Business Studies

Globalization and Information Research

This assignment is intended to give you an opportunity to strengthen your skills in gathering and analyzing business-related information. It provides a deeper understanding of how companies can look at globalization as part of their strategic and operational plans. The assignment has two parts: one focused on information research and analysis, and the other is on applied analytics.

Resources: 

• Microsoft Excel®
• “How Netflix Expanded to 190 Countries in 7 Years” from Harvard Business Review
• xlsx file 

Part 1: Globalization and Information Research

Context: Companies that perform well in their country of origin usually consider expanding operations in new international markets. Deciding where, how, and when to expand is not an easy task, though.

Many issues need to be considered before crafting an expansion strategy and investing significant resources to this end, including:

• the level of demand to be expected for the company’s products/services
• presence of local competitors
• the regulatory, economic, demographic, and political environments

Carefully researching and analyzing these and other factors can help mitigate the inherent risk associated with an overseas expansion strategy, thus increasing the likelihood of success.

As a data analyst in your company’s business development department, you’ve been tasked with the responsibility of recommending countries for international expansion. You’ll write a report to the company’s executive team with your research, analysis, and recommendations.

Instructions: 

Write a 525-word summary covering the following items:

• According to the article listed above, what were the most important strategic moves that propelled Netflix’s successful international expansion?
• The article mentions investments in big data and analytics as one of the elements accompanying the second phase of overseas expansion. Why was this investment important? What type of information did Netflix derive from the data collected?
• According to the article, what is exponential globalization?
• Not all international expansion strategies are a resounding success, however. Research an article or video that discusses an instance in which an American company’s expansion efforts in another country failed. According to the article/video you selected, what were the main reasons for this failure? Do you agree with this assessment?
• Explain some of the reasons why certain companies’ expansion plans have failed in the past.

Part 2: Hypothesis testing 

Context: Your organization is evaluating the quality of its call center operations. One of the most important metrics in a call center is Time in Queue (TiQ), which is the time a customer has to wait before he/she is serviced by a Customer Service Representative (CSR). If a customer has to wait for too long, he/she is more likely to get discouraged and hang up. Furthermore, customers who have to wait too long in the queue typically report a negative overall experience with the call. You’ve conducted an exhaustive literature review and found that the average TiQ in your industry is 2.5 minutes (150 seconds).

Another important metric is Service Time (ST), also known as Handle Time, which is the time a CSR spends servicing the customer. CSR’s with more experience and deeper knowledge tend to resolve customer calls faster. Companies can improve average ST by providing more training to their CSR’s or even by channeling calls according to area of expertise. Last month your company had an average ST of approximately 3.5 minutes (210 seconds). In an effort to improve this metric, the company has implemented a new protocol that channels calls to CSR’s based on area of expertise. The new protocol (PE) is being tested side-by-side with the traditional (PT) protocol.

Instructions:

Access the CallCenterWaitingTime.xlsx file. Each row in the database corresponds to a different call. The column variables are as follows:

• ProtocolType: indicates protocol type, either PT or PE
• QueueTime: Time in Queue, in seconds
• ServiceTime: Service Time, in seconds
• Perform a test of hypothesis to determine whether the average TiQ is lower than the industry standard of 2.5 minutes (150 seconds). Use a significance level of α=0.05.
• Evaluate if the company should allocate more resources to improve its average TiQ.
• Perform a test of hypothesis to determine whether the average ST with service protocol PE is lower than with the PT protocol. Use a significance level of α=0.05.
• Assess if the new protocol served its purpose. (Hint: this should be a test of means for 2 independent groups.)
• Submit your calculations and a 175-word summary of your

Coca-Cola Company

Business overview

Coca Cola Company is a multinational beverage company founded by Dr. John Pemberton. The Company has grown over the last decades from a small company to a multinational company.   Coca Cola Corporation provides over 500 nonalcoholic brands of beverages, including soft drinks, water, sports drinks, and juices, and other dairy beverages (The Guardian, 2010, p. 4). The company also produces independent bottles for wholesale and retail purchases. Finally, Coca cola operates within the global market of Europe, America, Asia, and Africa with its headquarter based in Georgia, North America.

Mission statement

Coca-Cola Company strives to deliver unique and high quality beverages in a bid to refresh its global customers. The company’s key priority is to create a refreshing customer-base experience in its range of products. It targets the entertainment industry as a major consumer of refreshing products.

Vision statement

Coca-Cola Company aims to become a leading producer of the beverage and refreshing products across the entire global market. in addition, it also strives to diversify its range of products in developing unique but appealing products to its customers.

Market analysis

As a multinational company, Coca cola runs in a competitive beverage market with its major competitors, including Pepsi, Red Bull, Diet Pepsi, Gatorade, Keurig Dr. Pepper, and Mountain Dew. All of which are international companies, thereby intensifying the competition within the global beverage market. The company, however, enjoys numerous trade advantages within the international market.

For instance, it has maintained diverse but unique products ranging from Coca-Cola, Fanta, Black Current, Sprite, and Stoney. Coca cola Company also owns the patent rights in its unique product processing. This has enhanced its market leadership across the global market. Coca-Cola Company has also created a good customer experience through its guarantee of customer support services, including cost-free refrigerators and business to business delivery of products to the company’s retailers. On the contrary, the organization of Coca cola like other companies faces other challenges. For instance, the company does not have a direct link with its customers, which undermines the creation of an operational system that promptly responds to the customers’ needs. The company also faces the challenge of poor supervision and accountability issues. For example, the company’s production processes are entirely run by the human taskforce who do not fully conform to all the managerial guidelines of effective supervision and counterchecking of all the production processes.

Recommendations

Going forward, the company needs to consider the following recommendations. The organization needs to put in place control systems that oversee the supervision and counterchecking of production and processing operations to strengthen the human labor efforts. The company also needs to build more on its branding to ensure that the request variability of its customers is easily identified and factored in to enhance its customer’s experience further (Eggert, Kleinaltenkamp & Kashyap, 2019). Coca-Cola Company also needs to put a major focus on the business customer relations in shifting the attention of the customers’ needs from the ‘eyes’ of its customers. The company must also initiate social media marketing in trying to enhance its close ties with the customers to identify their immediate tastes and preferences. Finally, the company needs to consider venturing in new product lines that directly target its customers other than the common retail to customer business links. Such direct links are a major boost to the firm’s sales across the global market. Coca-Cola Company must consider these recommendations in creating a successful business environment in the future.

References

Eggert, A., Kleinaltenkamp, M., & Kashyap, V. (2019). Mapping value in business markets: An integrative framework. Industrial Marketing Management, 79, 13-20.ed for better returns.

The Guardian (2010). Company Profile for Coca cola. Retrieved from:             https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/companies-      list-c-d1