Yearly Archives: 2008
Something borrowed, something blue.
According to Stuart Elliott, the advertising columnist for The New York Times, J. C. Penny is launching a new clothing and home furnishings line called American Living. Using product designs by Ralph Lauren, whose name and sub-brands will not be associated with the new brand, the American Living launch will look and feel like Polo ads and be shot by Bruce Weber the photographer who has established Ralph Lauren’s consumer face.
Come Back Baby.
One of the reasons U.S. Airways has had such a rocky time over the years is because of all its purchases and mergers. In order to strengthen itself, U.S. Airways allied with various other carriers with different regional and national strengths, but those multiple mergers proved its downfall. It was always hard to manage all of the different planes in the combined company.
When new airline carriers start from scratch they purchase one, maybe two types of plane. The parts work for all the planes, the maintenance for all planes is the same, engines come from one manufacturer, training for pilots is simplified, and there is less complexity in the day-to-day management. It is a very efficient way to run an airline. U.S. Airways, on the other hand, was the maestro of a cacophony planes, maintenance operations, equipment, and people trained in the various aspects of this patched together airline. Not efficient.
Ford Motor Company has made a decision to manufacture one of its car models — the Fiesta — the exact same way in every country around the world. That’s efficient. For the most part this is how
Let’s get over on overeating.
Obesity is an epidemic. Americans and many Europeans continue to over-eat even though they know it’s not good for them. Like the experimental rats that continue to ingest cocaine until they die, many people continue to eat until they are the butt of jokes at school, or their arteries clog in middle age, or other major health issues like diabetes occur late in life.
Yahoo Plus Danger Equals…
Danger, the maker of the coolest of the cool in mobile handhelds, has just agreed to be purchased by Microsoft. Microsoft played it quietly throughout the negotiations making sure not to look too eager, but it was a very strategic purchase. Should the Yahoo deal go through look out for Microsoft to kick into high gear in the mobile category. I don’t know Yahoo’s full mobile offering but bet there is more in it than meets the eye. I smell something going on, perhaps with an already secret Microsoft initiative, which could put Microsoft in the middle of a mobile, social, messaging, internet, advertising play of market-changing proportion.
And not to be too paranoid (hee hee) but do you think Research In Motion’s (RIM) messaging outage yesterday – the second major service disruption in 12 month — could have had anything to do with this deal? Hacker nation?
Stay Tuned. (Does anyone under 30 know what that means?)
Bostock or Nostock
There was an item in the Wall Street Journal today about Roy Bostock, Yahoo’s new Chairman of the Board, and how he will be instrumental in managing Yahoo’s response to Microsoft’s hostile takeover bid.
The article ends “As directors absorbed the offer that day, someone in the room joked that Mr. Bostock has been chairman for only half an hour and had already increased the company’s value more than 60%.” This is the type of hero worship that can really cloud the picture.
Mr. Bostock is 67 years old. He is a career ad guy. Yes, he played roles in the a number of high-level mergers of ad companies and knows his way around ad holding companies. But these activities, though they may have been big, were certainly not market-changing. Some were with networks on the downswing. Mr. Bostock may be a great one to help facilitate merger activity and he may be a good intermediary between buyers and sellers of advertising, but I wonder about his Silicon Valley chops and ability to see the future of social media.
Wal-Mart Dabbles in Healthcare
Is Google About to be Yahooed?
Google has been drawn in to the “Microsoft is buying Yahoo” fray and it may just be what Microsoft is bargaining for. Were I Microsoft, I’d want to create as many side skirmishes as possible for Google to keep it distracted. And Google’s Eric E. Schmidt, with all that Microsoft scar tissue on his back, has taken the bait.
Google’s strength — its brand strength — is in search. During earlier centuries when exploration was the next frontier being the “map” company was the winning proposition. In today’s internet society being the “search” company is where the gold is. That said, Google has in many respects forgotten its product mission, becoming greedy and marketed spreadsheets and word processing software, video, and myriad other off-mission technologies. It is diluting its meaning as a search company. And slowed revenue in its latest quarter has perhaps validated this observation. (Search certainly hasn’t slowed.)
Once Google loses its core business value, it may become Yahoo. Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer may be a smarter dude
Hayden Panettiere and Anna Nalick
Goodbye and Hello Moto
Motorola has always been a perplexing brand. Like Lucent and AT&T before it, Motorola has operated for decades in the telecommunications hardware business. Makers of big network phone switches, tiny alphanumeric pagers and cell phones, Moto became most famous for its “gotta have” Razr phone.
Moto with frequent highs and lows in all of its hardware businesses has for some reason not been able to consistently fire on all cylinders. Just when they’ve had a strong run, they go soft. And the Street blames management. Carl Icahn has an answer, and it’s a good one. Split off the mobile devices company (read cell phones) and create two separate businesses.
Though Nokia and Apple will be strong competitors of the handset business, and I’m sure there’s a Chinese company on the horizon, Moto has the people, pride and market power to go back on top. With renewed focus and leadership we may all be speaking into Moto phones in a year or two. (And please don’t listen to any branding companies and change the name of the business. Fight the urge.)