3 Generic Strategies for Global Value Creation

Adaptation

Adaptation—creating global value by changing one or more elements of a company’s offer to meet local requirements or preferences—is probably the most widely used global strategy. The reason for this will be readily apparent: some degree of adaptation is essential or unavoidable for virtually all products in all parts of the world. The taste of Coca-Cola in Europe is different from that in the United States, reflecting differences in water quality and the kind and amount of sugar added. The packaging of construction adhesive in the United States informs customers how many square feet it will cover; the same package in Europe must do so in square meters. Even commodities such as cement are not immune: its pricing in different geographies reflects local energy and transportation costs and what percentage is bought in bulk.

Ghemawat subdivides adaptation strategies into five categories: variation, focus, externalization, design, and innovation (Figure 3.1 “AAA Strategies and Their Variants”).

Variation strategiesStrategies that involve making changes in products and services, policy adjustments, business positioning, and expectations for success. not only involve making changes in products and services but also making adjustments to policies, business positioning, and even expectations for success. The product dimension will be obvious: Whirlpool, for example, offers smaller washers and dryers in Europe than in the United States, reflecting the space constraints prevalent in many European homes. The need to consider adapting policies is less obvious. An example is Google’s dilemma in China to conform to local censorship rules. Changing a company’s overall positioning in a country goes well beyond changing products or even policies. Initially, Coke did little more than “skim the cream” off big emerging markets such as India and China. To boost volume and market share, it had to reposition itself to a “lower margin–higher volume” strategy that involved lowering price points, reducing costs, and expanding distribution. Changing expectations for, say, the rate of return on investment in a country, while a company is trying to create a presence is also a prevalent form of variation.

A second type of adaptation strategies uses a focusStrategies that focus on particular products, geographies, value chain stages, or market segments as a way of reducing differences across regions. on particular products, geographies, vertical stages of the value chain, or market segments as a way of reducing the impact of differences across regions. A product focus takes advantage of the fact that wide differences can exist within broad product categories in the degree of variation required to compete effectively in local markets. Ghemawat cites the example of television programs: action films need far less adaptation than local newscasts. Restriction of geographic scope can permit a focus on countries where relatively little adaptation of the domestic value proposition is required. A vertical focus strategy involves limiting a company’s direct involvement to specific steps in the supply chain while outsourcing others. Finally, a segment focus involves targeting a more limited customer base. Rather than adapting a product or service, a company using this strategy chooses to accept the reality that without modification, their products will appeal to a smaller market segment or different distributor network from those in the domestic market. Many luxury good manufacturers use this approach.

Whereas focus strategies overcome regional differences by narrowing scope, externalization strategiesStrategies that transfer responsibility for specific parts of a firm’s business model to partner firms to accommodate local requirements, lower cost, or reduce risk. transfer—through strategic alliances, franchising, user adaptation, or networking—responsibility for specific parts of a company’s business model to partner companies to accommodate local requirements, lower cost, or reduce risk. For example, Eli Lilly extensively uses strategic alliances abroad for drug development and testing. McDonald’s growth strategy abroad uses franchising as well as company-owned stores. And software companies heavily depend on both user adaptation and networking for the development of applications for their basic software platforms.

A fourth type of adaptation focuses on designStrategies that focus on design flexibility and standardization to reduce the cost of variation. to reduce the cost of, rather than the need for, variation. Manufacturing costs can often be achieved by introducing design flexibility so as to overcome supply differences. Introducing standard production platforms and modularity in components also helps to reduce cost. A good example of a company focused on design is Tata Motors, which has successfully introduced a car in India that is affordable to a significant number of citizens.

A fifth approach to adaptation is innovationStrategies that are characterized by their focus on improving the effectiveness of adaptation efforts., which, given its crosscutting effects, can be characterized as improving the effectiveness of adaptation efforts. For instance, IKEA’s flat-pack design, which has reduced the impact of geographic distance by cutting transportation costs, has helped that retailer expand into 3 dozen countries.

Aggregation

AggregationStrategies that focus on achieving globalized economies of scale or scope by creating efficiencies based on exploiting similarities among geographies or markets. is about creating economies of scale or scope as a way of dealing with differences (see Figure 3.1 “AAA Strategies and Their Variants”). The objective is to exploit similarities among geographies rather than adapting to differences but stopping short of complete standardization, which would destroy concurrent adaptation approaches. The key is to identify ways of introducing economies of scale and scope into the global business model without compromising local responsiveness.

Adopting a regional approach to globalizing the business model—as Toyota has so effectively done—is probably the most widely used aggregation strategy. As discussed in the previous chapter, regionalization or semiglobalization applies to many aspects of globalization, from investment and communication patterns to trade. And even when companies do have a significant presence in more than one region, competitive interactions are often regionally focused.

Examples of different geographic aggregation approaches are not hard to find. Xerox centralized its purchasing, first regionally, later globally, to create a substantial cost advantage. Dutch electronics giant Philips created a global competitive advantage for its Norelco shaver product line by centralizing global production in a few strategically located plants. And the increased use of global (corporate) branding over product branding is a powerful example of creating economies of scale and scope. As these examples show, geographic aggregation strategies have potential application to every major business model component.

Geographic aggregation is not the only avenue for generating economies of scale or scope. The other, nongeographic dimensions of the CAGE framework introduced in Chapter 1 “Competing in a Global World”—cultural, administrative, geographic, and economic—also lend themselves to aggregation strategies. Major book publishers, for example, publish their best sellers in but a few languages, counting on the fact that readers are willing to accept a book in their second language (cultural aggregation). Pharmaceutical companies seeking to market new drugs in Europe must satisfy the regulatory requirements of a few selected countries to qualify for a license to distribute throughout the EU (administrative aggregation). As for economic aggregation, the most obvious examples are provided by companies that distinguish between developed and emerging markets and, at the extreme, focus on just one or the other.

Arbitrage

A third generic strategy for creating a global advantage is arbitrageStrategies that exploit economic or other differences between national or regional markets, usually by locating separate parts of the supply chain in different places. (see Figure 3.1 “AAA Strategies and Their Variants”). Arbitrage is a way of exploiting differences, rather than adapting to them or bridging them, and defines the original global strategy: buy low in one market and sell high in another. Outsourcing and offshoring are modern day equivalents. Wal-Mart saves billions of dollars a year by buying goods from China. Less visible but equally important absolute economies are created by greater differentiation with customers and partners, improved corporate bargaining power with suppliers or local authorities, reduced supply chain and other market and nonmarket risks, and through the local creation and sharing of knowledge.

Since arbitrage focuses on exploiting differences between regions, the CAGE framework described in Chapter 1 “Competing in a Global World” is of particular relevance and helps define a set of substrategies for this generic approach to global value creation.

Favorable effects related to country or place of origin have long supplied a basis for cultural arbitrageStrategies that are based on exploiting the favorable effects related to country or place of origin on consumer preferences.. For example, an association with French culture has long been an international success factor for fashion items, perfumes, wines, and foods. Similarly, fast-food products and drive-through restaurants are mainly associated with U.S. culture. Another example of cultural arbitrage—real or perceived—is provided by Benihana of Tokyo, the “Japanese steakhouse.” Although heavily American—the company has only one outlet in Japan out of more than 100 worldwide—it serves up a theatrical version of teppanyaki cooking that the company describes as “Japanese” and “eatertainment.”

Legal, institutional, and political differences between countries or regions create opportunities for administrative arbitrageStrategies that attempt to derive competitive advantage from legal, institutional, and political differences between countries or regions.. Ghemawat cites the actions taken by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation in the 1990s. By placing its U.S. acquisitions into holding companies in the Cayman Islands, the company could deduct interest payments on the debt used to finance the deals against the profits generated by its newspaper operations in Britain. Through this and other similar actions, it successfully lowered its tax liabilities to an average rate of less than 10%, rather than the statutory 30% to 36% of the three main countries in which it operated: Britain, the United States, and Australia. By comparison, major competitors such as Disney were paying close to the official rates.Ghemawat (2007a), chap. 6.

With steep drops in transportation and communication costs in the last 25 years, the scope for geographic arbitrageStrategies that focus on gaining competitive advantage through the leveraging differences in transportation and communication costs due to geographic differences.—the leveraging of geographic differences—has been diminished but not fully eliminated. Consider what is happening in medicine, for example. It is quite common today for doctors in the United States to take X-rays during the day, send them electronically to radiologists in India for interpretation overnight, and for the report to be available the next morning in the United States. In fact, reduced transportation costs sometimes create new opportunities for geographic arbitrage. Every day, for instance, at the international flower market in Aalsmeer, the Netherlands, more than 20 million flowers and 2 million plants are auctioned off and flown to customers in the United States.

As Ghemawat notes, in a sense, all arbitrage strategies that add value are “economic.” Here, the term economic arbitrageStrategies that are focused on leveraging differences in the costs of labor and capital, industry-specific inputs, or the availability of complementary products. is used to describe strategies that do not directly exploit cultural, administrative, or geographic differences. Rather, they are focused on leveraging differences in the costs of labor and capital, as well as variations in more industry-specific inputs (such as knowledge) or in the availability of complementary products.Ghemawat (2007a), chap. 6.

Exploiting differences in labor costs—through outsourcing and offshoring—is probably the most common form of economic arbitrage. This strategy is widely used in labor-intensive (garments) as well as high-technology (flat-screen TV) industries. Economic arbitrage is not limited to leveraging differences in labor costs alone, however. Capital cost differentials can be an equally rich source of opportunity.

Pursuing Adaptation and Aggregation

P&G started out with a focus on adaptation. Attempts to superimpose aggregation across Europe first proved difficult and, in particular, led to the installation of a matrix structure throughout the 1980s, but the matrix proved unwieldy. So, in 1999, the then CEO, Durk Jager, announced another reorganization whereby global business units (GBUs) retained ultimate profit responsibility but were complemented by geographic market development organizations (MDOs) that actually managed the sales force as a shared resource across GBUs. The result was disastrous. Conflicts arose everywhere, especially at the key GBU-MDO interfaces. The upshot: Jager departed after less than a year in office.

Under his successor, A. G. Lafley, P&G has enjoyed much more success, with an approach that strikes a better balance between adaptation and aggregation and that makes allowances for differences across general business units and markets. For example, the pharmaceuticals division, with distinct distribution channels, has been left out of the MDO structure. Another example: in emerging markets, where market development challenges are huge, profit responsibility continues to rest with country managers.

Aggregation and Arbitrage

VIZIO, founded in 2002 with only $600,000 in capital by entrepreneur William Wang to create high quality, flat panel televisions at affordable prices, has surpassed established industry giants Sony Corporation and Samsung Electronics Company to become the top flat-panel high definition television (HDTV) brand sold in North America. To get there, VIZIO developed a business model that effectively combines elements of aggregation and arbitrage strategies. VIZIO’s contract manufacturing model is based on aggressive procurement sourcing, supply-chain management, economies of scale in distribution.

While a typical flat-screen television includes thousands of parts, the bulk of the costs and ultimate performance are a function of two key components: the panel and the chipset. Together, these two main parts account for about 94% of the costs. VIZIO’s business model therefore focuses on optimizing the cost structure for these component parts. The vast majority of VIZIO’s panels and chipsets are supplied by a handful of partners. Amtran provides about 80% of VIZIO’s procurement and assembly work, with the remaining 20% performed by other ODMs, including Foxconn and TPV Technology.

One of the cornerstones of VIZIO’s strategy is the decision to sell through wholesale clubs and discount retailers. Initially, William Wang was able to leverage his relationships at Costco from his years of selling computer monitors. VIZIO’s early focus on wholesale stores also fit with the company’s value position and pricing strategy. By selling through wholesale clubs and discount stores, VIZIO was able to keeps its prices low. For VIZIO, there is a two-way benefit: the prices of its TVs are comparatively lower than those from major manufacturers at electronics stores, and major manufacturers cannot participate as fully as they would like to at places like Costco.

VIZIO has strong relationships with its retail partners and is honored to offer them only the most compelling and competitively priced consumer electronics products. VIZIO products are available at valued partners including Wal-Mart, Costco, Sam’s Club, BJ’s Wholesale Club, Sears, Dell, and Target stores nationwide along with authorized online partners. VIZIO has won numerous awards including a number-one ranking in the Inc. 500 for “Top Companies in Computers and Electronics,” Good Housekeeping’s “Best Big-Screens,” CNET’s “Top 10 Holiday Gifts,” and PC World’s “Best Buy,” among others.http://www.vizio.com/

Arbitrage and Adaptation

An example of a strategy that simultaneously emphasizes arbitrage and adaptation is investing heavily in a local presence in a key market to the point where a company can pass itself off as a “local” firm or “insider.” A good example is provided by Citibank in China. The company, part of Citigroup, has had an intermittent presence in China since the beginning of the 20th century. A little more than 100 years later, in 2007, it was one of the first foreign banks to incorporate locally in China. The decision to incorporate locally was motivated by the desire to increase Citibank’s status as an “insider”; with local incorporation, the Chinese government allowed it to extend its reach, expand its product offerings, and become more closely engaged with its local customers in the country.

China’s decision in 2001 to become a member of the World Trade Organization (WTO) was a major factor in Citibank’s decision to make a greater commitment to the Chinese market. Prior to China’ joining the WTO, the banking environment in China was fairly restrictive. Banks such as Citibank could only give loans to foreign multinationals and their joint-venture partners in local currency, and money for domestic Chinese companies could only be raised in offshore markets. These restrictions made it difficult for foreign banks to gain a foothold in the Chinese business community.

Once China agreed to abide by WTO trading rules, however, banks such as Citibank had significantly greater opportunities: they would be able to provide local currency loans to blue-chip Chinese companies and would be free to raise funds for them in debt and equity markets within China. Other segments targeted by Citibank included retail credit cards and home mortgages. These were Citibank’s traditional areas of expertise globally, and a huge potential demand for these products was apparent.

Significant challenges remained, however. Competing through organic growth with China’s vast network of low-cost domestic banks would be slow and difficult. Instead, in the next few years, it forged a number of strategic alliances designed to give it critical mass in key segments. The first consisted of taking a 5% stake in China’s ninth-largest bank, SPDB, a move that allowed Citibank to launch a dual-currency credit card that could be used to pay in renminbi in China and in foreign currencies abroad. In the following years, Citibank steadily increased its stake to the maximum 20% allowed under Chinese law and significantly expanded its product portfolio.

In June 2007, Citibank joined forces with Sino-U.S. MetLife Insurance Company, Ltd., to launch an investment unit-linked insurance product. In July of 2008, the company announced the launch of its first debit card. Simultaneously, it signed a deal with China’s only national bankcard association, which allowed Citibank’s debit cardholders to enjoy access to the association’s vast network in China. The card would provide Chinese customers with access to over 140,000 ATMs within China and 380,000 ATMs in 45 countries overseas. Customers could also use their debit cards with over 1 million merchants within China and in 27 other countries. Today, Citibank is one of the top foreign banks operating in China, with a diverse range of products, eight corporate and investment bank branches, and 25 consumer bank outlets.Citibank’s Co-Operative Strategy in China (2009).

Developing an AAA Strategy

There are serious constraints on the ability of any one company to use all three “A”s simultaneously with great effectiveness. Such attempts stretch a firm’s managerial bandwidth, force a company to operate with multiple corporate cultures, and can present competitors with opportunities to undercut a company’s overall competitiveness. Thus, to even contemplate an “AAAThe “AAA” approach to strategy seeks to implement the three “A” strategies (adaptation, aggregation, arbitrage) simultaneously.” strategy, a company must be operating in an environment in which the tensions among adaptation, aggregation, and arbitrage are weak or can be overridden by large-scale economies or structural advantages, or in which competitors are otherwise constrained. Ghemawat cites the case of GE Healthcare (GEH). The diagnostic imaging industry has been growing rapidly and has concentrated globally in the hands of three large firms, which together command an estimated 75% of revenues in the business worldwide: GEH, with 30%; Siemens Medical Solutions (SMS), with 25%; and Philips Medical Systems (PMS), with 20%. This high degree of concentration is probably related to the fact that the industry ranks in the 90th percentile in terms of R&D intensity.

These statistics suggest that the aggregation-related challenge of building global scale has proven particularly important in the industry in recent years. GEH, the largest of the three firms, has consistently been the most profitable, reflecting its success at aggregation through (a) economies of scale (e.g., GEH has higher total R&D spending than its competitors, but its R&D-to-sales ratio is lower), (b) acquisition prowess (GEH has made nearly 100 acquisitions under Jeffrey Immelt before he became GE’s CEO), and (c) economies of scope the company strives to integrate its biochemistry skills with its traditional base of physics and engineering skills; it finances equipment purchases through GE Capital).

GEH has even more clearly outpaced its competitors through arbitrage. It has recently become a global product company by rapidly migrating to low-cost production bases. By 2005, GEH was reportedly more than halfway to its goals of purchasing 50% of its materials directly from low-cost countries and locating 60% of its manufacturing in such countries.

In terms of adaptation, GEH has invested heavily in country-focused marketing organizations. It also has increased customer appeal with its emphasis on providing services as well as equipment—for example, by training radiologists and providing consulting advice on postimage processing. Such customer intimacy obviously has to be tailored by country. And, recently, GEH has cautiously engaged in some “in China, for China” manufacture of stripped-down, cheaper equipment, aimed at increasing penetration there.