Marketing Generics Blog
Projected Japanese Car Maker Sales in China for Q4
How can a few uninhabited islands trash world trade?
Wednesday, October 10, 2012
Being in China and reading only Chinese version of the news every days certainly gives one a different perspective on life and makes one realise how interlinked and co-dependant the economies of the world are today. Insult Islam and your flag gets burned and maybe your ambassador gets killed: insult China’s territorial status and you end up losing millions or billions of $ of trade, as the Japanese are finding out the hard way as the spat over the Diaoyu Islands shows no sign of abating.
I, like many (and probably many Japanese or Chinese) had certainly never heard of the Diaoyu Islands until a few weeks ago, but their recent ‘purchase’ by the Japanese Government has provoked a major reaction here, at both government and consumer level. Whilst the history of these islands is complex and ownership is claimed and currently disputed by both China and Japan, neither side was actively disputing them until 1968 when it discovered that oil might be there, and more recently the Japanese Government purchase of the islands from an individual reignited the story.
China's GDP Annual Growth Rate
What goes up must slow down
Monday, September 24, 2012
China’s upward trajectory economy has defied gravity for some years but there are real signs that the economy is starting to change. Of course China famously reduced its growth forecast to around 7,6-8% from 9 something last year, but even so, 7-8% growth is still phenomenal by any means. But now there are various small but important signs starting to emerge which signal that life will start to get increasingly difficult both for individual Chinese companies and its economy.
And the animals went in two by two – Ryanair wants bigger doors for their aircraft
Monday, August 06, 2012
Michael O’Leary is talking to a Chinese aircraft manufacturer (COMAC) about building a plane for him with bigger doors that would allow two passengers at a time to get in and out of his planes thus reducing boarding and unloading times. It’s not clear how much real difference a few minutes in improved embarkment would make on say a 1½ hour flight, but this is only one of many wheezes that Michael has looked at (pay toilets, stand-up seats, etc) to squeeze efficiencies out of the business model.
But behind these announcements is a much bigger poker game.
How can we get more Wisdom in our decision making, please?
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
We are building an increasingly ‘unwise’ society” is the starting premise of a fascinating talk given the other day by my good friend and teacher Peter Owen. Peter, himself a source of much knowledge and wisdom on many topics has been studying for some time about ‘wisdom’ and ‘unwisdom’: what are they, and can we improve wisdom in our decision making?
Does Samsung really have 20:20 Vision?
Monday, July 16, 2012
Who would have foreseen 10 years ago Samsung becoming a world leading consumer brand? Samsung is huge – a Chaebol1 conglomerate, with nearly 350,000 employees, a turnover in 2011 of $220.1bn2, arguably the world’s 9th largest corporation by revenues and bigger than Toyota, and a nett profit of $21.2bn, but their Vision for 2020 is to get a whole lot bigger. Samsung today is a vast, sprawling, highly diversified conglomerate, present in several major activities, notably electronics (it’s the largest chip maker in the world after Intel with semiconductor sales of just under $30bn and is #1 in DRAMs), shipbuilding (2nd largest in the world), telecoms, engineering, construction (Samsung built one of the Petronas towers in KL and the Taiwan 101 building in Taipei), financial services, chemicals, retail, medical services, aircraft engines, and even clothing and entertainment. Go to Seoul and you really feel you are in Samsung City.
Source of graphic: Metlife’s report “The Ageing of Korea. Demographics and Retirement Policy in the Land of the Morning Calm”
Can society prosper when decline becomes the norm? Japan and Korea’s deteriorating demographics
Thursday, June 21, 2012
It’s more than 25 years ago since I used to work regularly in Japan and I am visibly older but so is the population of Japan. At checkout from my hotel, I even had the unusual experience of being the youngest guy in a suit at the checkout counters, and that’s the first time that has happened for a number of years! The data reveals all. Japan is not only getting older but smaller: in 2011 the population decreased by 202,765 - the largest drop since statistics began, partly due to the tsunami 3/11 disasters. What on earth happens to business when the population experiences major decline like this?
The Toto Washlet Gseries
My Beautiful Bidet
Saturday, June 16, 2012
As a European, I have never quite been able to understand the Japanese obsession with the fancy toilet gizmos that seem to be universal now in Japan and I'm always suspicious where water and electricity work in tandem, but as this is my only choice in the hotel room, I am forced to use it and try and understand it. So I have decided to lift the seat (sorry about the pun) and find out what’s the story behind (sorry again) this phenomenon?
Skymark Japan
Maybe Ryanair is not so bad after all…
Thursday, June 14, 2012
I’m back in Japan again, loving the service levels, how everything works just right, and how clean everywhere is. But budget airline Skymark (http://www.skymark.jp/en/) could challenge Ryanair for its attitude towards passengers as its 8 point "Service Concept" guidelines were introduced in mid-May, stating that, for example, cabin staff would not help passengers stow their bags, attendants were not required to use "polite language" when talking to customers, and that the crew's primary task is not to attend to passengers but to serve as safety personnel.