Course work on generic toolkit for sony company

Sony Company

Profile and Background of the Sony Company

Sony Company is one of the world most popular companies when it comes to electronic. This is for the main reason that it provides unique devices. For an exceptionally long period, Sony Company has produced different gadgets. The wide variety of the gadgets produced by the Sony Company has been of significant use to the society. This is because machines make the lifestyle of the human beings simpler. The Sony Company was established in Japan with extremely minimal amount of money (Flugge, 2008, p. 95). However, the company has slowly matured from an exceedingly tiny organization into a multinational association. This has been supported by the creative minds of the management team.

Through the implementations of new laws and strategic marketing plans, the company has captured more audience. This has been of immense benefit since the customers have been able to purchase more commodities from the company. This has made the Sony Company become more competitive in nature than the other companies. The competition of the company is favored by the enormous profitable gains that the company is making. Most of the rivals of the Sony Company have been unable to compete because of the range of the commodity offered by the company. Although in the current years, numerous companies are emerging, the Sony Company is still well recognized. This is for the main reason that the devices provided by the company are of high standards (Chang, 2008, p. 102).

Through the innovations of the different gadgets, Sony Company has been able to maintain its prosperity for the last sixty years. The company has slowly but steadily emerged from the manufacture of the tape player to Walkman and eventually to the OLED televisions. Currently various gadgets such as Laptops, palmtops and computers of high technology are manufactured by the Sony Company. This has attracted more customers into purchasing the commodities produced by the Sony Company. The wide range of the devices also increases the diversity of the company. This is what has made the Sony Company be more competitive in nature. Sony Company was established by Ibuka Masaru and Morita Akio immediately after the Second World War (Nathan, 2001, p. 133). It was at first originated by the Telecommunication Engineering Corporation.

The company was established by a total amount of two hundred thousand yen (200, 000 yen), which is almost equivalent to one fifteen hundred US dollars ($1, 500). In the first few years, the company had problems with purchasing its products (Shin Luh, 2003, p. 114). For instance, the power megaphone, which was the Sony’s first gadget, was not sold due to lack of customers. However, this improved in the year 1950 when the second gadget, tape recorder was launched in the market by the Sony Company. The tape recorder attracted more customers since it was a unique gadget in the entire world. The advertisement posted by the Sony Company attracted schools and law courts which were interested in buying the commodity.

In the mid 1950’s, the name Sony was created after the company realized that the initials TTK were already used in America. This was an appropriate trade name since it was easier to pronounce also unique. Through the slow but gradual movement, the Sony Company was able to launch a branch in the United States. This exposed the products that were being manufactured by the Sony Company to the world. After making massive profits, the management decided to launch another branch in the United Kingdom. This evens the company to expand at an unusually faster rate in the 1970’s. In the year 1973, Sony Company explored its market into France and Spain and eventually into Germany in 1986 (Pham, 2009, p. 152).

The products that are produced currently are of a wide range increasing the availability of the market commodities. Various customers have been attracted by the unique devices and features that they contain. Some of the common devices that are manufactured by the Sony Company encompass of the various play-stations that are used to play computer games, laptops, radios and digital cameras. Other small but useful gadgets encompass of the compact disks, memory sticks and ipods. The earlier devices that made the Sony Company recognized are the Walkman and the beta max (Martin, 2005, p. 89). This made the company to be more familiar since the target market was the youths who were addicted to music.

Targeting the young generation in the marketplaces, the Sony Company made enormous profits. This is because it discovered that the young people love listening to music. This generated more income for the Sony Company making it be well recognized and competitive in nature. The management of the Sony Company is the root of all the successful moves that the organization has made in the past years. The management involved the president of the company, Ibuka Masaru, company manager, management staff and the employees (Khosrowpour, 2000, p. 157). Strategic measures were suggested by the manager of the company. This was confirmed by the president before the policies were enacted and implemented.

Cooperation and working as a single unit is the prime secret that the employees and the management use to provide quality services. This also made the company acquire loyal customers who would still purchase the various products manufactured even when there is economic recession. Loyal customers are able to buy commodities from the Sony Company even when new companies emerge in the market. Through the increase customers and demand in the commodities, the Sony Company opened various branches worldwide. Currently, the Sony Company has more than two hundred and forty different companies internationally. This makes it one of the biggest manufacturing companies in the entire world.

Challenges Facing the Sony Company

Through the various years, the Sony Company has been facing serious competition from other emerging companies. This has made it difficult for the Sony Company to make ambiguous profit. This also made it extremely difficult for customers to be able to decide on which products to purchase in the marketplaces. For this reason, various customers had difficulty in making the correct choice of product. The price of the commodity has also been a serious problem to clients who are to purchase the Sony Company products. Some of devices such as the radio systems and play stations are extremely expensive. This made most of the customers divert from purchases expensive commodities and opting for the cheap gadgets. This is even currently a problem that the Sony Company is facing even to date. Most of the customers are opting for cheaper commodities from other emerging companies such as Life is Good (LG) Company (Hellriegel and Slocum, 2007, p. 64).

Another problem that the clients face is the fact that various emerging companies are imitating the original products that are manufactured by the Sony Company. Various companies are using the same technology as the Sony Company to manufacture new product. Although this is prohibited as copyrighting, the companies are secretly copying Sony Company. For this reason, the clients or customers that purchase Sony Company commodities usually have difficulty in purchasing Sony’s original products (Tafoya, 2010, p. 107). This can be rectified through placing a logo and trademarks in the original Sony Company products. This makes it be exceedingly easy for clients to identify the genuine commodities produced by Sony Company. This also reduces the time that the client wastes in the market searching for the genuine product to purchase. Another challenge is proper management of the various offices that are found in the two hundred and forty nations (Peters, 2009, p. 166).

Fig1. A graph representing sales made by the Sony Company between the years 2010-2011

According to the graph, the sales of the Sony Company have been declining in the past few years. This is for the main reason of the stiff competition that the company faces from other merging business that purchases the same commodities. Commodities manufactured by the Sony Company are expensive due to quality and originality. This has made customers to opt of purchasing their products from other companies. This in the recent years has made it very difficult for the Sony Company to make the expected profitable gains (Baker and Hart, 2007). For this reason, Sony as a company has been encountering various losses. However, through the use of the focus tool, the company can identify its challenges and set measures to regain its trust to the customers. Through this mechanism, the Sony Company will be able to retain its profitable gains once more.

Toolkit Work Plan for Sony Company

Since the Sony Company has been experiencing various problems in the past with the clients, a generic business toolkit is particularly vital. This is to assist clients in making fast and easy decision in the marketplaces. There are three main tools that are used in the forecasting of any given companies stock rate. This encompasses of Forecasting by Regression Analysis, Forecasting by the Z-Chart, and Forecasting by smoothing. Through these different forecasting methods, companies can be able to identify challenges and problems facing production, supply and purchase. For the purpose of discussion of this paper, the Z-chat will be used to analyze the future profitable margins that the Sony Company might incur. Through the business toolkit, the Sony Company is able to develop a work plan that will enable its clients and customers to shop with ease. This will encourage the loyal customer to purchase commodities from the marketplaces (Fairley and Zipp, 2010, p. 71).

In any given organization, forecasts are very vital and for that case should not be produced by a single unit of forecasters. Forecasting is a continuous process that can never be fully accomplished. For this reason, the Sony Company usually has continuous forecasting to ensure that the performance of the organization is measured. This ensures that the old decisions are appropriately modified and the forecast is updated according to the current market. There are different phases that are involved in the forecasting process. The first procedure is the model specifications. This will specify the models being used for forecasting. This is followed by estimation of model which will indicate if the model is appropriate. In this stage, the amount of capital to be used in the entire forecasting phase is estimated. The generation of the forecasting method is then implemented. This encompass of the new strategies to ensure that there is change in the organization. After verification to identify that the model is stable, the model is used in implementing change into the organization.

Fig2. The Different Forecasting Phases

Forecasting of the Sony Company Using the Z-Chart

The Z-chat is a chat that is used in quick fix forecasting by organization. This is the key reason why I selected it rather than the other forecasting tools. It gives immediate results that clearly explain the future of the business company. This makes it extremely simple for the management to implement the necessary changes to ensure that the business flourishes. Since the Sony Company has been facing various challenges, the use of the Z-chat to forecast of the future sales of the company will be appropriate. This will assist the management to make the necessary changes hence recovering from the losses that the company incurred in the previous years.

The Z-chat is usually very vital in predicting short time sales of the company. For instance the sales of the Sony Company for the next three months can be forecasted using the Z-chat. The strength of this method is that it gives a preview of the actual commodity in the marketplaces. However, this method has a weakness in the sense that it is more expensive hence can incur losses to the Sony Company (Paley, 2002, p. 131). The method can be improved by reducing the number of years that are to be predicated. This will reduce the time wasted and the capital used in the process of forecasting.

However, this is only possible if there are previous sales for the other previous months. To be able to predict, the trading conditions are assumed to remain constant and the present trends of the company will continue (Goldstein, 2007). For instance, the total amount of sales for the previous nine months of the Sony Company will be used. Apart from the total sales of the Sony Company for the previous nine months, the figures of the previous year are also vital for the forecasting process.

The table indicates Sony’s California branch sales for the nine months of the year 2004 and the sales for the entire year of 2003. From the given data, another table can be derived indicating the actual sales of the year 2004, the cumulative totals and the moving total. The cumulative total is derived by adding the sales of the current month to the total of the previous month’s sales. For instance, actual sales for January, 520+ 380 for February, = 900 which is the cumulative total for February. Moreover, the moving total is obtained by addition of the current sales to the total of the preceding 12 months and subtracting the equivalent month of the previous year. For instance, the moving total for the 12 months in 2003 is 7, 310 (see Fig 3). This is added to 520 which is the actual sale. This totals to 7, 830 and then subtracts the previous month last year, January actual sale 940 to get 6, 890 which is the January 2004 moving total. The moving total is the most essential tool that actually aids in forecasting (Lipe, 2002). This is for the main reason that it includes all fluctuations in the sales.

The data obtained as the cumulative totals and twelve months moving total is then plotted in a graph (A and B respectively) to give the forecast of the entire sales of the Sony Company the entire year. The lines representing each of the variables are extended to meet as an even point. The prediction of the remaining three months of the Sony Company can then be obtained from the graph.

Recommendations

There are various recommendations that can be implemented to change the status and make it easy for customers to purchase Sony Company products. One of the key recommendations that can be implemented is increasing the advertisements to attract more customers. Advertisements and promotions attract more customers and convince them in purchasing the products. The adverts should be of bright colors and simple for people to understand. The adverts should also be produced in all media making it highly possible for all the people to recognize the Sony Company commodities. These include the television, radio, poster advertisements and the internet. (Daft, Murphy and Willmott, 2010, p. 129).

References

Baker, M., and Hart, S. 2007. The Marketing Book, Butterworth Heinemann, Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann,

Chang, S., 2008. Sony vs. Samsung: the inside story of the electronics giants’ battle for global supremacy, New York: John Wiley and Sons

Daft, A., Murphy, J., and Willmott, H., 2010. Organization theory and design, Cambridge: Cengage Learning EMEA

Fairley, S., and Zipp, W., 2010, The Business Coaching Toolkit: Top 10 Strategies for Solving the Toughest Dilemmas Facing Organizations, New York: John Wiley and Sons

Finklestein, R., 2007. 49 Marketing Secrets (That Work) to Grow Sales, New York: Morgan James Publishing

Flugge, J., 2008, Sony – a Japanese Company Going Global, London: GRIN Verlag

Goldstein, B. 2007, The Ultimate Small Business Marketing Toolkit: All the Tips, Forms, and Strategies You’ll Ever Need, London: McGraw-Hill Professional

Hellriegel, D., and Slocum, J. 2007. Organizational behavior, Cambridge: Cengage Learning

Gilley, J. 2001. The manager as change agent: a practical guide for developing high-performance people and organizations, New perspectives in organizational learning, performance, and change, New York: Basic Books

Khosrowpour, M., 2000, Organizational achievement and failure in information technology management, CASES ON INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY SERIES, Volume 2 of Success and Pitfalls of It Management Series, Michigan: Idea Group Inc (IGI)

Lipe, J., 2002. The marketing toolkit for growing businesses: tips, techniques and tools to improve your marketing, Michigan: Chammerson Press LLC

Martin, J., 2005, Organizational behavior and management, Cambridge: Cengage Learning EMEA

Nathan, J, 2001, Sony, Chicago: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Pham, K., 2009. Marketing Strategy of Sony for Portable Audio Device Business, London: GRIN Verlag, 2009

Peters, P., 2009, The Ultimate Marketing Toolkit: Ads That Attract Customers. Blogs That Create Buzz. Web Sites That Wow, Chicago: Adams Media

Paley, N., 2002. The manager’s guide to competitive marketing strategies, New Jersey: St. Lucie Press

Shin Luh, 2003, Business the Sony way: secrets of the world’s most innovative electronics giant, New Jersey: Capstone

Tafoya, D., 2010. The Effective Organization: Practical Application of Complexity Theory and Organizational Design to Maximize Performance in the Face of Emerging Events, London: Taylor & Francis