Cat and John Deere Executive Summary Essay

According to Ultimate John Deere By Ralph W. Sanders (), John Deere was as considered by many more of an adapter of technology an imaginative marketer rather than an innovator. He was a keen on seeing value in new ideas and adapted them to his products so that they could better serve his customers4. In addition his desire for quality transposed to become the family tradition transforming the on-man plough making shop to the largest farm equipments making company in the world.

In 1976, Deere & Company was among the world’s leaders of farm and industrial equipment. The majority of Deere’s success was attributed to the light crawler tractor market with over 50% market share. It was at that time Deere earned a reputation for manufacturing reliable small tractor equipment. Deere evolved into producing and manufacturing the larger industrial equipment in phases, beginning in small forestry operations. As farmers and smaller operators sought to diversify their businesses, Deere offered newly innovative attachments and crawlers, and was now seeking to integrate into the large tractor market in phase five. In this phase, Deere introduced the JD750 bulldozer, a heavy contracting

One of the five oldest companies in the United States, Deere and Company is the world's largest manufacturer of agricultural equipment and a major U.S. producer of construction, forestry, and lawn equipment. The

This document provides an in depth company analysis of Deere & Company (DE). In the first segment of the analysis, an overview of John Deere’s history, product and service offerings, corporate strategy, and a synopsis of the heavy equipment production industry will be evaluated. The second segment includes a financial overview and analysis of the three most recent

John Deere & Company manufactures and distributes agriculture equipment as well as a broad range of construction and forestry equipment. The company is partnered with FedEx in order to maintain the logistics flow involved with the company’s transactions. FedEx is responsible for providing outsourced transportation services to 11 Deere facilities across the US and Canada. The 11 Deere facilities have different service agreements with FedEx in terms of cost and service depending on the type of business unit.

Massey is a multinational company and has a series of products. It produces farm and industrial machinery and diesel engines, which contributes to 80% and 20% of sales respectively. The farm and industrial machinery has two product lines: the farm machinery line and industrial machinery line. The former produces tractors, combine harvesters, balers, forage harvesters, cane harvesters, agricultural implements, farmstead equipment and other equipment for agricultural purpose, while the latter produces different

Products. John Deere has a wide portfolio of products, with lawn equipment, farming machinery, and construction equipment, as well as consumer products targeting at the enhancing the brand image and social unity of the equipment users and their family. The consumer products include apparels, hats, and boots for men, women, and kids, and a wide range of toys for kids. It also includes household items, party items, school items, and accessories for the equipment and machinery. These are sold through its dealers, John Deere online store, and those of online dealers such as Rungreen.com. In addition, John Deere is widely exposed to the existing market through social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter, and through educational videos and product demonstration videos on YouTube and blogs. The logo is green and yellow color, signifying agriculture and construction. Businesses buy the products for farming and construction, while families buy them to work their lawn. Consumer motive is functional with utilitarian need, though some consumers might buy the premium products for hedonic reason to satisfy their need for expression.

Buyers. As of 2013 Deere has 34% share of the exports of agricultural equipment. Buyers tend to go with a known brand name. Deere has been around 1837 and have been known for their excellent quality farm equipment. Since the buyers are a small group of farmers, government and big corporations, the buyers cannot influence the prices of the equipment. Deere is known for not repossessing farm equipment when there is a down turn, like the depression. This does instill the brand into the buyers. They established operations in strategic countries to keep the prices down and have product ready when it is needed.

John Deere is a man who has changed the life of an Illinois farmer. His success in that lead to even more success like his very own company. John Deere innovated plows and made an impact on society by helping over one thousand farmers succeed in their jobs with his improved plow while showing people that persisting can lead to a solution.

On his talk show Paul Harvey had one famous speech “So God made a Farmer.” In the speech he describes a farmer as firm but caring, He says, “. . . It had to be somebody who’d plow deep and straight and not cut corners; somebody to seed, weed, feed, breed and rake and disc and plow…So God made a Farmer.” John Deere has helped farmers accomplished many of those things he listed seeding, weeding, and plowing. Plowing might be last on the list for Paul Harvey, but it is the first accomplishment of John Deere which turned into to a big and outstanding company. John Deere created the first steel plow in a little blacksmith shop in Illinois.

John Deere was born in Rutland, Vermont on February 7, 1804. When John was 17 he apprenticed himself to a black smith for 4 years. After that he immediately went into the blacksmithing business. John borrowed money to build his own blacksmith shop. Tragically, his shop was destroyed by fire not only once, but two times. John could not pay off his debt and facing bankruptcy, he made the decision to head west where he could find work, and be able to pay off his debt (Nortrax).

Following a solid rally of 28% in the first ten months this year, Caterpillar’s (NYSE:CAT) shares plunged nearly 7% in the last month alone, thanks to falling financials and lower guidance for the full year. CAT blamed economic weakness throughout the world for a consistent decline in its financials over couple of consecutive quarters.

The construction and forestry segment manufacturers and distributes an expansive line of machines and service parts used in a variety of industries. Although this market segment has less of an impact on their financial performance than agriculture and turf, Deere is expecting revenue to increase about 8% in 2013. This increased revenue will primarily come from improved economic conditions in the U.S. Finally, the financial services segment mainly derives its revenue from their dealer network and the finance of customer purchases is expected to see improvement. As you can see from the chart below, agriculture and turf account for nearly 77% of the companies operating profit and grew over 13.5% in 2012 as compared to 2011. While financial services experienced a decrease in overall operating profit as compared to 2011, it remained second ahead of construction and forestry contributing $712 million in operating profit to the company.

For the last 90 years, Caterpillar Inc. continues making growth possible while promoting constructive change throughout the world. However, customers turn to Caterpillar for the assistance of expanding infrastructure, energy, and natural resources. Sales and revenues for 2014 were $55.184 billion netting $3.695 billion, which were just below 2013 numbers of $55.656 billion resulting in $3.789 billion. Caterpillar is the front-runner for the manufacturing of “construction and mining equipment, diesel and natural gas engines, industrial gas turbines and diesel-electric locomotives” (Caterpillar, n.d.). Caterpillar mainly functions through its three product divisions of construction industries, resource industries and energy, and transportation (Company, n.d.).

Caterpillar’s goal in competing in a global market was to seek new markets and increase its revenues. High R&D and high capital intensity of Caterpillar’s business, and homogenous customer needs favored the adoption of an aggregation strategy. Caterpillar had recognized that due to its industry focus and worldwide product standardization policies, there were significant potential savings through economies of scale and scope to be exploited by international