RE: In China, To Get Rich Is Not So Glorious – Ching-To Li

China was not what it is now 20 years ago. After opening its market to the world in the past decade, China has rapidly grown into one the the largest economies in the world. The increase of billionaires have also contributed to the positive economic returns but unfortunately, corruption remain as one of the largest issues in this country.

After spending my summer in Shanghai and Beijing working for my aunts’ business, I have realized the vast difference in work ethics compared to that of the western world. In China, employees worked longer hours and kept on a very tight schedule. Most business decisions made by CEOs or high-ranking officials were conducted “informally” and usually outside of the business environment (e.g in bars, restaurants etc). This made illegal transactions and bribery easier between corporations. Instead of looking at the bigger picture and seeing what is best for the company, personal goals get in the way and people start to lose their values and beliefs.

Ching-To’s Blog: https://blogs.ubc.ca/chingtoli/2012/11/18/in-china-to-get-rich-is-not-so-glorious/

Having stumbled across Ryan Ho’s blog, I read an interesting post regarding the “Supply Chain Management” of Zara.

As Zara’s number one fan, I am relatively fascinated by the way the company manages its supply chain.

According the the guest speaker, Zara implements a business model that revolves around a short supply chain management. In this case, instead of manufacturing and shipping their products from China, they decided to keep their production and manufacturing back in Europe. One reason behind this is because Zara wants to keep up their brand image/quality, and also be able to adjust quickly to the changing fashion trends. One example was when Madonna wore a certain outfit to her concert in Europe; Zara was able to produce, manufacture and ship out a splitting image of that outfit in approximately 4 days. This shows how quickly they must be when trying to adjust to changing global trends. If their manufacturing happened in China, shipping these new products and distributing them to different stores would take a lot longer.

From their prices, Zara is considered to be a relatively higher end store. According to Ryan, prices of Zara clothing in North America and Asia are similarly if not, the same. On the other hand, Zara is much cheaper back in Europe due to lower costs since production and manufacturing happens at home.

Ryan’s blog: https://blogs.ubc.ca/rcyh/2012/11/15/zaras-fast-fashion-business-model/

After reading about Christina Kwan’s blog post regarding “Sustainability,” I decided to give my two cents perspective on this topic.

Having being raised in Toronto (14 years to be exact), I have never learned much about sustainability. Not saying that we as a city is not sustainable, but just the fact that you do not see a lot of it around the city up until recent years. Upon arriving in Vancouver for school, I realized an immediate difference between the two cities. There were A LOT more trees, the air felt cleaner, and everything was more sustainable looking. I have noticed that the walls of the Vancouver International Airport were made out of green walls. And the fact that there were hundreds of recycling bins around the area. Not to mention, the hybrid taxis that we took to get to our hotel.

While visiting the UBC campus, I was informed that many of the buildings were self sustaining and eco-friendly. Many classrooms contained lights that would flick off when there weren’t any people around, and were designed in special ways so that it would save more on energy.

Having realized how important sustainability was, I feel that Toronto should learn more from Vancouver and its methods for being a sustainable city. (Also the Maple Leafs should learn a thing or two from the Canucks…no lie…we kind of suck).

Christina’s Blog: https://blogs.ubc.ca/christinakwann/2012/11/13/sustainability/

The 2012 Presidential Election sparked many controversies and debates, and it has surely kept us on the edge of our seats. I for one, was not watching the elections religiously since I did not want to fail my upcoming midterm. Not wanting to look like an outcast, I kept myself updated with the polls through: Twitter. Not CNN, not Huffington Post, not CBC, but Twitter.

The presidential election was the most talkedabout event on Facebook and Twitter, with over users 71.1 million users on Facebook mentioning topics that related to elections day. More popular than the 2012 Superbowl (in which “Super Bowl scored a 8.62 on the Talk Meter, while the San Francisco Giants winning the World Series tracked at a 6.1”), this years’ election managed to score a 9.27 on Facebook’s Talk Meter. “Bird Bird” appeared to the be phrase that was the most popular during the campaigning and “Binders Full of Women” came closely in at second place. Not only was Facebook and Twitter being hit with Obamafever, Instagram saw a 2.1 increase in their daily photo uploads on the day of the election.

“People from around the United States tagged more than 100,000 photos with #IVoted, and 150,000 photos with #election2012, allowing folks to share their own— and tune into others’ — election night experience in real-time,”

Articles:

http://mashable.com/2012/11/08/election-day-facebook/

http://mashable.com/2012/11/08/instagram-election-obama/

http://mashable.com/2012/11/07/obama-viral-posts/

Some of the most valuable companies in the world include ones such as: Exxon Mobil, Microsoft, and IBM. In the last few years, one company seemed to find itself on the top of the list – that company happens to be Apple.

Previously, Microsoft was number one, but its stocks have been unstable these past few years. On the other hand, Apple was able to provide itself a “market cap of

over $620 billion dollars.” Apple shares now cost over $600 per stock and with the current Iphone 5 and Ipad Mini hitting the market, its shares are bound increase even more.

“Given the company’s unbelievable innovation over the last few years, and the subsequent mountains of cash that it has earned as a result, the likely catalyst for the stock to eventually peak and decline will be Apple’s inability to continue to innovate at its current pace.” In the meantime, Apple is showing no sign of falling back compared to other tech companies such as Motorola, Samsung, Google HTC, and Microsoft, placing them a good position against its competitors.

Article: http://www.forbes.com/sites/benzingainsights/2012/08/21/apple-now-most-valuable-company-in-history/