P&G is faced with the question of whether they will be able to introduce and market SK-II, a beauty product developed in Japan, on a global scale. P&G has, in the past, successfully introduced products developed in other global regions to international markets successfully, however, with the introduction of SK-II, it will be one of the first times that they will attempt to introduce a beauty product on a global scale and break into new markets. In Japan, where SK-II was developed, the beauty and cosmetics industry was a $10 billion industry; however, more than 20% of the market share was taken by Shiseido while P&G's Max Factor held a 3% market share, making the company "a distant number-five competitor" to Shiseido. Additionally, P&G must contend with their desire to expand into emerging markets and develop a marketing and organizational strategy that will allow them to do so successfully.
In order to introduce SK-II beauty products on a global scale, P&G must first overcome a variety of issues. These issues include the introduction of a product into a culture with different consumers, distribution channels, and competitors. On top of this, P&G had to restructure its organization to make it more efficient and be able to collaborate among different regions worldwide. P&G also had to overcome the fact that it could take more than a decade for new products to be introduced on a global scale, which was further impacted by limited profits and the autonomy of national subsidiaries.
These issues and obstacles were gradually overcome by de Cesare actions and organizational vision, which caused P&G to fall into the alternate-generation phenomena. This phenomena occurs when a first generation builds a successful business and the second generation maintains the business practices put into place by the first generation,...
The third generation, in turn, revitalizes a business or organization and helps to push it forward. De Cesare was able to embrace the third generation mentality and helped to consolidate P&G regionally, while increasing the organization's research and development strategies to rival competitors; this includes increasing resources at P&G Japan from 60 people to an appropriate size that could match the 2,000-person research and development team at Kao, one of their main rivals in Japan.
To successfully introduce products on a global scale, P&G should develop products concurrently at a centralized R&D center. Additionally, marketing plans should be specialized based on region and consumer types. These marketing strategies need to focus on the culture of the consumer, how these products are going to be distributed, and where these products will be distributed. Once these steps have been implemented, products should be released at the same time. This simultaneous market penetration will lower the amount of competition for the time being and allow P&G to profit from these products before substitutions are introduced.
If P&G is able to centralize its research and development, technology, and marketing strategies, they will be able to get a jump-start on introducing products to the consumer on a global scale at the same time. This will give P&G the opportunity to decrease the number of subsidiaries it relies on while increasing its profits. As long as future CEOs and regional managers continue implementing and building upon de Cesare's vision, P&G is sure to be a leading corporation in the beauty industry, among others.
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