In its new global campaign “Untamable”, Bacardi displays its struggle since its introduction in Cuba in 1862 and the revolutionary government led by Fidel Castro that seized Bacardi’s Cuban assets in 1960. 

One ad reads: “Some men are kicked out of bars, others are kicked out of countries.” Another reads “Earthquakes, fires, exile, prohibition, Sorry fate – you picked the wrong family.”

In a visual advertisement filmed at night, actor Jordi Molla represents a Bacardi scion, walking uphill in the middle of a winding cobbled street filled with men demolishing casks with sledgehammers, red-flags waving and beret-wearing actors depicting Cuban revolutionaries. A voice-over says “The Bacardi family didn’t just survive- we thrived; because true passion can’t be tamed. Bacardi- untamable since 1862.” Bacardi declines to state how much it spent on advertisement, but its known that in 2012 they spent $43.1m on ads in the US.

Typical alcohol brands depict situations where liquor is used in times of cheerful social gatherings, and Bacardi is trying to break the norm by focusing on a history unique to the brand, targeting the 18-29 age groups as they hold the highest consumption of rum among younger drinkers, according to a Mintel survey.

Bacardi leads the rum category with a 35.4% share of the volume sold in the US in 2012. Marketing Professor David Vinjamuri at the New York University says “It’s certainly distinctive and ownable in the sense that Bacardi has a history that other brands cannot point to. There’s a very significant trend underway in marketing and advertising communications about content driven brands, and they’re not selling products, they’re selling content.”

Sources:

Newman, Andrew Adam. “Bacardi Campaign Focuses on Resilience, Rather Than Rum.” The New York Times. The New York Times, 17 Nov. 2013. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.

On last Sunday, three Middle Eastern Airlines (Emirates airlines, Etihad airways and Quatar airways) signed to buy 225 of Boeing’s new 777X jets resulting in a total order cost of $95 billion. The latest deals come from the Dubai Airshow where airlines from the Middle East announced more than $150 billion in orders of various planes.

Emirates airlines which order 150 777X’s said it would also buy 50 more A380s which have so far disappointed sales overall. The A380 deal would be reportedly worth $23 billion, however both Boeing and Airbus offer discounts. Etihad Airways also announced that it would buy 25 of the 777X’s and Qatar Airways said it would buy 50 of the new jets.

This huge order illustrates how big money in aviation is moving towards Asia and the Middle East. This indicates how the industry is growing in rapidly modernizing areas of the world. The Middle East is slowly considered as the pathway between Europe and the East. Flights from Europe usually go over the UAE to Asia and Australia.

Work Cited:

Drew, Christopher. “New Boeing Jet Pulls In $95 Billion in Orders.” New York Times. New York Times, 17 Nov. 2013. Web. 17 Nov. 2013.

Google-owned Motorola is still trying to position itself in the smartphone market. Since sales of Motorola’s high-end smartphone the Moto X have been slow, the company decided to switch to the lower-end market and create a less expensive phone, with the limitation that it won’t release the phone in China, the biggest market for low-end phones in the world.

The Moto G will cost $180, and is believed to have a potential customer number of 500 million in places like Brazil and Chile. The phones appeal is based around Google’s embedded services such as Google Play, however in China Google is banned, limiting the smartphone. Dennis Woodside, the chief executive of Motorola said: “Our ability to compete there is a bit constrained. Moto G won’t be offered in China.” Motorola believes that the phone will appeal to people outside of China as it differs greatly from cheap smartphones with a 4.5 inch high-resolution screen and run will run the latest Android software to support the latest apps on the market.

This phone is a gadget with a mission of spreading Google’s services around the world. “Google’s mission is to organize the entire world’s information and make it universally accessible.”

Work Cited:

Chen, Brian X. “Motorola to Offer Moto G Smartphone Aimed at Emerging Markets.” The New York Times. The New York Times, 13 Nov. 2013. Web. 17 Nov. 2013.

During the first 24 hours on the market, Sony’s new PlayStation 4 video gaming console sold 1 million copies. The consoles went on sale Friday in the U.S. and Canada and will launch the gaming console in Latin America and Europe on November 29^th.  Sony said that it expects to sell 5 million units by the end of its fiscal year in March. 

The PlayStation 4 is Sony’s first new gaming console to come out since the PlayStation 3, seven years ago. It faces competition for gamers’ time and attention from Microsoft’s Xbox One, which goes on sale this week, as well as smartphones, tablets, and other gadgets.  The entry of new gadgets into the gaming industry might affect how much consoles Sony sells, as in years prior such as 2007 they weren’t as developed.

This entry of new devices in the industry will most likely have an impact on sales; however I believe that due to the strong brand positioning that the Sony PlayStation has created by a reputation for being a device that pushes the boundaries of visual graphics and gaming experience, sales shouldn’t be affected drastically. Customer loyalty will also affect sales.

Works Cited:

“Sony Sells over 1M PlayStation 4s in First Day.” The Miami Herald. N.p., 17 Nov. 2013. Web. 17 Nov. 2013.

PlayStation 4. Digital image. Playstation. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.

It has been three years since the European Commission started examining alleged claims that Google was misusing its supremacy as a search engine, and it seems that the two sides have reached an agreement. As reported by the Financial Times, a settlement would be reached where Google avoids formal charges and heavy fines which were consequently 7 years ago put on Microsoft. In May 2012, Joaquin Almunia, the European Union’s competition commissioner assembled a list of concerns relating to Google, which is said to account for more than 90% of searches in Europe.

–          Google favors its specialized search services over others and that Google had an agreement with companies that used its advertising, that they would be included in results after similar searches.

–          The search engine was copying content from its competitors.

–          Advertisers couldn’t easily transfer from Google to others.

Google will solve these concerns by clearly labeling the advertisements that are in contract with the search engine, giving more freedom to competitors, preventing bias. The result of this investigation will be that Google will esthetically look different to Europeans. However, with this investigation over, Google is not released from the limelight, as recent report stated that mobile OS providers wanted the Commission to look into the dominance of Android, Google’s mobile operating system. Personally I like the fact that the IT industry has this form of investigations because it eliminates the bias and monopoly which can ensue, and benefits the users of such technology.

Sources:

Schumpeter, Joseph. “A Flavour of Utility.” The Economist. The Economist Newspaper, 13 Apr. 2013. Web. 06 Oct. 2013. <http://www.economist.com/blogs/schumpeter/2013/04/google-and-european-commission>.

Source: Interbrand

Apple is now the most valuable brand in the world according to a detailed research report presented by Interbrand, a corporate identity and brand consulting company owned by Omnicom Group which has been researching and compiling the World’s most valuable brands since 2000. Coca-Cola which was on top for 13 years has now fallen to number 3, behind Apple and Google. Jez Frampton, global chief executive at Interbrand said in a recent interview: “Apple’s arrival in the top spot was perhaps a matter of time.” Apple was No. 2 last year, climbing from No. 8 in the 2011 report. The report estimates that Apple brand is worth roughly $98.3 billion, up 28% from 2012 report. The value of the Coca-Cola brand also rose by 2% to $79.2 billion, but that was insufficient to retain its position as Interbrand’s World Number 1 for the 14 year in a row. Google, which rose from fourth place last year, also overtook Coca-Cola. In fact, of the top 10 Best Global Brands for 2013 five are in the tech field: Apple, Google, Microsoft, Samsung which came in at 8^th place, and Intel which came in at 9^th.  However not all technology brands fared well on the list as an ample amount of them tumbled down, or even failed to make it within the top 100. BlackBerry, which we discussed in class earlier this month, disappeared from the list and Nokia was considered the ‘biggest faller’ dropping from 19^th to 57^th place.

Sources:

Elliott, Stuart. “Apple Passes Coca-Cola as Most Valuable Brand.” The New York Times. N.p., 29 Sept. 2013. Web. 6 Oct. 2013. <http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/30/business/media/apple-passes-coca-cola-as-most-valuable-brand.html?src=recg&_r=0>.

The social-networking service Twitter has reported that three fourths of its 218 million monthly average users from June to October were from outside of the United States. Twitter stated that it has earned more advertising revenue from its US users than from foreign. In order to enhance its advertising experience at a global level, it plans to increase advertising in France, Argentina, Japan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, and South Africa in order to make its offerings more sophisticated. Twitter said that 65% of its revenue came from mobile ads. However, Twitter faces many challenges in trying to expand its services in developing countries. These up and coming markets have many problems. For instance, many emerging market users do not posses smart phones that are compatible with Twitter, meaning that the quantity of overseas users depends on the popularity of higher-end smart phones.  Another problem that Twitter like many other social networks face, is the ban by authoritarian governments, such as the ban of social networks in mainland China for security reasons. Finally, Twitter faces the problem of getting people’s time, partly due to the emergence of other applications such as Whatsapp, WeChat, which offer private communication through voice and message in comparison to Twitter which is primarily public communication. While US domestic agencies might use Twitter to track individuals, the fact that it has US roots gives it credibility to international users, primarily those living in authoritarian regimes.

A Twitter app on a smartphone in Berlin. Three-quarters of Twitter’s users in the three months through June were outside of the United States, the company said.

Sources:

Jolly, David, and Mark Scott. “Twitter’s I.P.O. Plan Has an International Focus.” The New York Times. N.p., 4 Oct. 2013. Web. 6 Oct. 2013. <Twitter’s I.P.O. Plan Has an International Focus>.

HTC, the Taiwanese technology giant has recently reported an early quarterly loss ($101 million in the third quarter). The tech giant is suffering from the growth in the lower-end smart phone market and the pressure from new competitors, mostly in China. HTC primarily produces high end models where it competes with Samsung, however Samsung dominates as it is currently the biggest producer of smart phones on both ends of the spectrum and also produces memory chips that are used by companies such as rival Apple. HTC has found itself in a bad position as it is stuck competing with Samsung, and isn’t exploring the lower end market where Lenovo, ZTE and Huawei, all Chinese companies are gaining major recognition. Horace Dediu, an independent telecommunications analyst in Helsinki, Finland, stated that it would be very difficult for HTC to recover based on past evidence. It is usually very common for a phone maker to sell its handset business or leave the phone business years after a first quarterly loss is posted. For instance Motorola lasted 5 years, Nokia and BlackBerry only 2. I honestly believe that HTC will overcome this loss and continue to produce high quality primarily Android-based smart phones as it has been doing ever since it launched the Desire series in 2010. What Motorola, Nokia and BlackBerry have in common is that they did not switch to Android which holds well above majority of the mobile OS market. 

Sources:

Pfanner, Eric. “HTC Reports Its First Loss, but Samsung Shows Vigor.” The New York Times. N.p., 4 Oct. 2013. Web. 6 Oct. 2013. <http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/05/technology/htc-suffers-first-quarterly-loss-as-samsung-soars.html?ref=business&_r=0>.

“’Business ethics’ is a critical examination of how institutions and people should operate in the world of commerce. In particular, it involves the examination of how firms function within constraints of self- interest, such as profits, and when the actions of individuals or firms affect others”, as defined by Dr. Chris MacDonald.[i]

Milton Friedman stated that the actions of a particular business aren’t required to be founded on social well being, but instead as suggested, the purpose of a business is to maximize the desires of its stakeholders.

In recent news a former board member of the German multinational engineering and Conglomerate Company  has been charged with breaches of trust and abetment. As DW reports the company might have ended its decade long affair relating corruption, but it has not completely removed corruption within the company. Back in 2003 the leading German company is believed to have bribed the Argentine government $9.5 million in order to receive a multi- billion dollar contract which was to produce new non- forgeable passports for 40 million Argentineans. In the report even former Argentine president Carlos Menem received money to help the German company acquire the contract. In recent years the company underwent a large scale transformation making it adopt a zero tolerance policy for any individual who takes ‘slush funds’. However, the company has negative credentials yet again as it has been linked to price fixation by an international cartel during the construction of a subway line in Sao Paulo, Brazil. The state of Sao Paulo has announced its intent to file a criminal case against the multinational German company, bringing its newly formed image to the test. [ii]

This corruption scandal is directly associated to the statement made by Friedman. The actions of a particular business aren’t founded on social well being; they are founded on the desires of its stakeholders. It raises the question of business ethics. These two cases regarding Siemens seem to prove that a firm is acting within its self- interest and in that process affecting other firms and competition.