Nissan and the "7-S" model

Nissan cars didn't always go by that name. In the early years of Nissan most people knew them as Datsun. Initially the strategy of the company seemed to be focused on making affordable cars that got great gas mileage. These strategy worked fantastically in the 70's especially when American gas prices rose due to the Arab gas embargo. Many people saw Datsun as having BMW quality but with a smaller price tag. All of this combined to make Datsun one of the top Japanese auto makers in the US. Everyone all over the world knew the name Datsun except in their home country Japan, there they were known as Nissan.

In an attempt to strengthen Nissan's name the company decided to rename all Datsuns to Nissans. This not only caused confusion in the market place (no one knew who Nissan was) but also it mis-aligned their strategy. Nissan was great at making low cost gas efficient vehicles and they seemed to be aligned to do so. By re-branding all of their cars to be a part of the Nissan name, which was a higher class vehicle, it mis-aligned their strategy of now being perceived as a high class company. Now Nissan is only the number three Japanese brand in the US.

Though it seems that they have re-aligned the company to fit the re-branding of Nissan as a high class car maker (especially with the addition of the Infinity line) it seems that Nissan wants to start making low cost gas efficient cars again. Since they have worked so hard to elevate the brand's image they are going to release this new line of cars under the name Datsun.

I think this will work in keeping their 7-S model aligned since they are not trying to change their strategy completely, but rather revive the old image as something separate from Nissan's brand image.

Quality Cars Becoming The Norm Rather Than The Exception

For a long time the auto industry has made cars that on average last 200,000 miles at best before it becomes more economical to purchase a new one. Although the life of a car depends on the care and maintenance that have gone into it, it mostly depends on the quality of which it was built in the first place.

If I were to ask you which car manufacturers make the most dependable cars, which companies come to mind? For me I have always thought that Toyota was one of the most dependable cars manufacturers and a leader in quality manufacturing. They dedicated themselves to a strategy of making dependable cars before most other car companies saw the value in this. Because of this first mover advantage, Toyota holds a position in consumers minds that other car companies are having to struggle to reach. Their first mover advantage also allows them to keep developing quality cars and be a bit ahead of the development curve.

Toyota also has an added advantage according to the VRIO model. Looking at the table below and using Quality as the resource I would say that it is Valuable, relatively Rare in the car manufacturing business, Costly to Imitate, and Exploited by Toyota. So long as Toyota keeps improving their car manufacturing process and making dependable cars they will have a sustained competitive advantage and their economic performance with be above average.

Is The Resource or capability…
Valuable?	Rare?	Costly to Imitate?	Exploited by the Organization?	Competitive implications	Economic  performance
No	--	--		Competitive disadvantage	Below normal
Yes	No	--		Competitive parity	Normal
Yes	Yes	No		Temporary competitive advantage	Above normal
Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes/No	Sustained competitive advantage	Above normal

Want a Recession Proof Job?

Look no further than the Gong Industry. It seems a little ridiculous but according to an article in the Wall Street Journal gong seller Andrew Borakove has discovered that his gong business (of selling absolutely nothing but gongs and gong accessories) is a recession proof industry. During upswings in the economy salesmen were Borakove's main buyers. These salesmen would have their customers ring a gong after buying  a big purchase to make them feel more excited about buying something they probably couldn't afford. During a recession many people turned to meditation for all of their stress and yoga instructors started pouring in orders. Even the supposed end of the world looming has his gong business flourishing because Borakove sells gongs that are tuned to the same frequency as minor planets.

Using Porter's 5 forces to analyse the global gong industry it is easy to see why Borakove is so successful.

Barriers to Entry: I honestly think the biggest barrier to entry is thinking of starting a gong business in the first place. Others include cost of a warehouse, initial investment in gongs, and a high ranking gong website. Overall these are not high cost barriers. The one that would be most difficult would be getting your website ranked as high as Borakove's.

Supplier Power: It seems like there are many options for people to get the supplies they need to run a gong business with the exception of gong bags that seems to be sold in China. Thus supplier power is not going to drive up the cost of the gong industry.

Substitutes: If a customer wants a gong, I cannot think of any other musical instrument that would be a viable substitute, so there are really no threats from substitutes.

Buyer Power: The customers who purchase gongs are usually one time buyers and are not an organized group so they don't have much in the way of power that would drive down the price of gongs.

Rivalry: While many music stores also sell gongs there are not many gong specialists, so Borakove has a pretty good market share of the gong realm and would most likely keep that market share even if someone else decided to also specialize in gongs because of his high rank in search engines.

Wall Street Journal Article:
 http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203806504577181151324644504.html?mod=ITP_AHED 

Is Blackberry making a comeback?

In today's world of smartphones many people believe that the iPhone and the Android are the top competitors, while one of the first smart phones ever, the Blackberry, is all but forgotten among my generation. When I think of Blackberry I think of executives and businessmen who need to check their email on the go, while when I think of iPhones I think of the young and techno savvy. For a while Blackberry hung onto its claim on the businessman and stuck with its original design, but in 2010 it released the Torch series which has touchscreens. In this way they seemed to want to capture both the businessmen who were their typical customer, and reach out to the younger generations as well.

With this choice there is a risk of straddling, and ultimately providing service poorly in two ways, but I think with the smartphone industry if Blackberry did not offer a touch screen it would end up losing even its most loyal customers. Also I feel that Blackberry is going about adding a new service to their phones in the right way. The Torch series (all of which have touch screens) come in three different designs. The original where there is a screen with a slide out key board, the second model which looks very similar to the iPhone and Android phones, and the newest one that looks like a traditional Blackberry just with a touchscreen. While I still think the smart phone industry is a highly competitive industry that is dominated by two giants, Blackberry who has long been a player is making the right choices to getting back in the game.