Environment
Essays

Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) has emerged as one of the most profitable and prolific companies in the world, generating a market capitalization rate of $623B as of this writing in late August, 2012, delivering $148B in Revenues in their latest fiscal year and $40B in Net Income (Apple Investor Relations, 2012). One of Apple's greatest strengths is its ability to quickly translate innovative product concepts and designs into state-of-the-art products that deliver exceptional customer experiences. Apple has honed this through decades of disciplined execution and a continual focus on creating a highly synchronized supply chain, highly collaborative product design and development workflows, and the ability to take concepts to completed products in a fraction of the time of their competitors (Murray, Goode, Muro, 2010). Apple is credited with creating the smartphone market, tablet PC, cloud-based music buying and delivery service (iTunes), centralized document and image storage (iCloud) and more innovations in operating systems in the last five years than Microsoft (Apple Investor Relations, 2012). All of these accomplishments taken together have led to Apple creating a catalyst of growth in the tablet PC market, fueling a 100%+ increase in iPad sales (13% year over year) and iPhone sales that have increased 152% over the last eighteen months as well (Apple Investor Relations, 2012). Apple continues to accelerate the sales of their iPad, iPhone, iTouch devices in addition to its mainstream laptops and systems. Apple is able to accomplish these significant results by concentrating on the execution of its value chain, a decades-only concept that Dr. Michael Porter originally created to illustrate how the functional departments of a company all must be synchronized to deliver profitability (Porter, 2008). Apple's value chain is exceptionally effective in managing the coordinating of supply chain, sourcing, quality management, production, product design, marketing services, logistics and retailing operations. As long as two decades ago Apple had been concentrating on how to create this level of synchronization across their entire enterprise (Larson, 1994). As the business model of Apple has continually become more complex, the ability of the organization to stay agile and quick to respond has increasingly become more difficult. This is a common problem companies have as they grow in size and complexity of their business models. For Apple, the environmental factors in the areas of economic, social, technological and political change have challenged their ability to grow, and also forced them to create a more market-driven organizational structure, abandoning the highly successful product divisions of the 1990s and early 2000 timeframe (Apple Investor Relations, 2012). The intent of this analysis is to evaluate how Apple is managing to continually grow despite economic, social, technological and political environmental forces impacting their business. In addition, an analysis of their market environment, response to the turbulent economic environment they operate in, the nature of their product strategies, an assessment of their strategic direction and strategic options are all included in this analysis. A separate section is included for each of these areas throughout the analysis. The Porter Fives Forces Model is used for analyzing these market dynamics (Porter, 2008).

The leadership style of Carl-Henric Svanberg can be explained in terms of the context of the leadership situation. Svanberg's appointment as CEO of Erikson was an unprecedented move in the history of the company because he was the first CEO to be brought in from outside the industry. This created some discomfort to people within the organization. But most external to the company also felt optimistic about his taking control of the affairs of the company. The company itself was passing through a historic crisis in the form of declining profitability and a shrinking market. Network operators had ceased expanding their infrastructure which was a big blow to the growth Erikson had been experiencing for almost a decade.

Genetic research shows that genetic content of a child account for their characteristics and behavior. Biological factors are chromosomes, genes, human reproduction and cell division; which affect the building blocks of the human organism. The genetics content affects a child's growth physically. The genes sometimes have trigger impacts on the metabolic system to have proper functioning.There is an active transmission of genetic codes in living things with specifications on certain specified growth patterns.The involved inheritance patterns include dominant and recessive inheritance factors.

The case study analysis focuses on Communication in Organizations. The case study dwells on two cultures that meet and there arises the issue of lack of understanding due to the cultural barrier and lack of effective communication skills. There are therefore suggestions of how these miscommunications can be handled and how the cultural facts can be considered in communication.

Are the Federal Laws against Medical Marijuana Constitutional?

Nursing research is a two-way academic communication – it results from data that comes from the ground up (the egg), but it must be processed by those who have the expertise and time to perform the proper steps within acceptable methodology (the chicken). In the field of contemporary medical care, particularly physician and nursing, there are five major reasons why more than a cursory knowledge of research and research methodology is essential for a professional career: expectation of a level of academic proficiency, ability to understand and communicate complex terminology to multiple stakeholders, an understanding of the research process so that as materials become available they are understandable, the possibility of conducting research and/or further interest in specific subject matter, and finally, the essential need to remain cognizant of contemporary medical developments.

¶ … personality that I am most proud of, it is excruciatingly hard to single out one characteristic. However, given that I am Palestinian with mixed ethnic roots (Palestinian-Muslim father and Polish-Christian mother)…

Race and community are two concepts that need to be explored in depth in Anderson, South Carolina- my hometown. By exploring certian facets of society more closely, the relationship between race and community are illuminated so that inequities can be brought to light and addressed.

¶ … Stereotypes -- Why are Black People Good at Sports?

¶ … worldwide energy market, focusing on one of its largest players, Exxon Corporation, and its influence over the overall economy. There are a number of key issues and challenges that have to be highlighted and…