Franteractive Strategy Portal - New Content

Maximin Strategy from FRANTERACTIVE.NET

Fri, 3 Jul 2009 19:58:00 EST

In which situations does it make sense to forego profit maximization and maximize your minimum gains instead (i.e., follow a Maximin Strategy? Find out by brushing up on Game Theory from FranTerActive.net, the business strategy portal for one and all.

FRANTERACTIVE.NET - NDA - New Buzzword

Wed, 1 Jul 2009 18:58:00 EST

Unless you are a business like the HP Printer Division which touts (as per a fairly recent keynote by its division head Vyomesh Joshi) that its arrangements with Japanese manufacturers don't even have a formal written contract, you are better off, for multiple reasons, to get that NDA or Non-Disclosure Agreement signed by various stakeholders. NDAs are necessary evils, but important business tools nevertheless. Learn more about NDAs and why you need them in the Web 2.0 world.

FRANTERACTIVE.NET STRATEGY PORTAL - Sections on GAME THEORY Added

Mon, 29 Jun 2009 17:58:00 EST

Game Theory was a part of Advanced Strategy Frameworks in the strategy portal until now. It has now been expanded and new web pages dealing with PRISONERS’ DILEMMA and DOMINANT STRATEGY have been added with 2 by 2 pay-off matrices to illustrate the concept of strategic gaming. Prisoner’s Dilemma is the best traditional example in game theory to explain NASH EQUILIBRIUM, which, in the context of the Prisoners’ Dilemma, can be defined as: Prisoner X is doing the best it can given what prisoner Y is doing. Similarly, prisoner Y is doing the best it can given what prisoner X is doing. The link here will take you directly to the web page. Enjoy…

MP3 Audio PODCAST added --- TALC by Mishra: Technology Adoption Life Cycle

Fri, 17 Apr 2009 23:02:08 EST

Sam Mishra talks about TALC - Technology Adoption Life Cycle, and touches upon a lot of points from the strategic marketing perspective in this 18 minute long management education MP3 audio:

1. Innovators, Early Adopoters, Early Majority, and the Chasm: For a technology to be successful, the early majority have to be on board. To get to the early majority, innovators and early adopters should already be on board. However, Geoffrey Moore's concept of the CHASM exists between the Ealry Adopters and the Early Majority. A company can fall into the chasm for any number of reasons: if you lack aggressive sales people, or if a bigger competition kills you, or if the economy gets into a recession...

2. Why the Late Majority, as a different market segment requires a different marketing strategy...For example, for the EARLY MAJORITY, the technology can be a source of competitive advantage; so Sam challenges Nicholas Carr here on Carr's theory that IT (as a source of competitive advantage) does not matter. On the other hand, for the LATE MAJORITY, the technology may be a necessity (as Carr asserts in his book --- IT does not matter --- that IT will become a necessity like electricity or any other utility). So, targeting / positioning needs to differ for these two distinct but major market segments, if a company wants to be successful in grabbing a lot of market share...

3. How TALC ties not only to the PLC but also the S-Curve of Technology Adopotion...For example, mathematically speaking, the S-Curve is the INTEGRAL of the TALC bell-curve...Listen to the MP3 audio to find out...

Silicon Valley Update: The demise of Silicon Graphics an Example of Marketing Myopia?

Fri, 3 Apr 2009 23:15:00 EST

From the recently added business concept titled Marketing Myopia: This happens frequently in Silicon Valley, where the core of the product line for a company is its underlying technologies. Since technologies change very fast, unless there is focus on R&D / product development, your existing products can become obsolete in due course. An example of this is Silicon Graphics, once a high-flying Silicon Valley firm. Once upon a time, the firm's products, namely high-resolution graphics workstations, were at the core of such famous Hollywood productions like Jurassic Park and Terminator 2. However, the company suffered from Marketing Myopia, did not upgrade its servers, giving other server firms a chance to steal market share / customers. Silicon Graphics, which once boasted of multi-billion dollar revenue, has filed for bankruptcy, and at the time of writing (April 2009) is rumored to be taken over by a small server manufacturer for only 25 million dollars! To understand what Marketing Myopia is, click on the link above…

PODCAST – Sam Mishra narrates how he used the S-CURVES framework to trounce Scott McNealy of Sun Microsystems

Wed, 18 Mar 2009 14:50:00 PST

In this PODCAST, Sam Mishra, Author of Strategic Case Analysis, talks about S-Curves and how he had successfully applied the framework to depict the disruption of Solaris by Linux. After his LinuxWorld keynote, Scott McNealy, the then CEO of Sun, was presiding over a Q&A session. There, Sam got a chance to approach the whiteboard and draw the framework out in its applied form - - - i.e., the lower S-Curve depicting Solaris and the upper S-Curve depicting Linux (so Linux was depicted as lower in terms of technology adoption but disrupting Solaris nevertheless). Click on the link above to listen to the complete story and how you can apply S-Curves to chalk product strategy, business strategy, and corporate strategy…

PODCAST ELABORATING “VALUE CHAIN ANALYSIS” ADDED TO THE PORTAL

Sun, 15 Mar 2009 09:04:00 EST

In this podcast, Sam Mishra talks about Value Chain Analysis and associated strategy concepts like forward integration, backward integration, off-shoring, outsourcing etc. Sam leverages his substantial experience in the software industry and explains a complex concept like Value Chain (which is typically used to analyze manufacturing companies) and how it can be applied to services companies like software. In the process, Sam touches upon the following: (1) What is forward integration, what is backward integration, how can you take strategic make-vs-buy decisions in the context of off-shoring / outsourcing, etc. (2) When does it make sense to forward integrate (for example, if you are competing with IBM, which has a global services arm, you better acquire a services firm if you don't want all your accounts be taken over by Big Blue), and is the services firm too big to forward integrate / acquire? (3) Concepts like "synthesizing product requirements" as opposed to requirements "analysis" in the context of software development / manufacturing. (4) Why Porter's Value Chain Analysis remains a robust tool to analyze not only a company's core competency, but also complementary assets like off-shored contract software development, off-shored contract software parters doubling up as biz-dev partners who can "open doors", etc. CLICK ON THE LINK ABOVE TO LISTEN TO THE PODCAST…

PODCAST ELABORATING THE FIVE C's FRAMEWORK Added

Mon, 2 Mar 2009 02:15:00 EST

In this podcast, Sam Mishra elaborates on the Five C's framework from his book Strategic Case Analysis. Over and above what is covered under each C in the book, the author uses his industry experience, his dialogs with successful CEOs (Andrew Grove of Intel), and his analysis of competitive dynamics in the hyper-competitive Silicon Valley (competition between Cisco Systems and Juniper Networks to dominate the Core Internet Router business) to drive home the point that Five C's are a key tool-set for any business strategist / strategic marketer - - - (1) Company: The author narrates how he asked Andrew Grove (the then CEO of Intel Corporation) once what Mr. Grove's leadership style was, and what Mr. Grove's reply was. Listen to the podcast to find out more, and to understand why leaders can make or break a company. (2) Customers: While explaining the C relating to Customers, the author refers to segmenting customers in more meaningful ways, as dealt with in a separate podcast on STP & VALS-2. (3) Competition: Delves more deeply into concepts like "tight appropriability", "complementary assets", and "speed". The author also explains how Cisco Systems moved in strategically to dilute the competitiveness of Juniper Networks in the battle between these two companies for dominance in the "core Internet routers" business. (4) Costs: In the context of outsourcing / off-shoring to reduce costs, the author uses his experience with a small product company which unsuccessfully tried an off-shoring model and failed. However, off-shoring software development to India can be a great cost cutting strategy if the firm is a larger firm, i.e., at least a thousand programmers. (5) Channels: The author explains, using the double marginalization concept, how it is important to know who has how much market power in which segment of the channel. To listen, click on the link above…

Podcast explaining VALS-2 Segmentation plus STP Marketing Added

Wed, 25 Feb 2009 21:20:00 EST

PODCAST: Sam Mishra elaborates on the marketing segmentation related frameworks from his book Strategic Case Analysis. Using his vast experience in diverse industry verticals and actual marketing / strategy engagements, Sam touches upon the following in this podcast: (1) How Steve Jobs, the creator / founder / CEO of Apple Computers could fit into different psychographic segments pertaining to "Status" at different stages of his life, as he climbed from a "Striver" to an "Achiever" to an "Actualizer"; (2) Relationship between VALS-2 pchychographic segments and Maslow's Hierarchy of needs; (3) Difference between hot-sheets, beat-sheets, cheat-sheets in Positioning (part of STP - Segmenting, Targeting, Positioning); (4) STP best practices for segmenting industrial customer bases - can you do better than segmenting your customers into SMB (small and mid-size businesses), mid-market & enterprise / Fortune 500? To listen, click on the link above…