essay

Analysis of Apple and Alphabet

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Intra-Firm Value Chain & SWOT

Apple Inc’s strengths include its ability and capacity to produce effective hardware, software, application and services. It’s also a very powerful brand that is supported by its marketing and advertising capabilities and it also has the most loyal customer base. Apple also has a strong brand image, high-profit margins, and effective innovation processes. Apple’s weaknesses are that its products are highly-priced, it has ventured into various businesses that it is not competent in, its products are incompatible with other software, and a limited distribution network. Its opportunities include there is a high rising demand in laptops globally, the dependency on technology is increasing, globalization, it has an opportunity of diversifying their products and it has an opportunity of expanding their distribution network. The threats Apple Inc faces include new competitors in the market, product imitation, aggressive competition within blue-chip companies, and backdoor mechanism.

Alphabets Inc. Strengths include it has dominated the web search, browser usage, video content sharing, online advertising among other markets, it has demonstrated excellent acquisition capabilities, it is the biggest traffic generator, it has a vast market share and it is financially strong (Shittu, 2017). Its weaknesses are its privacy policies, it's over-dependence on advertising and its weak position in the cellphone and cloud technology industries. Its opportunities include venturing into the wearables market and cloud computing. It has an opportunity to diversify its business, and it can grow through acquisitions. Its threats are regulatory and legal pressures, its high R&D expenditure, its declining market share, and growing competition.

From the SWOT analysis, Apple has a higher competitive advantage compared to Alphabet Inc. Apple also enjoys a higher intra-firm value chain since it outsources the production of some of its products in China. However, Alphabet Inc. has a better distribution network.

Strategic Positioning & Strategy

Apple Inc's position strategy is the use of innovation and a strong brand. Through innovation, Apple Inc comes up with new products that are introduced into the market. With its strong brand and high customer retention rates, it can penetrate the market easily (Payne, 2017). Its strategy of corporate branding revolves around the emotions of the products. They practice advertising strategies that attach their products to certain emotions thus attracting more customers. They have introduced their own operating systems, hardware, and software which are integrated. That makes their products easy to use.

Alphabet Inc's main positioning strategy is derived from its large customer base. It has implemented three types of positioning. The first is multi-segment positioning where it offers a diversified portfolio of products to its large market base. The second is standby positioning whereby some of its products are not targeted to any demographic but any person willing to buy the products and lastly an imitative positioning, whereby it comes up with similar products with those already in the market in some instances.

Analyzing Willingness to Pay

Apple Inc has a high willingness to pay. That is evident as it has the highest retention rates in the mobile phone industry and iPhones are one of the most expensive phones in the market (Khan, & Ali, 2019). Alphabet Inc also has a high willingness to pay as it has a diversified portfolio that is used widely in the world. However, Apple Inc has a higher willingness to pay compared to Alphabet Inc.

Options-Led Approach to Making Strategic Choices

When making strategic choices, both Apple and Alphabet should be guided by their options. Apple faces a problem of diversification and a higher proportion of its revenue is from the sale of iPhones. Therefore, the management of Apple should promote innovation so they may diversify their product portfolio. That will increase their competitive position in the market. Alphabet has a diversified portfolio but depends on ads for a bigger proportion of their revenue (Wirtz, 2019). Therefore, they should also come up with other revenue models. Both companies have one product contributing to the giant share of their revenues. However, considering its profitability, Apple has a better future.

In 2017, Tom Cook was faced with the challenge of maintaining a management team and promoting innovation in Apple. During the year Apple’s headquarters were moved to Cupertino, California. It would be advisable for Tom Cook to come up with strategies that promote innovation. With such strategies, the management team should be encouraged to organizing and actualizing them thus reducing challenges in maintaining the management team. Tom Cook would also have to fire the non-cooperative management team members and hire others.

References

Khan, J., & Ali, G. (2019). A hedonic price analysis of consumer’s preferences and willingness to pay for quality attributes of apple. Sarhad Journal of Agriculture, 35(4), 1243-1246.

Payne, B. (2017). Brand Positioning and its Usefulness for Brand Management: the Case of Apple Inc. Newcastle business school student journal, 1(1), 51-57.

Shittu, A. A. (2017). An investigation of human resource management in the organization, on the example of “Google Inc.” (Doctoral dissertation, Тернопільський національний технічний університет ім. Івана Пулюя).

Wirtz, B. W. (2019). Google/Alphabet Case Study. In Digital Business Models (pp. 207-236). Springer, Cham.

Appendix

Assumptions

Assumptions in the analysis of Apple and Alphabet

It is assumed that the two companies face the same challenges that they faced at the time of the analysis.

It is assumed that the two companies have the same products during the time of the analysis.

It is assumed that the two companies have the same market dynamic they had in the time of the analysis.

From the case, it is assumed that Apple has a higher willingness to pay, higher competitive advantage, intra-value chain, and strategic position compared to Alphabet because of its strong brand and effective innovation strategies

Definitions

The willingness to pay - it is a concept that shows the maximum amount of money that a customer is willing to pay for a product or service.

Competitive position- it is the value that a brand, product, or service offers compared to other players in the market.

Strategic positioning- it is the way that a business or company distinguishes itself in a valuable way to earn a competitive advantage over its competitors.

SWOT analysis - It is a model that shows a company’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and weaknesses. It is used to identify a company’s competitive position

Option-led approach - It is an approach that shows the weaknesses of a company and suggests better alternatives.

Willingness to pay

The price elasticity of demand can be used to show how different customers are willing to pay for a product. The elasticity of demand shows the responsiveness of demand when the price of a product changes. When coming up with the willingness to pay, several techniques are used. They include

Attribute valuation- it involves conducting market surveys that show how and why a customer would pay for a particular product.

Revealed preference- The actual purchases of a customer is used to determine their willingness to pay

Discrete choice- uses the individual attributes of new products to identify customers’ willingness to pay.