Recently PlayStation 4, a gaming console released by Sony, is probably one of the most popular topic in the tech industry. It is the most advanced gaming console that might change the way people entertain and as a matter of fact, the 1 million sales within the launch day has already changed the history of gaming console.

Behind the glorious achievement, however, a serious quality problem have captured the attention of the public. It is reported that a number of gamers have found that their PS4s simply do not work. In the meantime, Chinese press has reported that the workers of Foxconn who manufacture PS4s claimed on the Internet that they intentionally did not put their effort into making the products and they even just take some parts of the machine away. The workers explained that the reason why they did this was because Foxconn treated them badly and in return, they wanted Foxconn to do badly.

This event is really a clear reflection on how important the relationship between the workers and management is. If the managers care little about his team, they will receive the bad result from them.

It is still not clear what the consequence of Foxconn will be but it is foreseeable that it will not make Foxconn happy.

Picture available from: http://cdn.techinasia.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/foxconn-student-ps4.jpg

Refernece article: Rumors of Alleged Foxconn PS4 Sabotage Are Sketchy, At Best (Click to read).

A bicycle made by 3D printing.

3D printing is one of the hottest topic these days. Though the commercialization of it in consumer industry is still fay away from us, it have already stepped onto the historical stage and we have heard a great number of implementation and predictions of 3D printing.

Welcome to your printable future, a blog posted by Kai Ng Yan, talks a little about the author’s insights on 3D printing. I agree with the author’s opinion about the potential glorious and splendid future of 3D printing. 3D printing is truly fascinating. However, I disagree with him on his example of Rolls-Royal. He said that Rolls-Royal is planning to bring the 3D printing into its engine production process and before very long, other firms will quickly follow its step. It is fine that Rolls-Royal plans to do so but it is not practical for everyone else to do it. Because of the nature of the business, a luxury automobile manufacturer is able to use some state-of-the-art technology to produce cars while a food company, for example, might not be able to afford the high-cost production means to produce food. I believe when 3D printing is widely speeded, then the author’s envision will be fulfilled.

Picture available from: http://media2.policymic.com/fd9ec900aa31f056cb827a96e5ff26a0.jpg

Reference blog: Welcome to your printable future (Click to view the article).

I read a blog,The Importance of a Company’s Culture, discussing the author’s view on companies’ culture. Personally I agree with him that the culture of a company is of crucial importance in sustaining the vitality of a company. It overall enables a company to be more cohesive and efficient. I also find his view that culture facilitates the recruitment process to be a good insight. Indeed a high integration between the company’s cultures and the personal values is more likely to benefit the company and employing the employees based on a firm’s culture is going to achieve this.

Inspired by this blog, I also come up with the idea that normally a company’s culture is usually positive so if the company tries to integrate its culture into its product or service. It might have a positive impact on the company because these product is carrying the company’s attitude to the society. Maybe some sophisticated investigations and experiments have already revealed this relationship.

Reference blog: The Importance of a Company’s Culture (Click to view the full article).

Entrepreneurship is Management

Although I never start up a company, I am very excited about owning a company and based on all my imagination and experiences I want to share some insights on the startup.

I have read an article talking about lean startups: Lean Startup Principle: Entrepreneurship is Management. The title is straightforward and it tells me that management is crucial in a startup business. As I read the article, I learned one very basic and important idea involved in startup environment that, to a startup, the environment is dynamic. In order to survive in the business, the startup therefore has to be highly adaptive, or using the words in the article, not afraid to pivot. The central idea of this is that startups expose themselves to many aspects of the businesses so they are more likely to know or know more about what to avoid in their businesses because customers do not like these.

Another important insight I have gained from the article is that startups’ CEOs should create an environments that are conducive to creativity. Usually good ideas can be from any member in the initial stage of the business thus CEOs should collaborate more with staff, giving them more autonomy and encouraging them to think creatively.

Picture available from: http://startupopen.com/wp-content/themes/classynsimple/images/slide_catchingup.jpg

Reference article: Lean Startup Principle: Entrepreneurship is Management (Click to view the article).

Click to see the full picture.

I was shocked when I looked at this diagram because the value of these young tech companies substantially surpassed the value of those well-known traditional media. One more interesting thing that is worth to notice is that the sole value of Apple Inc. is almost equivalent to the total value of the old media.

I think thoroughly about this dramatic situation and come up with two possible causes that might lead to this phenomenon. Externally, mobile media has the inherent advantages of being more portable and flexible than traditional media, which are the important factors to succeed in the contemporary society as the tempo of life becomes quicker. New technology is just loved by people. Even though traditional media is trying its best to digitalize its own contents, this is still considered as a disadvantage compared to those high-tech companies.

From my personal perspective, the internal reason why new media beats old media might be the fact that the managerial positions in tech companies know more about IT as they are compared to their counterpart in traditional media. Good integration of information technology into their own business system simply enable the management to make better decision. This is another disadvantage that might probably handicap the development of old media, though I agree that this effect is on a lesser extent compared to the external factor.

Reference material: The Future of Digital: 2013 (Click to see the full article).

I recently read an article about the about the latest proposed BC Water Sustainability Act. The article mentioned the current situation in BC’s water management that the related legislation has not been updated for a very long time and BC is now the only area that has no regulation on the groundwater. In fact, even the new Water Sustainability Act cannot fully fulfil its seemingly wonderful goal. However, the news of the new act is still widely spread and the reason for this, as it is agreed by the majority, is the fact that government want to increase the business opportunity. The author indicated that it is the growing trend that more and more investors valued sustainability an important part within a company. Proposing the new Water Sustainability Act could more or less cover the fact that many BC companies waste too much resources.

Linking to the knowledge in the class, sustainability is indeed an increasingly important topic for a company. I believe that economizing the use of the resources not only attracts investors but also reduces the cost of the companies; therefore companies have sufficient internal incentives to be sustainable. Besides a company is now required to be perform sustainable acts as resource scarcity has become the growing concern. For BC, it is urgent to come up an effective means to optimize the water management, as it will benefit both the local businesses and people.

Picture available from: http://www.metrovancouver.org/2012SCI/SiteImages/Gallery3.jpg

Reference article: Unpacking BC’s Proposed Water Sustainability Act (Click to view the full article).

Selling sex is not as easier as it was in the past. The unstable economy in Britain and US has led to unemployment and the increases in price, which indirectly affected the business of sex workers because increasingly less people are willing to pay money to them during the time of economic recession. Many escorts have even started to offer discounts because if they don’t low down the price, not even a person will come. People have tried to find other jobs like cleaner but even these jobs are found hard to get. People at the very bottom of the society eventually have to involve in this dangerous industry to continue their lives.

Prostitution is such a basic business that I find it doesn’t even have complete components of business like accounting, finance and operation. In spite of this the workers still suffer from the influence of society, I can then only conclude that the economic problems are little serious right now.

Reference article

http://www.economist.com/news/britain/21578434-old-industry-deep-recession-sex-doesnt-sell

Photograph available from

http://fashion.strollay.com/new-awsome-look-of-street-girl/

In my last blog I mentioned that there is a rumor concerning the possible replacement of Tim Cook as Apple’s CEO. This news strikes me with another person who is going to step down from his position — Steve Ballmer, Microsoft’s CEO. In the late August this year, Ballmer has declared to the public that he was going to resign as CEO in Microsoft. There is one thing that I want to point out here that both figures, Ballmer and Cook, are the successor of great CEOs, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, who establish extraordinary companies. Ironically, the day Ballmer declared the resignation, the Microsoft’s stock increased by 9%. During the time when Cook is in the position of CEO, I find it similar that the stock price of Apple dropped by $300 from its original $700.

Cook and Ballmer

It seems that both Ballmer and Cook are not very welcomed by their investors. Why? The stock prices are two low! Investors want to make more money but the job for Ballmer and Cook are not just to make money. One things that is worth mentioned here is the fact that before these two CEOs are promoted they were all COOs. Why Gates and Jobs want COOs to take over their business? Perhaps after the great invention, they want people to first sustain their exceptional results and in terms of this, it will be understandable why they choose COOs as COOs know the companies perfectly and will keep the business run smoothly at least.

Picture available from

http://www.macworld.co.uk/apple-business/news/?newsid=3455743

This fall a great number of great things are going on in computer and cell phone industries. Together with updates to Windows OS and Mac OS, the releases of Galaxy Note 3, iPhone 5S and many other smartphone companies’ flagship handsets really make the IT companies go into competition with each other.

Apple’s stock price on 9.12

Meanwhile, I notice that on the day when iPhone 5S was released, the share price of Apple dropped unexpectedly. Investors say that even iPhone 5C is not cheap enough to gain a larger market share for the company. There are already rumors about the replacement of Tim Cook going on because it seems Tim Cook can’t meet the shareholders’ expectation, which is a promising future growth for the company.

The situation reminds me of past Apple which was dynamic distinctive and remarkable. In fact, Iit is still the same today. I think the value proposition of the company was, and still is, to deliver the best technological advancement integrated with artistic elegance to people who love perfection. I believe it is this that make Apple becomes a company that stands out among all other tech companies. Such positioning certainly can’t not be achieved by expanding market share as not all consumers all in that category; therefore how could a company that has its own style accepted by everyone?

Steve Jobs once said something similar like “Money will eat Apple”. Now I think it is the time for this great company to choose between “be itself” and “money”.

Picture available from

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2418443/Apple-shares-drop-5-new-iPhone-investors-fear-cheap-handsets-expensive.html#

http://www.gizmag.com/iphone-5s-5c-rumor-roundup/28984/pictures#1

Maquiladora is the name of Mexican factories located near the border between the US and Mexico. Since it is in a free trade zone geographically very close to the United States and labor is much cheaper in Mexico than in the US, a large number of American companies have factories there. The scale of Maquiladora is huge as 1.3 million people currently work among 3,000 factories. It brings large economic growth for Mexico, however, it cause severe problems as well.

“For 13 years, I earned the same salary: 110 pesos (sum equivalent to $7.85) a day.”

“We don’t have hopes for a better life here for our kids.”

These are the words said by workers in maquiladoras. In Mexico, a public secondary school charges parents for $11 a month and therefore many teenagers end up going to factories or involving illegal activities.

“These people come to work hard, to suffer. They are willing to work for very little,” said by a manager at a plant in Maquiladora.

The relationship between employee and employer is apparently not satisfactory but it is the norm here. There are a lot of firms that miss one important thing on their way of making money in Maquiladora and that is business ethics. Just like for a man to be a man is not just to keep himself physically healthy, being a business is more than just making money. The behavior of keeping the low wages for workers directly affect the basic lives of its employees. This is not good because many workers are eventually also customers.

References

http://www.udel.edu/leipzig/texts2/vox128.htm

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2012/06/17/152220/mexicos-maquiladora-labor-system.html#.UjJFTMV6yiw

http://tshirtgroove.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/05/sweatshops-dollar-300×200.jpg