“He was once a Market Leader”
The list of market leading companies that simply vanished in the last two decades is quite threatening. The fall of Eastman Kodak, Friendster, Netscape, Motorola and latest but most unbelievable BlackBerry and Blockbuster, rises goose-bumps when one imagines the future of today “market leading companies.”
While each of these companies suffered from its own particular fate:” rapid innovation, effectiveness of newest gadgets and lower prices by the competing companies”, are the stubbing key points that drove these big companies out of business.
However the inability of foreseeing future threats and the reluctance behind the ideology of being first in the market, such as in the case of Dell and Motorola, also enhanced the degree at which these companies exited their various markets.
There was no doubt about the dominance of Nokia as the world’s leading handset seller and Blackberry as the best corporate household name. Yet in less than five years these companies have fallen from grace and with their shares selling at a fraction of what it was 5 years ago.
Why they drastically fail? They underestimated the popularity of the smartphones given that most of their sales as of 2007 was not from smartphones. They thought getting into smartphone business would be a risky affair.
Risky or not, today many of these companies (Blockbuster is the example I can rapid think of) are still chasing after their companies instead of leading them, because they believe a brand is a tradition that needs to be sustain. However like the Angelina-Brad Pitt- and Jenifer history, Netflix taught this later company that, a leader who does not embrace change is doomed to failure.
Some of these companies were though given opportunities of being saved, but ego problem… a dilemma! For instance the famous example is Yahoo. This later turned down a 2008 buyout offer from Microsoft that would have brought more than twice the company’s current value.
“Plan long-term”
From previous failed corporations. One would assume that these companies have learn much to avoid falling into the same trap. However there is a thread that runs deep through all the companies who eventually throw away their market leader position and spiral down eventually bought out at a fraction of their value.
You have a dream of becoming big? Please before read this blog and position your business after a thoroughly analysis of your internal and external issues.
http://money.usnews.com/money/business-economy/slideshows/10-great-companies-that-lost-their-edge/11
http://allafrica.com/stories/201310090089.html?viewall=1