Amazon Case Study

Assignment 4. Amazon Case Study

Divya Chawhan

Student ID: 10444

BA- 380 Business Strategy and Decision Making

Prof. Alex

1a. Analyze possible scenarios for the evolution of the mobile technology industry?

The mobile technology industry is one of the fastest growths besides the Internet.  Mobiles have gone through a huge change and its market has expanded globally.  Since 1994, the cell phone industry has increased from 24 million to about 182 million in wireless phone and related devices operating in the United States with some 162-million mobile-phone users in the United States alone.  

The industry has boomed and has shown immense advancement in web interactivity and software apps. In the last decade, mobile devices have seen a lot of change from simple phones to pocket size computers, which has all the features of a desktop or laptop computer. This trend has given rise to enormous development in mobile software and design. This mobile software has millions of user-friendly applications for ever growing smartphone market places. The mobile networks which support the smartphones to work quickly and reliably have shown rising advancement form 2G networks to 4G networks, high speed wireless internet, The term smartphone only came popular after Apple introduces their first smartphone in 2007 – iPhone. I believe Apple’s biggest success was at their application section as they open up the development to everyone. Since modern smartphones are more like computers than cell phones in a classical sense, they naturally needed a fully functional OS of their own. Because of this, several companies such as Apple, Google, and Microsoft all came out with their own competing mobile operating systems that gave a full-scale interface to digital media access and software applications compatibility Evidence also suggests that these devices are becoming more and more important in people’s lives

In terms of how they have encouraged the widespread popularity of smartphones and other mobile devices and have transformed electronic gaming, Internet retailing, and social networking. As major competitors in this arena, Apple and Google have endeavored to distinguish themselves in terms of their relationships with app developers, numbers and uniqueness of apps available, as well as the marketplaces in which the apps are sold. While these battles are waged, others (Blackberry & Amazon) have continued to find their loyal users and niches in the market.

1b.Where is it on the Industry Life Cycle? What are the major factors of development?

Mobile Phones industry is at mature phase of its life cycle. Now every person has a mobile handset in his/her hand. That shows the kind of growth and market potential the mobile phone market has. Looking at the statistics, 91% of the US adult population currently owns a cell phone and of that 91%, 61% are smartphones. Further illustrating the popularity of smart phones 1 billion are expected to sell in the coming year, doubling that of the number of PCs.

With over 10 billion mobile Internet devices expected to be in use by 2016, the mobile application industry will grow tremendously to match demand and keep up with ever-evolving technologies.

At this phase of mature stage the mobile phone industry should be more careful to keep them sustainable and competitive. This could be possible by the strategic transformation in their product, processes and also in the services. Product and process transformation is very easy to implement but now the need of service transformation. This is one of the most important aspects for an organization to keep it sustainable and competitive that was being avoided earlier by most of the organizations in mobile phone industry. But with the increase in competition among various market players, to attain the sustainability and competitive advantage they have come up with new strategies and service transformation is one of the best example of the strategic management that has helped a lot to this industry to keep it sustainable.

2.Which business strategies do the major competitors use in this case?

Business Strategies:

Apple: It became the world’s most successful company due to a powerful competitive strategy. That strategy conceptualized by co-founder Steve Jobs, combines innovation in products, services, and business models. From near-bankruptcy in 1997, Apple’s revitalization really took off in the fall of 2001 when it introduced the iPod, a portable digital music player. Eighteen months later, Apple soared even higher when it opened the online store iTunes, quickly followed by its first retail stores. Apple’s stock market valuation reached $623 billion, making it the most valuable public company of all time.