Monthly Archives: September 2013

Satisfries, satisfy everyone!

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Burger King’s Satisfries demonstrates a value proposition that Burger King holds. Since there has been increasing awareness about health issues in consuming fast food, consumers want to have a healthier alternative. Burger King is responding to that through Satisfries, French fries that has a lower fat and calories percentage as opposed to its major competitor, McDonalds. Burger King’s move may gain a competitive advantage as they are responding to the external factor faster. This too, may gain some of McDonalds market, as consumers may prefer to switch to a “healthier” junk food.

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However, Satisfries is still not known yet, even within Burger King’s employees. Employees refer to Satisfries as “crinkle fries” instead of its real name. Employees, being one of the key resources, should be able to market the product’s name as well in order for the product to be known within society. They could have done that in order to better deliver the value proposition the product offers. If Satisfries is known, people can refer that name to an image of healthier fries, creating distinctiveness amongst fries from other brands. It is especially important given that people do not taste any different between the original and new fries (see video). This allows people to still enjoy the same good fries but feeling less guilty.

Article source: http://money.cnn.com/2013/09/24/news/companies/burger-king-fries/index.html

Video Reference:

Burger King’s Satisfries

Blackberry Messenger for iPhone and Android

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BBM is viewed as a good messenger application as it establishes a safer communication among users, using pins that users have to share prior to communicating. In terms of product, BBM is one of the stronger messenger applications.

However, it is also realized that sales of Blackberry gadgets are not looking good toward the present. In order for Blackberry to still make revenue, its strength; the BBM application, is utilized, making it accessible for other smartphone users brand. Looking at the sales of their gadgets, Blackberry is not able to maintain the exclusivity of BBM for their gadgets. Economies of scale might also be hard to achieve at this point as a lot of people prefer other smartphones. The fact that a lot of substitutes have arise such as WhatsApp, Kakao Talk, Line, etc. enable people to communicate with other smartphones brand as easy. Hence, although consumers like the features of BBM, they would most likely unwilling to switch to a Blackberry just for the BBM app, if they have substitute messenger applications that enables them to communicate with other smartphone brands.

Thus, in order for Blackberry to address its declining sales, selling its BBM may be the best option, as they can make more money by selling the software rather than keeping it exclusive with the hardware.

Article source: http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-05-23/blackberry-messenger-heads-to-android-and-ios

The Case of Freeport Mining

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Profit is one of the many essential needs for firms in order to experience growth and satisfy shareholders. However, it is important to remember that there are limits for a business to pave its way in maximizing profit.

Regulations set up by the government is a form of such limits, as it is aimed for society’s welfare. In reality though, there are companies that have take such regulations for granted, like Freeport that mines in Papua, Indonesia. It was reported that Freeport had violated the government’s environmental law, polluting the river with toxic, causing 30% of the species living in it threatened.

It is understood that such deed may be done to lower cost and save time, improving productivity. From Freeport’s perspective, it is better to dump 42 micrograms/liter of copper to the river, than having to reduce their capacity to meet the maximum of 20 micrograms/liter waste set by the government. However, this doesn’t take into account the environmental group’s and government’s opinion, for example. Hence, the stakeholders are not on the same page. The company though, may actually invest in waste management to keep up with the rules in order to be ethical.

Being ethical does not only mean to do good in business and following rules, but it also creates future opportunities for such business to get profit.

Article: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2006/05/04/damage-freeport-site-worse-claimed-ngo.html