Intel's Training For Engineering And English As A Second Language

In 1958, oil was first discovered in Nigeria. The discovery has led to the transition from agriculture-based economy to that of oil economy. One would believe that a country that produces a numerous amount of oil used to support the world with energy would have improved domestic infrastructures and economic development. Unfortunately, this is not the case in Nigeria. Nigeria has suffered since the discovery of oil and is still suffering till this day. Not only has it created conflicts between other nations and Nigeria but it has also divided the country into groups, which has fueled civil wars and tension between the government and the people. This is why the topic is a geopolitical event but before trying to understand how it is geopolitical, one should understand what geopolitics is.

particularly in the Niger Delta region. The people in this region are dissatisfied for many

Intel has a differentiation strategy based upon quality and innovation. This strategy has served the company well and should be continued. Differentiation strategy has worked for Intel in the past simply because they have continued to provide a product that the buyer needs and can use in a competitive technological market. As discussed earlier, one of the reasons they have been able to do this is the amount of money they have put into research and development. To gain an advantage over competitors the R&D department focuses on the product’s features and the way it is offered as the primary means. In order to stay as successful as Intel has been in the past with a differential strategy, they have to continue to stay ahead of the

Most children in the Niger delta have little or no education, due to lack of funds from their parents who have lost their lands and have no jobs because of limited opportunities. The Niger delta government and the oil companies have refused to look into the situation; instead they favor their close relations neglecting the masses. Corruption in the Niger delta has led some youths in taking drastic measure in order to put food on their table. For example, Ikechukwu Efe an indigene of the Niger delta said that some of his friends created their own “oil refinery”, which is made up of crude oil in metal barrels with controlled heat from fire woods. This is a dangerous process in refining crude oil but the degree of poverty in the state left his friends with no choice. If only the government of the Niger delta have created jobs with the wealth of the state Ikechukwu’s friend would not have to put their lives in danger. Until corruption is put to an abrupt the people of the Niger delta will continue to live in poverty.

Throughout the last 50 or so years, tech companies have risen and fall, gaining fame and power, and marking their names in history book for achieving momentous tasks, often in which can still be seen today. Intel is not an exception to this trend; in fact, the mega corporation is a prime example of what American tech giants look like: Intel has their hand in essentially every market dealing with computer components, from memory and memory controllers, to accelerators, to their main attraction, Central Processing Units, or CPU’s, for Desktops, Laptops, and Servers. Not only does Intel have vast reach in the computer component market, but they have complete control of not only their production process, being for the most part self-contained. From mining necessary resources, to shipping out their complete products from factories to their recipients, whether that be a store or an OEM. Intel is truly one of the most successful, if not the most successful Tech giant involved with Computer hardware. However, they only got to this place through nefarious actions, such as breaking contracts, playing the courts to their advantage, throwing their weight around, regardless of the legality of it, to meet their bottom lines. Considering that Intel is at such a high position, and has pretty much always existed at a fairly high position in the market, why? This paper will set out to find out the

In addition to the various changes Intel went through, there were also many environmental pressures such as fashion, geopolitical, market decline, hypercompetition, and reputation and credibility pressures placed upon the company. As noted above, the change in organizational culture and restructure can be considered fashion pressures, and the weak demand in the semiconductor industry can be associated with pressure of a market decline. Also, Intel had to deal with a number of geopolitical pressures such as the tragedy of September 11, 2001 and the resulting threat of war, as well as a sluggish national economy (Palmer, et al., 2009). Intel adapted by realigning its resources in an effort to capitalize the strength of its workforce in an effort to remain competitive.

The purpose of this paper is to critically analyze the case “Shell Oil in Nigeria” presented in our text book “Business and Society”. Here we discuss the company’s mission statement, their crisis in Nigeria, and the resulting outcome of their actions. Further we make some recommendations for future actions that may help Shell’s alleviate their crisis in Nigeria.

What has occurred in the Niger Delta is linked to its past struggles with military rule transitioning to democratic rule, which often ends in a military regime taking control nonetheless. From the start of its independence, Nigeria has slowly grown in its dependence on oil as it’s main economic revenue stream. Before the discovery of oil, the state had yam and cassava crops, palm oil, rubber, and lumbers that provided economic revenue, though modest (Jike, V.T. 2004). However once oil was found in 1956 and Independence in 1960, Nigeria has not only relinquished vast tracts of land to International Oil Companies (IOC) such as Royal Dutch Shell (later named Shell Petroleum Development Company), ExxonMobil, Chevron-Texaco, and ENI, but it has left the companies to conduct their extraction methods as they see fit (Imobighe, T. A. (n.d.); Kadafa, A.A. 2012). In 2006, the Oil Spill Intelligence Report stated, “Shell Nigeria is accused of using double standards”, referring to the outdated equipment and unethical methods Shell practices. The Niger Delta has experienced 50 years of oil spills since the beginning of oil production due to oil pipelines that are no longer in use leaking up to $10 million worth of oil a day as reported by Shell. Shell has thus been accused of using outdated and old equipment in the Delta they know they wouldn’t dare use in the other countries they operate in.

These attacks on the oil companies are serious enough for the government to ‘reward’ the violence by holding discussions with these warlords. The reason for this is that the country is a petro-state. This means that the country’s economy relies heavily on oil revenue, about 50 per cent of the GDP, 95 per cent foreign exchange earnings and 80 per cent of its budgetary revenues. This came about after the civil war, beforehand Nigeria was a relatively small producer of oil, but after it became a global producer of oil, 5th biggest producer in the group OPEC. Because of this civil war, oil companies such a Shell have had to form close partnerships with the Nigerian government, and indeed military dictatorships in order to exploit the abundance of oil in the country. Very little money from the oil production has gone into the communities where the oil is

Petroleum production began in the late 1950’s, and by the early 1970’s it was by far the leading export. The massive revenues from oil have led to widespread corruption that continues today. Up to a fifth of the country’s oil output, an estimated 400,000 barrels a day, is embezzled from illegally tapped pipelines. Money has also disappeared; Nigeria’s central bank claimed that some $20-billion in oil revenues had simply vanished.

Nigeria is the 7th world largest oil producer and is a major player in the world energy market. Oil and gas is Nigeria’s main source of revenue. It accounts for about 40% of the Gross Domestic Product and 70% of government revenues (Lawal 2004). Crude oil was first discovered in 1956 by Shell British Petroleum in a small village called Oloibiri present day Bayelsa State. Two years later oil in larger quantities was discovered in Ogoni.

Agricultural production, which used to be the mainstay of Nigerian economy, has been declining as results of crude oil discovery and subsequent increase in production and exportation of crude oil (Edo (2013). The discovery of crude oil and appreciation of oil price in the World market some years ago leads Nigerian government to abandon all other means of revenue generations, including agriculture, just to depend solely on crude oil revenue to finance most of her budgets. However, crude oil exports are no longer sustaining the economy due to the current downturn in crude oil price. For instance, the Nigerian government generated lots of revenues from crude oil exports, but majority of her populations are still under the poverty

(2011) to discuss the political economy of the Nigeria petroleum sector. These functions are clearly described in chapter four of this work.

According to statistics, “it is estimated that demand and consumption of petroleum in Nigeria grows at a rate of 12.8% annually. With an export industry with a substantially growth rate as Nigerian petroleum a lot of people would expect such a country to be moving forward in the development process, but it is not nearly so for Nigeria. It is unfortunate that the petroleum in the country is unavailable to the Nigerians,worst; it is so costly that domestics wouldn’t even consider it. This is due also to the fact that most of the oil rigged from the deepwater drilling is extracted by multiple oil companies of different nations and then refined overseas. So basically it becomes a situation where the natural resources are reaped away from the poor country materialized in the dominant countries and then price prohibitively high. Very rarely on special occasions a small account of the petroleum is distributed to the somewhat 200 million people in the country. Though

Given the high stakes built into the state-oil linkage in Nigeria, where oil exports account for 95 per cent of exports earnings and over 85 per cent of national revenues, politics continues to be influenced by oil. For those in power, access to oil is the ultimate prize in