Competitive Strategies and Government Policies Essay

Competitive Strategies and Government Policies - Essay Example Though recent developments are forcing automobile manufactures to either innovate or lose, most have responded with the willingness to retain their market shares in the future as well. Newcomers, Mergers and Globalization A horizontal merger between Porsche and Volkswagen (VW) took place on 5 July 2012. VW bought half of Porsche’s operations for â‚ ¬4.4 billion and â€Å"one VW ordinary share for the 50.1pc of Porsche’s car-making activities that it does not already own† (Osborne, 2012). As a result of the merger, Porsche’s 911 sports car became a part of VW luxury car production of marques Bentley and Bugatti, budget brand Skoda, as well as of the MAN and Scania truckmakers (Osboren, 2012). This merger was horizontal, as both of these companies have a share in the total global car sales. The merger was not declared anti – competitive because of companies’ market shares. According to Farrell and Shapiro (1990), horizontal mergers are of gr eat concern to authorities as some through increased market share engage in uncompetitive behavior, such as higher prices (p.107). Porsche cars comprised only 0.2 percent of the market shares in terms of sales in the United States in December 2012 (The Wall Street Journal, 2013). VW comprised 3.2 percent (The Wall Street Journal, 2013). ... Besides mergers, new companies have been entering the automobile industry. With recent changes in technology and environmental awareness, new companies striving for a larger market share belong to the electrical car section of the automobile industry. Such is Coda Motor Company (2013). There are additional electrical car producers, such as Tesla Motors (Tesla Motors, 2013), Wheego Electric Cars (2013), Venturi (2013) and Saba Motors (2009). However, all of these companies, regardless of how innovative they are, are affected by globalization. According to the trade models, countries with lower labor costs can produce the same goods at a lower cost than those with higher, thus shifting low skilled production activities to the former (Nunnenkamp & Spatz, 2002, p.5). Though the automobile industries are highly capital and human capital intensive, production started shifting to cheaper countries with a rise in foreign direct investment (Nunnenkamp & Spatz, 2002, p.9). As a result, less th an 70 percent of production takes place nowadays in developed countries, including the traditional producers such as Japan, the United States and Germany (Nunnenkamp & Spatz, 2002, p.5). The least intensive types of production take place in developing countries. For example, German companies produce auto parts domestically, but engines are produced abroad (Nunnenkamp & Spatz, 2002, p.5). Thus, there are new suppliers of automobiles. Due to the cheaper labor, the European periphery (Greece, Spain, Portugal and Ireland), Central and Eastern Europe, China and several other industrializing Asian countries, and Mexico among other countries, have been producing automobile parts since the 1980’s (Nunnenkamp & Spatz, 2002, p.6, 41). By 1998, Latin American countries’ market share amounted to

Movie on Social Network Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Movie on Social Network - Essay Example Facebook is one of the most leading social networking websites. According to a survey it has more than 800 million active members. But the Facebook did not come from thin air like that. In fact the idea evolved from Facemash, the predecessor to Facebook. On October 2003, Mark Zuckerberg while attending Harvard as an undergraduate made this site in which pictures of girls from the nine houses, placing two next to each other were compared as hot or not. However, authorities took notice and Mark was charged for violating rules and breaching security. But this incident gave Mark his first recognition. Though initially promising his expert programming skills in making a social network HarvadConnections.com to his seniors, Mark changed his mind. And with the help of his friends especially Eduardo Saverin , who was the co founder and did the initial investment, launched â€Å"The FACEBOOK†. During the course time Mark met the entrepreneur Sean Parker, who advised him on various matters. And in summer 2004, base of operations was shifted to California Investors like Peter Theil from PayPal invested in and THE FACEBOOK became FACEBOOK. By that time it had over 300,000 members, 160 schools including 5 in Europe. Various features like relationship status, nonstop server, tagging pictures and the â€Å"wall† were introduced. At this time shares were allotted, Mark 51%, Eduardo 34.4%, and Sean7 % and so on. Later Eduardo 34.4%, were diluted to0 .03% and was thrown out of the company as more companies were coming in, and Sean became the President of the company (Fincher, 2010). Celebrating their millionth member party Sean was caught by the cops on using drugs. At that point, the seniors from Harvard had filed a case in the federal court against the facebook, and claimed that it was initially their idea. Eventually, they received settlement money and signed a non