Apple is a worldwide company that has proved its success from the very beginning starting with Steve Job’s vision and guidelines for Apple’s operation processes. Apple follows a strict set of operational strategies for its supply chain system. The customer’s demands come first in the supply chain with cost cutting strategies closely following. The next strategy involves setting ambitious targets to make significant improvements annually, slow yet steady. The fourth operational strategy is simplifying the product and process while adopting a process view of the organization via face-to-face meetings. Next is the process involves dealing with any problems that may arise with the necessary changes to address it. The final process is centered on enhancing business relationships within the company and outside it as well. Apple’s major suppliers include the well-known AAC Technologies Holdings Inc., Acbel Polytech Inc., Advanced Semiconductor Engineering Inc., AKM Semiconductor Inc. and Alps Electric Co. Ltd. These companies were chosen carefully by Apple because they offer materials at a price that will allow for a minimized manufacturing cost. These companies have also made a name for themselves by providing great customer service that keeps large organizations like Apple loyal customers. Cost, because cost is so important to Apple, the company has outsourced the manufacturing process of their products. Apple 's products are assembled in massive factory complexes in China, run
Apple products are designed in California USA and manufactured in different foreign countries such as China, Taiwan, Korea, Mongolia, and Europe which produce part of the devices, most of the raw material ‘Earth Minerals’ to produce these items can be found in China. Since technology has a lot of benefits in human’s life, the demand has been increase year by year which make business to expand and hiring more people in the company. From 2005 to 2015 the number of full-time employee’s has been increase more than 80 thousands.
Apple Inc, best known as Apple is an American based global company that designs and sells electronics, PCs and computer software. The company was established in 1976 by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak and was incorporated in 1977. Some of the Apple’s best-known products are the Macintosh range of personal computers, iPod, iPhone, and iPad. By 2012, Apple reported to have more than 300 retail stores located in more than 10 countries in the world and more than 60, 000 employees on permanent employment, and about 2,800 on temporal employment. Despite the success the company, Apple has faced hard competition from other electronics manufacturing companies. The objective of this paper is to develop a strategic plan that will enable Apple improve its position in the personal computer industry. The paper will use Michael Porter’s forces; key success factors, SWOT analysis and the competitive strength to point out specific, workable recommendations that will allow Apple stay afloat and improve its position in the personal computer industry (Gamble & Marino 2012).
Manufacturing: Apple manufactures its products in other countries where labor is cheaper. Apple uses innovate technology that makes labor easier, quicker and at lower costs.
Apple Inc. is a global innovator of the MacBook, tablets, iPhones, iPods, and other innovative products. Apple is the leader in the electronic market sector for innovative product growth and development. The implementation plan will explain the strategic controls and contingency plan for the organization along with an implementation process. This will allow Apple to assess risks and financial forecasts that will be utilized on the basis of repositioning the organization brand.
Apple Inc. is a leading worldwide retailer of computers, tablets, cell telephones, and other entertainment items. Apple needs new development techniques, product development and a leader in the mobile market. The implementation plan below will show the group of action best suited for the corporation along with the implementation process, assessed risks and financial projections used as the basis for moving the business before.
Apple has a vertically integrated business model, meaning that they are involved in nearly every step of the production process for Apple products. The hardware they produce can be accompanied by a variety of Apple brand accessory components consumers may wish to use with their Apple device. The most popular Apple devices include iPod, iPhone, iPad, MacBook and AppleTV. Apple products run on their own unique operating system, which sets them apart in the industry from other personal
As mentioned earlier, Apple’s supply chain relies on third party suppliers and outsourcing to produce their devices. This strategy can become extremely risky in satisfying demand when resources are limited to one supplier, as seen in the company’s recent failing in meeting demand for the
Apples upstream partners are the manufactures Foxconn Technology Group, which also manufactures Apple's iPod, iPhone and Mac Min. It is headquartered in Tucheng, Taiwan but it manufactures the Apple products in its largest plan in Shenzhen, China. However Apple does not disclose the makers of its components, research shows that various parts and suppliers include:
The MacBook Pro is, to most, the world’s most innovative and efficient laptop, with over 4 million sales in 2013 alone. Steve Jobs created the line of Macintosh computers, originally in 1984 in Cupertino, California, which is currently the location of Apple’s headquarters today. Although the design of the MacBook Pro was created and originally manufactured in California, the assembly of the laptop now takes place in China due to the fact that the company is able to earn a greater profit from the cheap labour as opposed to that in the U.S. Apple receives the final product from a manufacturing plant owned by Foxconn, a company that specializes in the assembly of electronics that are mainly shipped to Northern America, whose headquarters are located in Longhua, Shenzhen, China. Shenzhen is recognized as one of China’s most economically sound cities because it is the hub of industrial factories and the location of many company’s headquarters. Foxconn is notorious for scandals involving unsuitable environments for their factory workers, but have since claimed that they have resolved the issues. Although there are still a fair amount of reports from Foxconn’s factory workers concern working conditions, Apple assures customers that there are continual reliable audits of the manufacturing plants.
Describing the company’s vision statement is much in detailed to ensuring accomplishments. As an example, Apple mentions in their vision statement several things one by one a few important parts, such as the importance of innovation, that relates to Apple’s fast pace strategy of innovation. Furthermore, Apple’s vision statement identifies clearly the quality or condition in which is an essential to the various products being successful. Furthermore, the company’s products are very much into helping improve actions daily. As an example, the quality of their product’s such as iPhone and iOS make’s easier for people to communicate, and access to the Internet. Furthermore, the company vision statement also shows being
In thinking about ops at Apple, it becomes clear that Apple is very much like past poster children of operational excellence like Wal-Mart, Toyota, and Southwest. It is not that Apple’s operational skills are great in an absolute sense. Rather it is that their operations are so intertwined with everything else that they are doing, they are essential to carrying out their strategy in the marketplace.
This paper aims to highlight and discuss the major challenges and opportunities which Apple Inc. faces while bringing innovation in the four primary areas of its business operations; including product innovation, process innovation, marketing innovation, and organizational innovation. The major focus of the paper is towards discussing the combination of all these processes which this organization follows and the major challenges which it faces in the course of its innovation or change strategies. The paper concludes by summarizing the importance of innovation for Apple Inc. in the light of the whole discussion.
Apple outsources its manufacturing, assembly and logistics as their contract manufacturers as these outsourcing companies are able to perform value creation functions at a lower cost due to low cost location Apple has also open its supply chain to the Fair Labour Association (FLA). They ensure compliance with their Supplier Code of Conduct by conducting hundreds of audits per year worldwide and work with their suppliers to make sure any problems are corrected.
Apple products are known to be at the top end of technological advancement, as one might expect, they involve a lot of components.
Apple I-phone's final assembly partner in China, Foxconn has been reported to have bad working conditions for its employees and this can have negative impact on Apple's brand image in the minds of the consumer. "Because of large orders, Apple also has to expand its number of partners in supplying parts and that causes Apple to have more difficulty when it comes to controlling quality management" (Cho, 2012). With a focus to spearhead emerging market like India where the consumers are price sensitive, Apple is in talks with Indian government to manufacture I-phone in the country .The aim for this strategy is to bring down the cost of its products, so that the company could increase sales in Indian market which has surpassed US as the No.2 smart phone market after