The world of aggressive sports currently lists boxing as its most popular incarnation. Why not? Boxing feeds off the need for an adrenalin rush and allows for the spending of excess energy among men. For decades, boxing was king. But in the 1990s, a new sport began to emerge that would begin to challenge the popularity of boxing. Known as the UFC or Ultimate Fighting Championship, it is a no holds barred physical contact sport that is set to overtake boxing in terms of popularity and betting revenue. My thesis is that the UFC has already well on its way to becoming more popular than boxing as a sport and betting venue for gamblers.
The game was originally deemed too violent for television airing and turned off an event the men whom they thought would be cash cows for the program due to its high physical and “no holds barred” of the sport. No move or maneuver was deemed illegal at the start. In fact, the sport was so bloody in the beginning that even Sen. John McCain openly declared that it was nothing better than a human style of cockfighting.
More recently, the World Boxing Council President Jose Sulaiman was quoted by Sky Sports in his 2007 interview as saying, “I oppose 100 percent this ultimate fighting. It has taken boxing to the era of the caveman and the Roman circus…These are not ancient times. This fighting is fed to those fans who like aggression, blood and illegality. They are not boxing fans. Boxing fans have class.” (Sulaiman Slams Savage Sports. 2008)
Such comments and reviews send the sport into a state of decline and unpopularity that it was as good as dead. The UFC organizers went back to the drawing board and tweaked the game system by injecting some rules into it.
According to Daniel Schorn’s 60 Minutes report (2007) “These days, there are 31 fouls, and the fighters don’t come at each other bare-fisted anymore. They’re required to use special gloves with a little bit of padding over the knuckles. You can’t kick to the groin anymore, and you can’t stomp your opponent once he’s on the ground. The octagon itself is 30 feet across. There’s padding under the fighters’ feet, and they put the fence around it so the fighters don’t go rolling out onto the floor.” (Mixed Martial Arts: A New Kind Of Sport, 2007) The rule changes apparently paid off as the money came rolling in for the producers and fight organizers.
It became obvious that even though men like testosterone-driven sports, they also drew the line at how these fights should be played out. That was the reason why boxing was so popular. Even though there was physical hurt between opponents, there were still safety measures in place to ensure that nobody got deathly injured in the course of the fight. By having the UFC fighters stick to certain rules, the “caveman era” of the UFC sport came to an end and catapulted it into the front-line of contact sports and betting.
Sports aficionados openly admit that UFC has steadily gained ground among the high stakes gamblers both online and offline over the past few years. Although boxing is still the best of choice for these people, most of them wait for big-name fights before placing bets.
According to The Gambling Weblog, “UFC, a mixed martial arts fighting league which has gained considerable attention among gamblers in the past 12 months, is now poised to overtake boxing in terms of online betting revenues…After UFC 71 gained a record amount of viewers, many online gambling sites have seen a huge increase in the number of customers looking to bet on UFC fights. ” (Bodog Says UFC Will Overtake Boxing, 2007)
Obviously, UFC will become more popular than boxing at a certain point. However, that is not to say that boxing will fade away. Instead, both sports will find their niche in terms of viewership and gambling venue over the years to come.
Work Cited
Hartness, John. (2007). Bodog says UFC will overtake boxing. The Gambling Weblog. Web.
Schorn, Daniel. (2007). Mixed martial arts: A new kind of fight. 60 Minutes. Web.
Chief Executive Officer’s Leadership Qualities
American Telephone and Telegraph (AT&T) has been created in 1885 in the United States of America. For a long time, the company has been a monopolist of the local and long-haul telecommunications in the country. However, closer to the 1990s AT&T has been forced to focus on the long-haul telecommunications only. At present, the company is the largest telecommunications provider in the United States, as well as the second greatest provider of the wireless services in the country. The company’s CEO is Randall Stephenson, and, judging from the AT&T’s performance, he is quite a successful leader. He became the company’s CEO, Chairman, and President in 2007 and, since then, he has greatly developed the company and strengthened its position as the largest telecommunications company in the world. Randall L. Stephenson can be regarded as an effective leader whose main characteristics are excellent communication skills, intelligence, and determination; from the perspective of the industry source, these characteristics are leadership skills, executing the company’s strategies, and continuous improvement; with these characteristics, Stephenson is likely to leave behind rich organization legacy to the company.
To begin with, the fact that Stephenson is an effective leader can be proven by his possessing and exhibiting such characteristics as excellent communication skills, intelligence, and determination. Good communication skills are vital for a CEO because he/she often has to pronounce public speeches or participate in the negotiations with other companies or investors. Being convincing is being successful for an ability to stand one’s ground means that a person is confident in his abilities. Being intelligent and knowledgeable is of no less importance for it allows having a global perspective on the issues relevant to the company’s work (Benton, 2009). Stephenson obtained his BS at the University of Central Oklahoma and his master’s degree at the University of Oklahoma. This means that he is an educated and intelligent person, which, in its turn, signifies that he is a talented manager and leader. Lastly, Stephenson’s determination is evident. He is a person who clearly identifies his personal and career objectives and does everything possible to fulfill them; his career growth between 2003 and 2007 testifies to his determination, to his not stopping when facing the obstacles, and achieving the desirable at any cost. These characteristics make Randall Stephenson an effective leader.
As far as the source industry is concerned, according to it, such qualities as leadership skills, executing the company’s strategies, and continuous improvement make Stephenson an effective leader. As stated by Silos (2003), the leadership skill is “the managerial ability to adapt to situations; operationally, it is the skillful manipulation of people, things, and ideas” (p. 122). From the perspective of the industry source, this skill is, perhaps, the most crucial for a CEO because, without his/her ability to manage people, the company will never develop properly and become highly competitive. The same goes about executing the company’s strategies; this characteristic is closely connected with the CEO’s leadership skills because outlining the strategies and defining the ways to execute them is one of the primary tasks of a CEO. Taking into account AT&T’s organizational performance, Stephenson is quite successful in doing this, which makes him an effective leader. Continuous improvement further contributes into Stephenson’s list of effective leader’s characteristics. Improving performance is what the source industry is interested in above all for such performance leads to higher profits. For the past two years, Stephenson has significantly developed AT&T, which means that this quality of his is extremely valuable.
Possessing all these characteristics, Stephenson cannot but will leave behind certain organizational legacy to his company. Stephenson has introduced a number of changes into the company gradually turning AT&T into the largest telecommunications company in the country. He will leave behind innovations, such as wireless communications, the service which the company started providing after he became its CEO. What’s more, Stephenson will leave behind reliability and a firm customer base which will allow the company developing further for the next several years. Finally, Stephenson will leave behind the greatest legacy, the company’s reputation. AT&T gained reputation of a successful company, a leader in a particular industry; this will always be remembered by the company’s clients, partners, and investors who altogether will continue contributing into its development and prosperity.
In conclusion, there are number of important characteristics which a leader should possess. Defining the most important among them is extremely difficult this is why considering particular characteristics is possible only on a separate example. This is example is Randall Stephenson whose professional skills and qualities allowed AT&T t achieve high levels of development. Stephenson’s most important characteristics are excellent communication skills, intelligence, and determination, which, as has been proven, make him an effective leader. According to the source industry, Stephenson possesses such characteristics as leadership skills, executing the company’s strategies, and continuous improvement; these expand the list of those professional qualities which AT&T’s CEO has. All these characteristics allowed Stephenson leave rich organizational legacy to his company; this legacy consists in innovations, firm customer base, reliability, and perfect reputation.
Reference
Benton, D.A. (2009). CEO Material: How to Be a Leader in Any Organization. New York: McGraw Hill Professional.
Silos, L.R. (2003). The power of the leader: mind and meaning in leadership. Hong Kong: Goodwill Trading Co., Inc.
Internationalization Of A Bicycle Company: India & The US
Factors Affecting Internationalization of Bicycle Company
The need for internationalization of companies began when firms saw the necessity to increase their export efforts due to the declining domestic consumptions (Andersen, 1993, p.209; Athukorala, 1995, p.2). However, their continued experience on the international markets exposed several challenges that impacted on their business. Such factors like globalization, complexities in managements, cultural variances, etc were some of the problems that emerged prominent (Gallagher, 1988).
Globalization
Globalization affects internationalization of any form of business. The bicycle companies specifically, have had it rough in their attempt to break into the international markets. Some of the reasons for these difficulties are highlighted below:
Competition from Emerging economies
Since 1980s, quite a large number of developing countries like China, India, Brazil and Korea broke into the business of manufacturing, posing unprecedented challenge to the established economies like Britain, US, Germany, and France (Hill, 1997; Kim & Hwang, 1992). This is considering the fact that bicycle manufacturing does not require a very high intensive manufacturing units or equipments to establish. These emerging nations have succeeded in harnessing their labour intensive abundance to provide them with a competitive advantage in labour intensive manufactures (Miller, 2006). Similar trend has occurred to other developing countries like Bangladesh, Hungary, Sri Lanka, Philippines and many others. All of theses nations have industries manufacturing bicycles. This shift could be attributed to the cuts in tariff on imported goods from developed nations. Again many of these developing and emerging world economies have liberalized their markets for the foreign investments, hence increasing their technological know-how to increase the competition. This kind of globalization has changed the business environment for the industrialized nations’ bicycle manufacturing companies, finding it difficult to venture into these lucrative markets (MacCarthy, 2009). This increased manufacturing effort from the developing and emerging markets thus contributed to the protectionist policies that barred entry of new companies.
The Capital Flows
The flow of capital is also likely to impact on the bicycle business. The globalization effect has meant that there is an increased trend of capital flow, which has subsequently increased the wages for workers (Bartlett & Ghoshal, 1991; Kim & Hwang, 1992). With the competition and price wars imminent, the profitability of bicycle business has remained at the edge, creating dilemma among bicycle manufacturers when it comes to a decision to venture into the international market.
Foreign Outsourcing
The trend in which many bicycle manufacturing companies perform the manufacturing in various nations has also changed the business environment for many manufacturers. For example, many companies resort to outsourcing of their services to other firms in the country of business. This has been attributed to the increasingly cheap and faster means of transport and communication, such as internet usage (Cantwell, 1999).
Managing a multinational corporation
A company venturing into business as a multinational corporation has a greater challenge than can be anticipated. The concept of internationalization theory holds that economic transactions made within the multinational corporation can be done in a cheaper way that is possible in an open market, and this subsequently explain the growth and geographical reach of a firm (Bartlett & Ghoshal, 1991). Managing a multinational corporation means managing different cultures together, with the help of advanced technology.
Technology
Technological ability of a company will be a huge determinant of its ability to efficiently process the inner transactions of Multinational Corporation, thus changing its underlying structure and the general cost base (Edward, 2006, p.67; Franko, 1986, p.221). For example, to have head office of a multinational organization to monitor all its subsidiaries activities including capital flow; it will need assistance from a well structured information technology network to do that.
Culture
Managing a multinational organization means having things done through people of varied cultural backgrounds with different cultural beliefs (Gallagher, 1988; John, Ietto-Gillies, Cox, et al., 1997). Understanding this group of people means understanding their background. It is therefore logical to conclude that for a bicycle manufacturing company, understanding the cycling culture as well as the management culture of a certain people of a nation is one step to success. Such issues as: power distance- the extent to which the powerful and less powerful integrate in the society is very important (Agthe, 2009). Other questions that the managers need to ask are: Is the society more individualistic or collective in nature? Is the use of bicycle approved across gender? Is the society more tolerant to uncertainties and how does it cope with it? (Agarwal & Ramaswami, 1992).
Internationalization of Falcon Cycles company
Brief Company Profile
Falcon Cycles’ humble beginning in 1880 from a mere repair of bicycles has been historic. After the establishment, the company changed its initial bicycle repair trade to adoption of the bicycle manufacturing business (Falcon, 2009). Its expansion was so mercurial that by beginning of 20th century, the company had well over 400 employees, while exporting its products to over 3 continents of Asia, Africa and Australia (Falcon, 2009). Tandem Group of companies acquired Falcon Cycles in 1995 and currently the company sells 300,000 bicycles annually (Falcon, 2009)
Porter’s diamond
“Porter’s Diamond” framework (Porter, 1998) is basically consisting of five determinants: (i) Threat from new entrants, (ii) Competitive rivalry (iii) Threat of substitutes, (iv) Supplier power, and (v) buyer power. However, the scope of this paper will cover only the first three of the framework.
Threat from new entrants
United States: In the US, The threat of a new entry of new competitors into the US market is real; an issue the management and stakeholders of Falcon comapny must observe and give a critical consideration. This is largely because the US market has bee known to offer relatively better opportunies for foreign investors (Edward, 2006). If such a scenerio occurs, it is likely to decrease the profitability of bicycle business and even create price wars. Porter’s framework looks at this aspect in detail and Falcon Company can respond to this in a number of ways. Porter considered the threat of entry of new competitors as a force which influences the company in achieving its goal (Porter 1998). There exists perfect competition in the bicycle producing companies including the ones from within United States. The potential new entrants like the Gazelle from Netherlands may be instigated by the increased number of eco-conscious consumers, desire to lead healthy lifestyle by the US consumers and the skyrocketing gas price for car users (Kahney, 2008). This is also important because without the entry of firms in the market there will not exist competition which is very healthy in the business circles. To get into the market they also have to consider other factors such as economies of product differences, brand equity, capital requirements, absolute cost advantages, learning curve advantages, expected retaliation by incumbents and government policies (John, et al., 1997).
India: The recent boom in Bicycle business in India has triggered a number of foreign companies to venture into Indian market (Miller, 2006). In the recent past, Cannondale bicycle company from US entered the Indian market, following the initial entry of Trek (MacCarthy, 2009). This means that more companies are likely to venture into the Indian massive market. To get access to Indian market, it is important for Falcon to note the nature of this market, as India is treated as amerging economy with the a strong demand for high- end product.
Competitive Rivalry
United States: The intensity of competitive rivalry is also an important force to be considered in the Company so that it achieves its profit levels. One peculiar thing about US business environment is that new companies would consider a strategy to enter the market through an already established entity by either acquisition or new establishment (Edward, 2006). This is because of the belief that it reduces the liablilities associated with father company, guided by the doctrine of limited liability (Edward, 2006, p.1). Again, Falcon for example needs to consider issues like the number of competitors in the market, the level of advertising particular competitors have done, the adversity of its competitors and the sustainable competitive advantage it has gained through improvisation (Edward, 2006). Through this the company will be able to meet the rivalry levels of its competitors.
India: As stated earlier, Indian bicycle business has been booming in the recent past. This has triggered internationally trecognized brands like Canondale and Trek to venture into this lucrative market. Other than the two, India has some other strong local brands like Hero Cycles (Miller, 2006, p.231). Miller (2006) observes that the number of competitors are even likely to increase more as India is seen as a cycling nation where bicycles are not seen as only ideal for leisure but as a basic necesity for various usage. Furthermore, india’s business culture of cooperations, mergers and acquisistions are well accepted growth strategies that are adopted by companies intending to achieve economies of scale, increase market share, diversify product range and explore new markets (Miller, 2006). Other considerations that stimulate mergers and acquisistions include backward/ forward integration of operations, access to tax advantages, managerail talents, additional financing, research and developemnt capabilities, and ability to compete favorably (Miller, 2006, p.125). this could explain cooperation between Cannondale and TI Cycles when they entered the Indian market. Falcon could apply a similar strategy with more considerations like the high-product nature of the Indian market and the management strategies in the new market.
Threat of substitutes
United Sates: The first force which influences the company’s goals according to Porter is the existence of substitute products (Potter, 1998). Porter implies that the availability of substitute products causes people to switch to the alternatives in response to factors like increase in price of the other product. American cycling culture has been enormous, especially for recreational activities. Recently however due to the citizens increased consciousness for global climatic change and the concerns over obesity and overweight related illnesses, cycling as a means of transport has emerged (Kahney, 2008). Such trends are likely to generate new products from other competitors. For instance, the recent surge in demand for electric bicycles from e-bike companies like Schwinn, which the country’s 3rd generation prefers is a threat to products of Falcon (Kahney, 2008).
Falcon Company needs to be careful in its attempt to enter US market because the rise of product diversification from other companies can be a very big threat because it provides substitute products that may be superior. The Company over the years has been doing research about the propensity of substitutes, the buying switching costs and the perceived levels of product differentiation thus making it outstand in the market (Falcon, 2009). It will be essential if the company adopt a more strategic approach to the US market, especially the young generation’s preference to increase the long term success opportunities.
India: Falcon has history of exporting bicycles to India (Falcon, 2009). However, its low market target market is drastically changing. The new Indian generation are high market consumers who would mostly overlook prices (Miller, 2006). This trend is posing a great challenge as it means the market demands high quality product, calling for new technology. Some established companies in the Indian markets already produce such products to target the specified market segment. Such a product is likely to pose a threat to the more or less conservative products of Falcon, hence the need to change with time if success is to be realized in this highly competitive market. Falcon therefore needs to increase its innovativeness and study this market trend more keenly in order to have a successfull market entry strategy.
Conclusion
Critically, the market condition in both India and United States are very international in nature, considering the open business environments offered by the respective governments. However, it must be noted that the two markets are completely varied in terms of business culture even though they may be sharing similar nature of demand. It must be observed that a nation’s competitive advantage is also influenced by the government actions and regulations towards business ventures such as taxation as well as by chance events (Porter, 1998). Political environment, socio-cultural changes or technological advancements also have an impact on national factor conditions (Porter, 1998). For Falcon Cycles, it is important that the US and Indian governments maintains a constantly supportive environment for the bicycle industry to provide them with incentives more innovativeness to adjust to the changing market trends.
It is logical to conclude that bicycle business environment for the two countries are still promising big. While the US has a familiar business culture that is western in nature, that is, the demand for bicycle is mostly for leisure, India on the other hand has a market that uses bicycle for a variety of purposes, including businesses and commuting to work. Even though, India is taking global direction especially with the current 3rd generation (Miller, 2006), it is not possible to assume the other segment of the market that still use bicycles as a basic necessity rather than leisure. The culture of cycling in India is historical and the increased traffic issue, environmental concerns and good topography is likely to spur bicycle business even further. Furthermore, India’s cultural orientation and religion are important culture that should be considered by any company aspiring to succeed. Generally, the two markets looks lucrative for Falcon considering globalization and increased awareness on environmental issues caused by motoring products, emphasized by the soaring gas prices.
References
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