UNILEVER IN CHINA

Unilever in China: Strategies and Prospects

Unilever in China: Strategies and Prospects

Introduction

The paper discusses the Unilever's position in China and its strategies along with its future plans. The market of china is analyzed. Also, the main competitor of Unilever, i.e. P & G's strategy and background is also discussed. The paper focuses on the strategies adopted by Unilever in China. The research method for the analysis and findings is secondary. Through the research, the conclusions are derived; keeping in view the strategies of Unilever and P&G. This section describes a brief introduction of Unilever in general (Gielens and Dekimpe, 2007).

Unilever Private Limited is the leading company in the global market of fast moving consumer goods. The key reason for Unilever's success is its continuous innovation in its production. The company launches new products every year which makes it ahead among its competitors. However, its principal operations being highly exposed to the Euro zone crisis could place Unilever at a liquidity risk in the future. Unilever, which has a wide portfolio of products across several consumer markets, has a strong orientation towards innovation that leads to new product development activities. The employees and the customers of Unilever are allowed to contribute their innovative ideas through Unilever innovation pipeline. This makes Unilever have the best source of innovative ideas from across the global (Stuttard 2000, p.111).

Unilever's business in China is the main daily chemical and food. The main brands include secret, China, Lux, Pond's, resonant, Dove, Sunsilk, Ling Shi, Shu-resistant, Knorr, Lipton, and the way the snow and so on. After many years of great efforts to cultivate these brands are already well-known, commonly used brand in the daily life of Chinese consumers.

Unilever in the world has six R & D centre, but is most impressed with is the R & D centre in Shanghai. R & D centre in Shanghai, their primary consideration is to strengthen the innovation capacity of Chinese companies. Their aim is not only limited to this. We increasingly recognize that to become Unilever's global centre of innovation, leading the rest of the world.

To achieve the company's commitment to long-term development in China since 2000, Unilever began a new strategic layout in China: management and research centre in Shanghai, Hefei, Anhui and other places for the production and processing bases. Unilever put into operation since 2002, the production base in Hefei. The production range covers household and personal care products, and tea processing. Hefei Industrial Park has become one of Unilever, the world's largest production base, are now exported to 14 countries, to become a truly global supply centre. After China was successful in WTO, Unilever placed its global procurement centre in Shanghai. The procurement centre relies on the rich resources of China for the exports of raw materials and finished products on an international scale (Caulkin, 2006).

Unilever believe that to achieve sustainable progress, must actively take on social responsibility in China: in China funded the establishment of 20 Hope primary schools, and they regularly organize interactive activities ...