 1,000 cars to Syria in the fourth quarter of 2003 at US$4,000-$6,000 each. This year, Geely wants to open US market. But with many strong competiters in car manufactory in US, with weak reputation around chinese product, How does Geely find an appropriate approach to develop its business? This paper will try to find the answer. First, we will introduce Geely background to help reader know its history and present situation. Then we will do SWOT analysis and Entry mode comparison toward its current status to find a better approach for Geely to enter in US. We will cover chapter 4 and chapter 14 in this paper. Company opportunity Although it’s hard for a new automotive manufactor enter in US market, which is roughly saturated and full of strong competitors, Geely still has its own advantages and oppotunities. Its super-low price becomes a brick to knock the door of US low end vehicles market. Some other famous and successful brand bulid a good model for Geely in car image, design etc. Also, US market is huge and American people have a high consumption, if Geely can catch the oppotunities, the chance to success will be great. Now, let’s take a look at its company background. Company background Geely automobile company was found on March, 1997 in Zhe Jiang China. It is a private own automobile company. The registered capital of this company is RMB 20 million. In 2001, Geely automobile became the first approved private company in terms of automobile manufacture in mainland China. The chairman of the company is Li Shu Fu. He has good relationships with the Chinese government leaders and Zhe Jiang province government leaders. China has high economic growth rates since 1980s. Many Chinese people make a lot of money every year. Most of them want to own cars or need cars for many easons. So the Chinese car market become bigger and bigger. It provides a good opportunity to Li Shu Fu and his employees to realize their dream: â€Å"Make the best Cars, ordinary People Can Afford. † Geely automobile company hires many workers to produce different styles cars in Zhe Jiang province and operates big business in mainland China, Middle East, southern America and Africa. The operatio n of the company can affect the economic growth of Zhe Jiang province. So, Geely automobile company always gets support from the Zhe Jiang province government. Gerry automobile company is focusing on low-income market in mainland China. In the first half of 2003, Geely Company produced 34360 units of cars and renews the lowest prices of its products in the automobile industry, so the company shared 3. 84% of the total Chinese car market. At the same, the company made technical cooperation agreement with German Rucker Company. The cooperation agreement helps Geely automobile to improve its products’ quality quickly. This company gets success in domestic market after its first car launched off in Linhai City Zhejiang Province. On June, 2003, the one hundred thousand Geely care launched off in Zhejiang Province. This company has import & export license and the ISO 9001 quality system certification, so it is very easy for the company to export its products to other countries. Gerry Company tries to enter in international market since its foundation. The company sells its products or establishes extensive trading relationship in different countries and areas since 2003. It seems to get success in Middle East, Southern American and Africa because the company exports large quantities of products to those areas per year. This company is looking for the opportunities to enter the U. S. market now. S. W. O. T Analysis Since we have assumed that Geely has its potential to open the automobile market in American, then the next step is to analyze the company and automobile industry environment. One of tools is provided by our text book called â€Å"S. W. O. T† analysis which stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (Sulivan, 2002). * Strength A strength could be defined as something a company is good at doing or a characteristic that gives it enhanced competitiveness. It may include aluable physical and/or human assets, an achievement or attribute that takes the company in a position of market advantage, alliances or cooperative ventures, and so on(Thompson & Strickland, 2001, p117). For Geely Automobile Company, low cost of physical and/or human assets is one of the major strengths. As we know, although Chinese labor cost is not the lowest in the world, its cost is still much lo wer than lots of industrialized countries. Besides, the average cost of raw materials, plant, and land is also cheaper than some western countries. Moreover, Geely does not only have low cost labor but also has lots of valuable human assets. In 2003, Geely recuited some experienced managers into their team including former the General Manager of SAIC Volkswagen, Vice President of FAW Volkswagen Group, President of Dongfeng Automobile Institute Research, Chief Representative of German BMW and General Manager of China region after service company of Benz Company. These lower-cost advantages make Geely achieve its low price strategy among other competitors. On May, 2003, Geely sparkplug automobile popularization and renovate the newest and lowest price of automobile in the automobile industry. For instance, Geely makes some low-priced sedans. One of those is under the brand name, Haoqing minicar which is the cheapest on the Chinese market, at just 32,000 yuan which converts to $ 3,867 U. S. dollars. Some company’s alliances or cooperative ventures also build up its strength. On Dec. , 2002, Geely made contracts with Daewoo International Co. , Ltd and Maggiora S. p. A, a famous Italy automobile project group with respectively to develop CK-1 and CI-1 automobile project. On June,2003, Geely made a technical cooperation agreement with German Rucker Company. * Weakness A weakness is defined as something a company lacks or does poorly or a condition that makes the company at a disadvantage. A weakness may include lack of financial support, poor brand image or reputation and so on (Thompson & Strickland, 2001, p117). As we mentioned that Geely is a private owned company in our company background section, it is more difficult for them to get financial support in order to expand market or R&D. Furthermore, even though it made strategy corporation with several Shanghai and Zhejiang commercial banks, from an international perspective, â€Å"the lack of a strong relationship with a large bank with lobal connections† (Sulivan, 2002, p512) seems to be a big weakness for them. The second weakness is the reputation of Chinese products. For example, every time we, including Europeans, Americans even Asians, mention made-in-China products, we probably are talking about most of toys, shores, textiles or cheap electronics, but fewer of high-tech products. It is true for Chinese automobile manufacturers such as Geely that in order to open western markets they still have a long way to build their product images. * Opportunity It is no doubt that America has one of the most favorable automobile markets in the world. The political and businesses environment such as regulation are stable and well-developed. The income per capita is also ranked at top. Besides, its infrastructures such as freeways and national transportation network are also well built. For automobile manufacturers, they can either open luxury car markets or focus on mid-income or lower-income consumers. For foreign car makers especially from Asia, Japanese opened American market in 70’s and Korean opened in 90’s; the next might be from China. Threats Like opportunity, a threat is also viewed at whole industry level rather than each single company. In the automobile industry, the most common threat is a lot of competitors. There are not only many worldwide well-known brands such as General Motor, Ford, Toyota, Martz-Benz which produce different kinds of luxury automobiles for high-or-mid income consumers but also lots of small m anufacturers such as Hyundai, Geely, or Chery (another Chinese automobile company) which focus on lower-income market. Another threat is fueling fears. Since Asia economy boom, the demand of natural resource such as petroleum is increased dramatically. However, nowadays, the oil reserve is decreasing. Due to the high demand and short supply in oil, consumers start to consider not only the prices of automobiles but also the ability of gasoline saving while they purchase the cars. The change of consumer purchase behaviors will directly affect automobile manufactures’ market strategy and R&D. In sum, S. W. O. T analysis is very helpful for both domestic-oriented and international-oriented companies to analyze internal or external economic environment. However, after finish this analysis, there is another analysis to do – country analysis before we choose an appropriate entry model. US Country Analysis In US, automobiles play an important role in our daily lives. We can not finish our duties without driving a car. According auto Automotive News, there are 16 million cars in US. Most of the car sales are not made US car companies. US made cars sales is around 44. 9 %. That means 55% of cars sales in US are from foreign company. Japanese cars are the most sales cars in US. There are a lot of reasons why the Japanese cars are popular in US market. First, Japanese cars are better quality and lower price than US cars. Second, the Japanese cars saves their customers in gasoline cost. Because gasoline price increases so quickly, the US economy is experiencing a inflation problem. The daily life product prices are in a rise. People have less spending power than before. The market for cheap cars will increase year by year. On the other hand, people who have higher income still want to buy an expensive car. Most of the rich people want to buy Europe cars, such as BMW, Mercedes Benz, and Audi. As for the cheap car market, Korean cars are taking over most of the sales. China automobiles may have a good chance to break into US market, because China may be more competitive than Korean cars. The car come from China also consume less gas. It is may have a good opportunity to break into US market. Entry mode Since the objective for Geely Automotives is to eventually dominate the U. S. low end vehicles market, the most appropriate way for Geely automotives to do this would be through the direct exporting along with sales subsidiary method of entry. Geely will start out by selecting markets that are more susceptible to buying Chinese vehicles such as California and certain parts of Texas. Additionally, this process is set up to allow Geely to move carefully, develop a good foundation in the U. S. markets and if the future looks favorable then Geely may eventually grow and expand from there. Since China already has some of the lowest labor costs in the world, Geely automotives may be able to leave their manufacturing plant in China and the cars will then be directly exported to the U. S. from China. Once the cars arrive then Geely U. S. subsidiary will be responsible from there on and transport the vehicles to the dealerships for sale. To augment the exporting process, Geely will open up sales subsidiary dealerships in the selected locations in California and certain parts of Texas. The function of these sales subsidiaries will be sales, customer support and along with repair and maintenance on the vehicles. The management team will be also be imported from Geely’s headquarters in China, whereas sales, customer support and mechanics can be hired locally, since there is a good supply of well trained car salesmen in U. S. already. While a sales subsidiary dealership may be more expensive to set up in the U. S. than a simple sales branch, the sales subsidiary will be better for long term growth and the expenses should be off set by higher revenues earned from the subsidiary. According to Dr. Sullivan in Exploring International Business Environments, a sales subsidiary will also be better for long term growth because a sales subsidiary will allow Geely to â€Å"1. Be closer in touch with end-user needs. 2. Have more control over distribution channels, And 3. Being perceived by customers as more committed to the market. † ( 263). Dr. Sullivan also notes that the major disadvantage of a sales subsidiary is in finding sales personal with the right mix of experience, language skills and willingness to work for foreigners. However this should not be a big issue for Geely since there is a large Chinese population in California and many well trained sales people. (263). The major thrust behind Geely’s entry mode is to expand through economies of scale even if it means sacrificing short term profits. Lawrence Ang, executive director of Geely describes it clearly when he said in a recent news update: â€Å"We're the most aggressive market player in pursuing price-cuts and economies-of-scale strategies,† Ang continues by explaining that â€Å"Market share is relatively more important for us in the near term than profit margin because China's auto industry will experience a trend of declining profit margins in the next couple of years,† Furthermore, Ang concludes that â€Å"†We need a critical mass. Then we can push down our per-unit costs, leaving room for maneuvering on pricing. † (china. org. cn) Case study†¦ Hyundai Motors To understand the effectiveness of this entry mode better, let us look at Hyundai as an example. Hyundai first entered the U. S. market in 1986, their timing was perfect because it was a time when most automobile manufacturers were striving to dominate the higher-end markets, and this left plenty of room in the low end vehicles market. Hyundai took advantage of this by providing affordable cars for college students and lower income families. Hyundai also started out by exporting to Canada and later to the west and east coasts of U. S. where these markets are more liberal to foreign cars. Hyundai’s success was immediate, setting a record by selling their 100,000th Excel in just seven months of their first appearance. (Hyundai. com). With the American car manufacturers slowly loosing market share and Hyundai moving up in their target market, this could be the perfect opportunity for Geely to enter the U. S. market and reproduce Hyundai’s astounding results. Conclusion Eventually, as U. S. has huge demand of automobile, and slowly looses its market share to the Asian automobile manufacture, and as Hyundai moves to higher-end markets, this presents an opportunity for Geely. According to S. W. O. T analysis, Geely has its strength on low cost of natural resource and labor, and opportunity on focusing large demand of low-income consumers but the threat on powerful competitors, and weakness on poor reputation. Thus, if Geely could fully utilize its strength and opportunity, and build up its reputation by improving its qualities, we strongly believe that Geely could successfully enter U. S. market, and has high chance to capture part of U. S. automobile industries.