The ADL Matrix or Arthur D Little Strategic Condition Matrix is a Portfolio Management technique that is based on the Product Life Cycle (PLC). It is developed in the 1980’s by Arthur D. Little, Inc. (ADL), one of the best-known consulting firms, intended to help a company manage its collection of product businesses as a portfolio. Like other portfolio planning matrices, the ADL matrix represents a company’s various businesses in a 2-dimensional matrix. It is a structured methodology for consideration of strategies which are dependent on the life cycle of the industry. The ADL approach uses the dimensions of environment assessment and business – strength assessment ie. Competitive Position and Industry Maturity. The environment assessment is an identification of the industry’s life cycle and the business strength assessment is a categorization of the company’s SBU’s into one of five competitive positions, these five competitive positions by four life cycle stages. Continue reading
Business Strategies
Case Study: The Merger between Daimler and Chrysler
DaimlerBenz AG of Stuttgart, Germany, and the Chrysler Corporation of Auburn Hills, Michigan, surprised the business world at a press conference in London on May 7, 1998, when they announced their “merger of equals made in heaven.” This major cross-border transaction, with an equity value of $36 billion, was the largest merger of its kind to date. Robert Eaton and Jürgen E. Schrempp, co-chairmen of DCX, announced their expectation that this deal would be “not only the best strategic merger or the best prepared merger, but also the best executed merger.” Daimler-Benz Chief Executive Jürgen Schrempp had concluded as early as 1996 that his company’s automotive operations needed a partner to compete in the increasingly globalized marketplace. Chrysler’s Eaton was drawing the same conclusion in 1997 based on two factors emerging around the same time: the Asian economic crisis, which was cutting into demand, and worldwide excess auto manufacturing capacity, Continue reading
Case Study: Google’s Acquisition of Motorola Mobility
Motorola mobility, which was previously known as the mobile devices division of Motorola, until January 2011 when it was separated. The company produces smart phones, set top boxes, end to end video solutions and cable modems. As soon as automobiles were becoming popular, Motorola helped with entertaining the passengers, as it introduced the world’s first commercial portable cell phone. On the other Hand, Google a privately held company, founded by Larry page and Sergey Brin, two Phd students at the university of Stanford, it has been focused on technology innovations to help its users find the information with unprecedented levels of ease, accuracy and relevancy. Google primarily concentrated on the areas of search, advertising, operating systems and platforms, enterprise and hardware products. These programs include AdWords, AdSense, Google Display and Google Mobile, with Android and Google Chrome serve as its operating system and platforms. Google generate revenues primarily through delivering Continue reading
Michael Porter’s Four Corners Model
Profiling a specific competitor is often important to management. However, many competitive profiles will fail to give management insights into how competitors will respond to your own strategy. Understanding this inter-relationship is important for knowing how to position your company in relation to the competition. One of the most popular models for this type of competitor analysis is the so-called Four Corners Analysis. The Four Corners Analysis developed by Harvard Business School professor and strategy guru Michael Porter is a model well designed to help company strategists assess a competitor’s intent and objectives, and the strengths it is using to achieve them. By examining a competitor’s current strategy, future goals, assumptions about the market, and core capabilities, the Four Corners Model helps analysts address four core questions: What drives the competitor? Look for drivers at various levels and dimensions so you can gain insights into future goals. What is Continue reading
Capacity Expansion Strategy
Growing an existing business often involves expansion of capacity, in terms of plant, human resources, technological infrastructure, R&D facilities, etc. Any major capacity expansion is a strategic decision that involves significant resource commitments and is often difficult to reverse. So such a decision has to be made carefully. Capacity expansion strategy is often narrowly applied to manufacturing. But in many businesses, there is no or little manufacturing. So, capacity needs to be understood in terms of the investments made in the most critical area of the value chain. Thus, in the pharmaceutical industry, capacity has to be defined in terms of scientific manpower and sales force. In a software development company, capacity has to be understood in terms of the number of programmers employed. In a Business School, capacity may be defined as the number of professors available to teach students. According to Michael Porter, the decision to expand capacity Continue reading
SWOT Analysis – A Strategic Planning Tool
SWOT is an acronym for internal Strength (S) and Weakness (W) of an organization, and external Opportunities (O) and Threats (T) facing that organization. A merging of the organization’s resources with the opportunities in the environment results in an assessment of the organization’s opportunities. This merging is frequently called SWOT analysis because it brings together the organization’s Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats in order to identify a strategic niche that the organization can exploit. SWOT analysis provides information that is helpful in matching the firms’ resources and capabilities to the competitive environment in which it operates and is therefore an important contribution to the strategic planning process. Having completed the SWOT analysis, the organization reassesses its mission and objectives. In the light of the SWOT analysis and identification of the organization’s opportunities, management reevaluates its mission and objectives. Are they realistic? Do they need modification? If changes are Continue reading