NIKE AS A GLOBAL COMPANY

Nike as a global company

Nike as a global company

Introduction

Nike Corporation was incorporated in 1968. In their thirty-four year history, Nike has primarily been in the business of designing, developing, and marketing athletic footwear, attire, equipment and accessories, lot of companies go out on a limb when it comes to business decision or management strategies with Nike Corporation. Nike is powerful company. Nike Corporation is a well managed company in striking industry, the company has a strong brand image, and they are effectively capturing the value shaped from their savings. Modern superior ways to make products are significant in today's Apparel companies, both to be efficient and to be able to make hi-tech products. Nike is dependent upon high technology in their effort to stay ahead of their competitors and create products. These technologies are found within computers, used to create, design and develop the products and machines that actually make the shoes. Besides these main areas of technology such a large corporation also uses a lot of diverse technology such as accepting programs on computers, intranet within the headquarters and not to forget Web page technology for their web page. They have extremely developed Web site used for marketing and sales purposes. (Carty 2001 34-47)Nike primarily competes in the footwear industry, a subset of the consumer cyclical sector. The major competitors of Nike are Reebok and Adidas, but any company that sells athletic and leisure footwear, apparel, or sports equipment could be considered contestant too. Competition within the footwear industry can be very strong and change quickly due to rapidly changing customer preferences and technology. With an active industry such as Nike, it can be challenging to sustain a competitive advantage.

The apparent major drivers of globalization in the global marketplace and the apparent drivers for this company

Nike positioned itself in an industry where are virtually no substitute products. Runners, walkers, basketball players, football players, and virtually every person that moves by foot needs footwear. Since people are beginning to become more concerned with their health, active lifestyles are becoming more common. Strong rivalry still exists between Nike, Adidas and Reebok, but the competitive environment does not present a threat to the industry's feasibility. Within the value chain in the footwear industry, there are only certain areas where profits can be extracted. Nike is keenly aware that this fact, therefore contract out portions of the business that they do not want to be as intimately involved. According to Bigelow (1997) Nike took on the new trend aggressively and imposed a management strategy that targeted on building its brand name, differentiation of its product, intense marketing and creating new markets and exploiting its potential. (Miller 2002 311-31)

Nike is an industry leader in developing innovative new products. One of the powers of Nike Corporation is its brand name recognition, because Nike has been around so long, the brand is recognized and respected both internationally and locally. Nike has effectively marketed their products and in addition understands the importance of ...