Why must Apple pay attention to the business cycle when planning to sell more products in China?
Innovative design, information technology and international competitiveness are the possible three phases of Apple’s business success. Apple did not invent any of the products, but made its name by reinventing its products through stylish design and cutting edge technology. The company has become market leader for products like iPod in U.S and several other countries. In China’s case, Apples’ I pod market share is less than 8 percent and Mac’s market is less than 1 percent. The company needs to pay attention to the business cycle when planning to increase sales in China because its market is quite different from other western countries and is in the growth phase. To aggressively market its products in the Chinese market, Apple must focus on tie ups with local suppliers-service providers and try cutting costs apart from focusing on the innovation and technology. This would give the company an edge over its competitors like Samsung who are already established in Chinese market.
Is Apple operating under conditions of perfect competition, monopolistic competition, oligopoly or monopoly?
Monopolistic competition is the structure where there are many companies in the market selling differentiated products to the customers. However, these sellers do not differ a lot in terms of price and characteristics of products or services. Looking at this definition and the Apple case, we can infer that Apple is operating under monopolistic competition market structure. Looking at the PC industry, as mentioned in the case, Apples’ Macintosh computers compete with PCs made by Hewlett- Packard, Dell, Lenovo and many other rivals. In case of smart phones, Apple competes with Samsung, Motorola, Nokia and others. Although most of the products and services that Apple offers are similar to other companies, what makes Apple stand apart is that it never stops reinventing both design and technology of its products and services to remain competitive. The ‘i’ in its iPod, iMac and iTunes stand for innovative design, information technology and international competitiveness and this has led the company to ring up annual sales of up to $32 billion globally. This ‘innovation’ differentiates Apple from its competitors.
