“In the 1980s, Apple and Microsoft battled it out for the PC market, and Microsoft won by allowing independents to make its hardware and software. Apple’s Steve Jobs had a different idea”

CBC, “Apple, Google in Platform, war over mobile”

Speaking of mobile phone platform, iOS and android would definitely be the first two popped out of your mind. Yes, there are still other platforms such as Windows Phone and Black Berry OS, but their influence on the entire mobile market would be very limited compared to tech giants like Google and Apple.

Apple, so far, has grabbed more than 10 percent of the entire market share by being the leader into the smartphone industry as well as the optimization of iOS with iPhone. Android, on the other hand, have captured 80% of the total mobile platform since it was born few years ago. Because android doesn’t have much limitation on the hardware as iOS does, the openness of the system would be extremely high. However, even though android has captured most of the market, nexus series, Google’s own smartphone, are not selling well.

The reason for that would be the difference between a mobile product and a OS platform. For iPhone, since it is only compatible with its own system, consumers have no choice on another while only considering iOS mobile devices (they sure have iPod touch and iPad, but those are defined slightly different than smartphones). Google, on the other hand, even though has its OS covered 80% of the mobile phone market, since every firm in the market would want to differentiate themselves, they would come up with different user interfaces, which are still based on android, but with a completely different look. By that, for every time Google launches its new android phone, it would face the pressure from all competitors that are using android as their OS, which would lead to a much lower sale compared to the “monopolistic behaviour” of iPhone in iOS devices.

“The kids who are losing their passion for Facebook are pretty much exactly the same ones who are flocking to Snapchat by the million”

Forbes

Facebook won’t expect to see that its real competitor would really arise from the mobile applications. Snapchat basically allows you to send photos and short video clips and only let your friends seeing it for a few seconds. It is very different compared to ordinary social media such as blogs, news feed and text messaging since the message in snap chat could only last for “a blink of an eye”.  Facebook, on the other hand, didn’t have much change that would stabilize its consumer segment these years. According to article, “decrease in daily users specifically among younger teens” would be a huge concern of the company itself. Facing the pressure from twitter’s success since IPO, Facebook has to eliminate any risks that could let the company loose more users.

Why are snapchat so popular that leads the company into a multibillion level? It makes me think about a similar case in China, where mobile app called we-chat have already taken a huge partition of market share from the former social media giant QQ from Tencent. It is generally true that mobile-based social media like snapchat and we chat, are more likely to capture what consumer wants because they only need to invest in the development of mobile applications. Facebook, on the other hand, might face the pressure from lack of innovation and its huge competitor so far, Twitter.

References:

http://www.forbes.com/pictures/eeji45ejejf/2010-facebook-pages-4/

http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidwismer/2013/11/17/snapchat-how-to-make-3-billion-or-was-it-4-billion-disappear-and-other-quotes-of-the-week/

Twitter’s (TWTR) first day of trading was a banner one. The stock priced at $26, shot up as high as $50.09 and closed the day at $44.90 a share, notching in a sweet 72% first-day gain from the IPO price.  But Facebook, just a few years ago when it launched its IPO, has much worse result than they expected.

Interestingly, Matt Nesto at Yahoo Finance pointed it out as the “4 Reasons why Twitter’s IPO Rocked Where Facebook’s Rolled”. In the blog he mentioned different factors such as timing, choice of financial markets, and the “First is Worse” theory. It is interesting to note that, rather than “first come first served”, Facebook as the first comer didn’t grab that much attention from the investors than twitter did.

Social media industry might be very different compared to the existing technology companies. They don’t have a complicated business plan as tech firms, some of them probably even haven’t thought about having one. The future of social media industry in the financial market would be ambiguous, since no one actual knows how they generate profit apart from advertising, which might be attractive to investors because the great potential it has based on unknown. What twitter does is probably try to grab more investors’ interest on the company and at the same time reduce the uncertainty the company creates through references of the former company Facebook.

“There’s a reason why test pilots are typically well paid and young. Along that same line of thinking, it would be hard to overstate the benefits Twitter derived from watching Facebook enter the public domain. But watching is only half the battle, since Twitter clearly watched, took notes, and then made sure not to repeat the same mistakes.”

Inspired by Danica Ilaneta,  “The Arc of Support”

I’ve never thought about how the knowledge we learned at school would actually be applied to the real life.  All those business concepts and theories, even the huge piece of business model canvas sound totally unrelated to anything but assignments.  I’ll never thought about using the knowledge from school to interact, or even help a business.  However, the presentation of Arc Initiative last week has, indeed, terminated my thoughts.

The Arc Initiative project is definitely not a “lets save Africa” project that any NGO in the world could easily accomplish, it indeed establishes a bridge between students in Sauder and business entrepreneurs in Africa, helps them set up more coherent plans using current knowledge from school.  It provides a environment that students are really being part of, by living, staying and talking with all those young and passionate entrepreneurs in Africa. One thing that interests me a lot would be  Tesfaye Mekonnen and his banana paper. It is a brand new product in Africa’s paper market, and very cost-efficient and eco-friendly. Being made out of different parts of banana trees, this kind of paper would have a variety of colour selection and unique look compared to wood papers.

I was surprised by how creative those entrepreneurs in the program were, and different stories they shared about their businesses. However, what attract me even more would be the combination of learning a brand new culture as well as the application of knowledge learned back school. The Arc Initiative would really become the arc that connects Sauder students and all those brilliant people on the other side of the world.

References:

http://www.sauder.ubc.ca/Global_Reach/ARC_Initiative

https://connect.ubc.ca/bbcswebdav/pid-1691811-dt-content-rid-6151623_1/courses/SIS.UBC.COMM.101.105.2013W1.17408/Class%2021%20Arc%20Stories%202013.pdf

https://startanevolution.ubc.ca/projects/the-arc-initiative/

http://www.sauder.ubc.ca/Global_Reach/ARC_Initiative

http://www.sauder.ubc.ca/News/2012/Sauders_Arc_Initiative_mentors_entrepreneurs_in_Ethiopia

Credit to Matthews Anderson’s Blog: “DSLR Cameras: Falling Exposures”.

I wouldn’t be so aware of the DSLR industry without reading Matthew’s comment on the Reuters UK business article. Yes, as a fan of DSLR for more than 5 years, it is really a shocking news that predicted DSLR’s replacement by smartphones in the future.

Why would have the smartphone, a device originally designed for calling and texting, become a threat to the high-end DSLR industry?   These two markets seem totally unrelated. However, by seeing how consumers define two devices nowadays, it wouldn’t be surprise that more and more consumers are using DSLRs, devices that used to be extremely costly and exclusively for professionals. The enlargement of the DSLR market is not a bad issue, however, since more and more consumers would be able to purchase a DSLR with a cheaper price, two products that are used to be unrelated, DSLRs and smartphones, started to become indirect competitors.

Most consumers would have to face two options, either spend less money purchasing a smartphone that has not only a compacted camera on it but also with many other functions, or spend more money on a heavy-to-carry camera but with professional image quality. Many people would satisfy the great image quality of DSLRs and choose smartphones instead as a daily basis. However, for professional photographers and camera lovers, getting a high-end DSLR would be the ultimate choice.

So how about the future of DSLR? In my opinion, smartphones would eventually be the substitutes for not only compact and low-end DSLRs, but also tablets or even PCs. However, the traditional DSLR industry would not be replaced since there is still a huge gap between the image qualities of the two.

A man eating a gigantic burger? Not a big problem.

 For girls? It might be a little awkward eating this way, isn’t it?

This issue might not be quite significant in other places but Japan because of the special cultural symbol named  “ochobo”- a small shapely mouth as a sign of beauty.

However, such a thing changes completely after the invention from  the Freshness Burger- simply, a facial mask.

What the mask does is that it covers  the whole mouth area of the person eating the food, and simultaneously matches that area by the drawing of a smiley face. Extremely cost-efficient, but the company did experience a significant increase in the amount of women purchasing the signature burger since they introduced the new package design.

What is the magic behind that?

Since the Freshness Burger only plays a small role in the entire market of  fast food, it would be extremely crucial for the company to differentiate itself from MNCs such as  McDonalds and Burger King. Staying fresh would be one point of difference, however, since there are still many burger companies that specialized in making organic fast food, getting a creative facial mask would be an unique way. On one hand it breaks the curse of “ochobo” and encourages more women to enjoy the signature burger, and on the other hand by getting a specially designed package , the company would access a more sustainable competitive advantage that could generate more revenue with less cost.

Relating to Further Personal Analysis

Today’s morning, about 10 a.m. PDT, Tim Cook, Apple Inc’s ECO and his team launched the new generation of iPhone, specifically, the “iPhones” in California, U.S. These two models, which are now named iPhone 5s and 5c, did make another historical mark on the Apple Company, just like when Jobs introduced the 4th generation of iPhone about 4 years ago. But for this time, the situation might be a little bit different…

“Market Share vs. Innovation, unlikely to gain them all.”

  iPhone 5c, a “Cheaper” model, designed primarily for those countries that Apple has not gain dominance in, now comes in 5 different sets of colours and an individually purchased case (6 colours), as well as an unexpected price. An survey just before the launch shows that more than 50% of consumers would expect the price to be less than 400 USD, while the situation is, 199 dollars more. Now with the starting price at almost 600 dollars, would that be really possible for Apple to gain more market share in the targeted countries, namely China and Brazil? Not likely, I would say.

  Clearly, consumers are not the only unsatisfied group, “The iPhone 5C is the most inscrutable Apple release in years. Let’s try to crack the code, shall we?” said by readwrite shows all the concerns and questions towards this new “Not-Quite-Cheap” iPhone. How can the price be so high and still want more market share in such a country like China? Is that really worthy for paying 600 dollars for a “carefully crafted” polycarbonate (aka plastic) “cheap” version of iPhone? Will the market respond positively to this “innovative act” of Apple? Only the market itself can give the answer to that.

Address for the official intro video:

iPhone 5c: http://www.apple.com/iphone-5c/videos/#video-product

Launch Live Stream: http://www.apple.com/apple-events/september-2013/