E cheirou-me logo a estratégia

Na última página do WSJ do passado dia 09.12 vi o artigo, "Small Al-Chip Maker Is Now More Valuable Than Intel", e cheirou-me logo a estratégia.

O artigo compara a performance de uma empresa produtora de chips que eu não conhecia, a Marvell, com a performance da Intel.

A valorização em bolsa da Marvell supera a da Intel. A Marvell Technology registou um crescimento significativo na sua capitalização bolsista, ultrapassando os 100 mil milhões de dólares, tornando-a mais valiosa que a Intel.

Este crescimento é impulsionado principalmente pela sua forte presença no mercado de chips para data centers e pelo seu papel no apoio aos avanços da IA (escolhas estratégicas sobre onde estar). O negócio de data centers da Marvell representa agora 72% da sua receita total, acima dos 40% do ano anterior, com as vendas a duplicarem ano após ano para 1,1 mil milhões de dólares.

A empresa beneficiou de uma importante parceria com a Amazon, ajudando a conceber chips de IA como o Trainium, o que reforça ainda mais a sua posição competitiva. Os analistas prevêem que as receitas relacionadas com a IA dupliquem até 2026, ultrapassando potencialmente os 8 mil milhões de dólares anuais.

O CEO Matt Murphy concentrou-se num crescimento constante e nas parcerias estratégicas, em vez de expandir significativamente a dimensão da empresa. 

Relevância da actuação da Marvell para o pensamento estratégico das PMEs:

• A Marvell mudou o foco para data centers e chips personalizados ligados à IA, mostrando como é importante priorizar mercados em crescimento em vez de insistir em sectores tradicionais ou saturados. Apostar em nichos promissores.
• Trabalhar com gigantes como a Amazon pode ajudar empresas menores a crescerem mais rápido e ganharem credibilidade no mercado. Também tem riscos, basta procurar aqui no blogue o que escrevo sobre pedofilia empresarial. Procurar verdadeiros parceiros, cuidado com o destino da Raporal.
• A agilidade da Marvell em ajustar seu modelo de negócio para aproveitar tendências como a IA é um óptimo exemplo do valor de estar sempre à frente no mercado. Rapidez e flexibilidade são as armas secretas das PMEs.
• O investimento da Marvell em soluções feitas sob medida para os seus clientes destaca como inovar e focar nos clientes pode diferenciar uma empresa no mercado. A velha prática da customização.
• O CEO da Marvell mostra como ter uma visão clara e focada — opção pelo crescimento sustentável em vez de crescer por crescer — pode ser a chave para o sucesso a longo prazo, algo que pode inspirar os líderes das PMEs.

A incapacidade de calçar os sapatos do outro

Li no DN do passado Domingo, "Indústria conserveira quer faturar mil milhões até 2030". Entretanto, ontem no JdN li "Conservas querem dobrar o cabo dos mil milhões, mas temem "gigante" Tailândia".

Lembram-se do karma e o leite? 

Não?! 

Eu recordo, ver "Karma is a bitch!!! Ou os jogadores de bilhar amador no poder!"

Lembrei-me do karma do leite ao ler a conversa do presidente da Associação Nacional dos Industriais de Conservas de Peixe (ANICP), José Maria Freitas. 

Qual o maior mercado de exportação para as conservas de peixe? Espanha!

O que quer a ANICP fazer? Reduzir as importações de conserva de Espanha!

Pena que em vez de crescimento canceroso, a ANICP não faça o trabalho de missionar o sector para: Em vez de tentar limitar as importações, a indústria conserveira portuguesa deve continuar a apostar em diferenciação da qualidade, sustentabilidade e inovação, que são as suas vantagens competitivas.

Essa estratégia já está em andamento, como exemplificado pela certificação "PT" e pela aposta em mercados premium como os Estados Unidos.

Fujam do objectivo de aumentar vendas e foquem-se no objetivo de subir vendas ao mesmo tempo que se aumenta a margem, o valor acrescentado integrado no produto. Não percam tempo com produtos baratos e comoditizados, façam como o alvarinho diferenciem-se.

A ideia de crescer em valor, em vez de volume, permite um desenvolvimento mais sustentável da indústria:

• Menos pressão sobre os recursos naturais e humanos.
• Incentivo a práticas produtivas mais sustentáveis.
• Maior atractividade para consumidores que valorizam produtos de alta qualidade, mesmo que mais caros.

Produtos comoditizados, que competem apenas no preço, colocam a indústria em concorrência directa com países onde os custos de produção são muito mais baixos. Isso perpetua uma dinâmica de baixos lucros e dependência do volume.

O foco em produtos diferenciados, como conservas gourmet, orgânicas, com sabores únicos ou combinações inovadoras, ajuda a posicionar o sector num patamar superior.

E recuo a 2007 e a:

Volume is vanity.

Profit is sanity.

Vantagem competitiva, capital intelectual externo e Mongo

Ontem, aproveitando uma viagem de ida e volta a Bragança iniciei a escuta do livro "The Coming Wave" de Mustafa Suleyman e Michael Bhaskar.

A certa altura, já no regresso fixei este trecho tão ao jeito de Mongo:

“The field of systems biology aims to understand the “larger picture” of a cell, tissue, or organism by using bioinformatics and computational biology to see how the organism works holistically; such efforts could be the foundation for a new era of personalized medicine. Before long the idea of being treated in a generic way will seem positively medieval; everything, from the kind of care we receive to the medicines we are offered, will be precisely tailored to our DNA and specific biomarkers. Eventually, it might be possible to reconfigure ourselves to enhance our immune responses. That, in turn, might open the door to even more ambitious experimentation like longevity and regenerative technologies, already a burgeoning area of research.” 

Ao ouvir isto pensei logo no que pode tornar obsoleta a indústria farmacêutica tal como a conhecemos. E foi então que a imagem de Roger Martin, "For me, the metaphor for competitive advantage is a long row of rooms. In this conception, every company, at any given point in time, exists in a room of its own making", publicada ontem no blogue me assaltou. Quando aqui escrevo sobre a importância do investimento directo estrangeiro, estou na verdade a abordar a possibilidade de capital intelectual vindo de fora permitir unidades de negócio que dão saltos na sequência da "row of rooms"

O que é uma vantagem competitiva?

"For me, the metaphor for competitive advantage is a long row of rooms. In this conception, every company, at any given point in time, exists in a room of its own making. The room is defined by the set of questions on which the company is working — and that set of questions is, in turn, defined by what the company understands about the market in which it competes. It understands things about the customers it serves, the technologies it uses, the competitors it faces, the industry in which it operates, etc. That causes it to work on projects and initiatives about which it currently knows. It competes on bases that it knows. It can’t work on things about which it doesn’t know because it can’t pose questions about things it doesn’t realize exist.


But in due course, working diligently on those questions in that room will bring about insights which will allow the company to move through a thick curtain to the next room. In that new room, it has access to questions that only became obvious to the company after it has contemplated and answered the previous questions. There is no other way into that room but through the curtain.

...

It is not easy. You can’t get into the next room just because you want to be there. You have to be thorough and conceptual about your business. You have to answer the questions in your room to get clues about the nature of the questions in the next. That means being endlessly curious about your business — the customers, the technologies, the anomalies, the outliers. Have urgency because it is competitive life or death. If competitors get into the next room before you do, it can be deadly. 

...

Be very deliberate about the questions you ask about your business. Invest heavily in the activity. Never just do. Do and reflect. Ask yourself, how can I ask more sophisticated questions about my business?

...

The goal is to acquire clues as to what is the next set of questions, because when you figure out what those questions are, you can slip through the curtains to the next room. And as long as you are in that room, you have a monumentally valuable lead in the ability to answer the next questions, and get through the next curtains, and so on. If you see any competitor appearing to ask questions that you are not yet asking, that is your signal that you better start understanding those questions because it is a threat to your survival. If they get to operate in the next room before you, it could be all over.

Always think about advantage as ever-evolving. It isn’t a moat. If you think it is, you won’t focus enough on the next room. And the advantage of always being in the next room is truly powerful — a truly renewable resource that is well worth pursuing."

Excelente reflexão de Roger Martin acerca do que é a vantagem competitiva em "What Strategy Questions are You Asking?" 

Performative aspects

 

"Routines are the bedrock of any organisation.[Moi ici: I call them processes like in ISO 9001] By ‘routine’ we mean a repeated performance either by an individual or a collection of people interacting together. Some of these routine behaviours have been deliberately designed and trained into people. Others have emerged without any deliberate intervention by managers. All routines evolve and are a source of incremental change and improvement inside the organisation.

...

Routines have an ostensive aspect and a performative aspect. The ostensive aspect is the basic structure of the routine. For example, consider the routine of dealing with a customer in a car-servicing facility. There is a general structure for this routine which includes greeting the customer, offering a seat and some refreshment, locating the paperwork, checking the work to be done and any other issues, handling the car keys, informing the customer when the car will be ready, etc. This ostensive structure is understood implicitly by experienced customer-service personnel, and it rarely alters significantly. The performative aspect is a particular enactment of the routine, that is, what I did with this customer this morning. Each time someone performs the routine, it will be slightly different, due to a whole raft of reasons, for example, time of day, the mood of the customer, the complexity of the service and repairs, etc. Thus, the performative aspect of the routine is the source of variation.

...

In fairly stable environments, it is likely that the ostensive routines of most competing firms will look very similar. What this means is that the sources of advantage that a particular firm might have will come from the particular performances of these routines achieved by its members. Subtle differences in the way that they enact these routines may well be sources of advantage and if these subtle differences incorporate significant amounts of tacit knowledge, then it is very difficult for competitor firms to replicate these valuable routines. Tacit knowledge is often referred to as know-how, and it is built through experience. ”

Trechos retirados de: Paul Raspin. “What's Your Competitive Advantage?”

"why some countries grow faster than others"

Mais uns trechos de "Windows of Opportunity: How Nations Make Wealth".

Recordar Irlanda e João Duque:

• Tamanho, produtividade e a receita irlandesa
• A caminho da Sildávia, portanto.
• Ah! Claro que os macacos não podem faltar. Eles não voam, trepam às árvores. 

"If we want to know why some countries grow faster than others, it is also important to understand that there is a ladder of economic development, the rungs of which represent different types of industry. It is a ladder developing countries have to climb in order to be successful - no developing country tries to start growing by creating a pharmaceutical industry, and no country has ever achieved a high GDP per capita by having a cheap garment industry. 

...

perhaps a more useful way of thinking about the rungs of the ladder of economic development is to see them as representing industries which require increasingly complex organisational and technological capabilities. On the bottom rungs are simple industries involved in, for example, the production of cheap clothes, the assembly of electronic components and the making of simple toys. On the top rungs are industries requiring complex organisational and technological capabilities that can only be acquired experientially, cumulatively and collectively; such as the aerospace, pharmaceutical and semiconductor industries. In simple industries, such as the production of cheap clothes or the assembly of electronic components, it is difficult for any firm to gain a competitive advantage. Consequently, the value-added per capita of firms is low, and the wages and salaries they can pay is also low.

...

Knowledge involves understanding the relationships or linkages between entities, and being able, therefore, to predict the outcome of events without having to act them out. 

...

Knowhow is different, as it involves the capacity to perform tacit actions; that is actions that cannot be explicitly described.

...

Before knowledge and knowhow can be used to make new products and services, they have to be embodied in individuals and organisations. The knowledge and knowhow that a single individual can acquire is limited, as an individual can only absorb so much information. Therefore, the knowledge and knowhow to make complex products and services have to be embodied in a number of different individuals and co-ordinated by a firm's organisation.

...

This point about the difficulty of accumulating the knowledge and knowhow to make products and services is important for two reasons. Firstly, neoclassical economists tend to assume that demand and incentives are enough to stimulate the production of a product or service anywhere in the world, and if they don't it must be because the system of allocating resources is not working efficiently. However, while incentives and demand may be enough to motivate intermediaries and traders, the people who produce goods and services also need to know how to make them.

Secondly, if the ability to accumulate the knowledge and knowhow to make products and services is difficult, it is likely that countries will have accumulated varying levels of knowledge and knowhow on their economic history, and therefore the complexity of the products and services they can produce will vary.

...

products requiring a large input of knowledge and knowhow would tend to be exported from only a few countries. Some of the products exported by a large number of countries include simple garments, such as underwear, shirts and pants; while some of the products exported by a relatively few countries include optical instruments, aircraft and medical imaging devices. Such a simple scan suggests that industries requiring less knowledge and knowhow are present in more places, as one might expect."

Superpoderes

Qual é o superpoder da sua empresa? 

"You wouldn’t hire FedEx to safely transport a fragile large item across the country. Their superpower is speed, not avoiding jostling. On the other hand, an art transport company might take a bit longer to get the vase to your new home, but their white-glove treatment (with actual white gloves) would make them an obvious alternative to FedEx.

“You can choose anyone and we’re anyone” is not a useful way to earn customers, patrons, or supporters. Because if you’re anyone, it’s worth mentioning that a search engine is happy to point people to plenty of other people who are as anyone as you are.

In order to deliver speed at a low price, FedEx had to commit. They made a significant number of choices all focused on that one metric. If you try to ship a very large (but very light) box via FedEx, you’ll discover that instead of costing $30, it costs $450. That’s because it breaks their system, and their system is their superpower.

When we think of an artist we admire, we’re naming someone who stands for something. And to stand for something is to commit."

Trecho retirado de "The practice: shipping creative work" de Seth Godin.

Batota, um exemplo

Ao longo dos anos uso aqui a palavra batota para ilustrar o fenómeno de optimização racional. Alguém, a liderar uma empresa, olha para a situação, percebe os drivers do negócio e o que é a vantagem competitiva. Depois, resolve abusar dessa receita e aplica-a religiosamente.

Ao continuar a leitura de "When More Is Not Better" de Roger Martin, ontem dei com uma estória que me pôs com curiosidade sobre qual será a solução proposta pelo autor. O que me veio à cabeça, no meio de um sorriso irónico foi o corporativismo de Salazar, o qual abomino:

"Consider the American waste-management industry. At one time there were thousands of little waste-management companies—garbage collectors—across the country. Each had one-to-several trucks serving customers on a particular route. The profitability of those thousands of companies was fairly normally distributed. Most clustered around the mean, with some highly efficient and bigger companies earning higher profits and some weaker ones earning lower profits.
.
Then along came the late Wayne Huizenga, the founder of Waste Management Inc. (WMI). Looking at the cost structure of the business, he saw that two big costs were truck acquisition (the vehicles were expensive, and because they were used intensively, they needed to be replaced regularly) and maintenance and repair (intensive use made this both critical and costly). Each small player bought trucks one (or maybe a handful) at a time and ran a repair depot to service its small fleet.
Huizenga realized that if he acquired a number of routes in a given region, two things would be possible. First, he would have much greater purchasing leverage with truck manufacturers and could acquire vehicles more cheaply. Second, he could close individual maintenance facilities and build a single, far-more-efficient one at the geographic center of each region. As he proceeded, the effect—greater efficiency—became the cause of more of the effect.
.
Huizenga generated the resources to keep buying small garbage companies and expanding into new territories, which made WMI bigger and more efficient still. This put competitive pressure on all small operators, because WMI could come into their territories and underbid them. Those smaller firms could either lose money or sell to WMI. Huizenga’s success represented a huge increase in pressure on the system.
.
Like a collapsing sand pile, the industry quickly consolidated, with WMI as the dominant player, earning the highest profits. Fellow consolidator Republic Services established itself as the second player, earning decent profits. Several considerably smaller would-be consolidators earn little to no returns, and lots of tiny companies mainly operate at subsistence levels.
.
The industry today is structured as a Pareto distribution, with WMI as winner-take-most. The company earned more than $14 billion in 2017. Huizenga died a multibillionaire."

Recordar este postal (2017).

Ou daqui:

"Imaginem só o que lhes poderia acontecer se fizessem batota, que é quando a gestão de topo de uma empresa pára e reflecte no porquê do sucesso e, resolve abusar, carregando a fundo nas vantagens competitivas específicas."

Ou daqui (2012):

"E, quando alguém descobre que tem uma vantagem competitiva, o que deve fazer?
.
.
.
.
B - A - T - O - T - A!!!!!!
.
.
Agir de forma a abusar da sua vantagem competitiva!!!"

Ou daqui (2012):

"- Mas o que fazes na vida?
- Ajudo as PMEs a fazerem batota!
- A fazerem batota? Mas o que é que isso quer dizer? Tem algo a ver com fugir aos impostos?
- Não, trata-se de ajudar as PMEs a abusarem e tirarem partido de algo a que se chama a imperfeição do mercado, a concorrência imperfeita. Lembras-te da história de David e Golias?
- Sim, mas o que é que isso tem a ver com as PMEs?
- Tudo, tem tudo a ver com as PMEs que fazem a diferença."

Há dias publiquei outro exemplo desta batota (atenção, a batota não se aplica só à competição pelo preço). Batota é o acto, a arte de abordar o posicionamento no mercado com inteligência e constância de propósito, algo muito raro de encontrar.

A importância das margens

Quando escrevi a série "Quantas empresas?" procurei chamar a atenção para a urgência de aumentar margens, de subir preços. Não um aumento de preços numa negociação, num braço de ferro com os clientes, mas porque se sobe na escala de valor, porque se aumenta a diferenciação da oferta, porque se cria mais valor potencial para os clientes.

Normalmente, este tipo de aumento não se compadece com a empresa actual... e aí é que está um dos problemas: a dificuldade em encolher a empresa, a dificuldade em mudar de vida.

Algumas vezes é-me penoso visitar uma empresa. Um outsider consegue abstrair-se da espuma dos dias e, numa atitude racional, olhar para aquela azáfama e perceber que são como perús na antevéspera do Natal. E escrevo isto sem arrogância, até com algum melindre. Basta-me olhar para os produtos que fabricam, para o seu valor acrescentado, para a dependência das quantidades, quando o contexto é de encomendas mais pequenas e de salários mais altos. Por vezes ainda consigo identificar "pontos quentes" que poderiam ajudar a criar a empresa do futuro, mas implicariam uma de duas coisas: o encolhimento da empresa actual, ou a autonomização de unidade de negócio para se focar nesses "pontos quentes".

No entanto, para a maioria dos empresários isso é como pedir a um pai que mate um filho.

Entretanto, este texto, "Put Value Creation at the Center of Your Transformation", chama a atenção para a importância da focalização no aumento das margens:

"The COVID-19 pandemic has dramatically raised the stakes for corporate transformations. Many companies will need to launch a transformation to remain competitive, yet the risks associated with failure are now higher. Unfortunately, transformation outcomes vary widely; ... Our research shows that companies must accomplish three goals to create superior value from a crisis transformation: deliver near-term improvements to profit margins, strengthen the core operating and business models, and rigorously manage the change.
...
Margin improvement is measured as the average growth rate of the EBITDA margin over the three-year period.
...
But not all change can be measured in terms of financial performance and stock price movement. That’s where the third and most critical aspect comes in: transformations require rigorous execution and change management.
...
Set a clear vision, and keep the communication simple and straightforward. Getting all employees to have the same understanding of the vision and objectives for the transformation is crucial, and companies can accomplish this through clear and vivid communication.
...
Launch a formal, structured program. Because a large-scale transformation is complex and has multiple interdependencies, it can succeed only if it is structured as a formal program with well-defined work streams and initiatives."

Como lidar com o fim da escassez

Ontem de manhã, durante a minha caminhada matinal, li o capítulo 2 - The End of Scarcity do livro “Remarkable Retail” de Steve Dennis.

Enquanto lia ia fazendo os meus sublinhados e ia fazendo o paralelismo para a imprensa, para o calçado, para tantos sectores económicos.

Depois, ao final do dia, num momento de balanço, recordei:

• o pedido de alguém que encomendava sapatos na China, e que agora pretende encomendá-los em Portugal, para vender na sua página. Quando olhei para os preços de venda ao público... pensei, não será possível produzir isto cá e vender a estes preços;
• o desabafo de um empresário desiludido com as margens que consegue ter no seu negócio.

Alguns trechos do tal capítulo 2:

"Media are no longer scarce
...
Information is no longer scarce
...
“A wealth of information creates a poverty of attention.”
...
Access Is No Longer Scarce
...
Choice Is No Longer Scarce
...
Today, in many circumstances, choice is no longer constrained by how many aisles the various stores within a reasonable drive time contain. The aisles are virtually endless, and the long tail of selection is often taken for granted. Choice is now so abundant that even the most idiosyncratic of tastes can be satisfied.[Moi ici: Mongo]
.
Convenience Is No Longer Scarce
...
Products that used to take weeks to get delivered can often be delivered the same day and sometimes, with the advent of Prime Now from Amazon, within an hour or so.
Products that had few, if any, viable options (or were prohibitively expensive) are now routinely delivered by retailers or delivery services
...
Connection Is No Longer Scarce
...
The boundaries that limited connection between individuals and brands have come down, and much of the friction, be it in cost, time, physical distance, or complexity, is now gone.
...
Cheap Is No Longer Scarce
...
Everything, Now
.
Decreasing costs of computing power and the associated network effects have created a bountiful buffet of choice, much of it on demand, whenever we want it.
Before the internet, the shopping world consisted of a limited selection of outlets carrying a limited assortment of products that might work well for us, purchased at a hoped-for decent price, during regular store hours, delivered mostly on the retailer’s terms.
...
Today, the expectation is that everything can be had now. No compromise. No excuses.
As retailers seek to gain customers’ attention, engage in meaningful ways, and earn their trust, this is no small task. This new abundance forces us to rethink much of what made our organizations successful in the past. The scarcity that used to determine so many retail and consumer market decisions is now effectively over. Forever.
.
Good Enough No Longer Is
...
the diminishment of key elements of scarcity has changed just about everything that was once important in most businesses.
...
Not too long ago, plenty of brands could get away with good enough. Their focus was on scale, serving the peak of the bell curve, providing average products for average people. Yet when customers have vast information at their fingertips, access to just about anything they want, whenever they want, from wherever they want, why should they settle for average, merely acceptable, unremarkable, mediocre, or boring?
Not only shouldn’t they. They’re not.
Our mission—should we choose to accept it—is to build new sources of scarcity that can be proprietary to our brand. These days building scarcity around information, access, choice, and connection is hard, if not impossible. 
...
Instead, this new scarcity must be built around commanding attention in new, interesting, and memorable ways, creating incomparable experiences, and earning customers’ trust by knowing them better than the competition and delivering on a promise over and over again. Mostly, we need to create a brand story that moves them, that customers become enrolled in, and that they feel compelled to share, to spread, to (quite literally) remark upon."

O capítulo 3 é sobre o Armagedão, ou sobre como as notícias da morte do retalho físico são um exagero.

Quantas empresas? (parte VIII)

Parte I, parte II, parte III, parte IV, parte V, parte VI e parte VII.

Ontem numa empresa discutíamos o futuro do calçado em Portugal. Enquanto essa conversa decorria, pensava neste texto que tinha lido durante a caminha matinal, "The End of the Jaffa Orange Highlights Israel Economic Shift":

"Since peaking in the early 1980s at 1.8 million tons a year, Israeli citrus production has dropped almost 75%.
...
With a strengthening currency making exports less competitive and scarce water supplies raising the cost of cultivation, oranges—and many other crops—are no longer worth the effort. Agriculture has fallen to 2% of goods exports, from a peak above 40% in the 1950s,
...
Just 1% of Israelis now work in agriculture, down from 18% in 1958, while the tech sector has shot up from virtually zero to 10% of jobs today, many developing software used outside the country. That’s helped double exports of services since 2008, to more than $50 billion last year—with services in 2020 poised to surpass goods exports for the first time. The shift “from basic agriculture like Jaffa oranges to top-of-the-line tech” makes economic sense,
...
In regional rivals such as Egypt, Turkey, and Morocco, “labor is very cheap, and water is very cheap, and the currency is better for exporters,” says Nitzan Rottman, who oversees work on citrus at Israel’s Ministry of Agriculture. “We can’t compete with them.”
...
Some farmers are shifting from crops such as oranges—water-intensive even with the best irrigation systems—to less-thirsty alternatives such as grapes, olives, and Argania spinosa, the nut tree that produces argan oil for shampoos and skin creams."

O calçado vai acabar em Portugal? Não.
Afinal por ano ainda se fabricam 23 milhões de pares em França e 35 milhões de pares na Alemanha (dados de 2016).

No entanto, com a subida do SMN e o cerco turco/romeno/marroquino, é preciso pensar numa Fase 4:

"O número de empresas vai voltar a diminuir
A quantidade de pares produzidos vai voltar a diminuir
O número de trabalhadores vai voltar a diminuir
O preço médio por par vai novamente dar um salto importante"

Recordar a Intel e a decisão: se estivesse a começar agora, apostava nisto ou mantinha-me a defender o negócio actual?

Outro factor a alterar a paisagem competitiva

Um tema que tem aparecido recorrentemente na minha lista de leituras nos últimos meses, a explosão da venda de artigos em segunda-mão:

• StockX to Become First Billion-Dollar Sneaker Reseller
• Why Teens Are Selling Clothes Out of Their Closets

Outro factor a alterar a paisagem competitiva que mexe com o mundo das PME exportadoras.

Vantagens comparativas

O amigo Aranha enviou-me este artigo bem interessante, "Confecções Lança estão a crescer 30% e investem 550 mil":

"A vida está a correr bem à Confecções Lança, que está a registar um crescimento de 30% nas vendas,
...
“Andamos sempre à procura de novos clientes. E o nosso produto tem melhorado muito. Além de que a entrega rápida e nas datas acordadas com os clientes é um dos mais importantes factores de fidelização e que ajudaram a construir a reputação de credibilidade da nossa empresa”,
...
A flexibilidade, que lhe permite fazer fatos por medida (que já atingiram um peso de 10% nas vendas) desde o início desta década, é uma das vantagens comparativas da Confecções Lança.  “As chaves do nosso sucesso? A qualidade do produto, ser confiável, resposta rápida, entrega nos prazos e flexibilidade”"

Isto temos escrito por aqui desde há mais de 13 ou 14 anos. Entretanto, parte desta vantagem está a ser comida pela Europa de Leste, Turquia, Marrocos, Tunisia, Etiópia, ... (recordar aqui, aqui e aqui, por exemplo).

Acrescento duas sugestões para este desempenho:

• descobrir o trabalho para nichos ("e de uniformes, em pequenas quantidades para o segmento alto, vestindo, por exemplo, os empregados do Ritz de Paris". Os nichos têm a vantagem de pagarem mais e terem custos de promoção muito mais baixos, além da focalização/especialização da produção e das mensagens)
• Trump (quando tiverem tempo leiam bem este artigo "What’s Your 'Plan B' for Made in China?" é longo, mas vale bem a pena o investimento. E já agora, depois leiam "Equilibrium Americanum")

Acerca da vantagem competitiva

E continuo a minha leitura matinal de "Fundamentals of Business-to-Business Marketing - Mastering Business Markets" editado por Michael Kleinaltenkamp, Wulff Plinke, Ian Wilkinson e Ingmar Geiger.

"When analyzing benefit differences, we need to focus on the meaning of differences in competencies, processes, and programs for the buyer. A seller’s competitive strength is its ability to offer greater benefits or lower costs, i.e., greater net benefits, to the buyer compared to competitors.
In order to analyze this ability, we can make use of the description of the market transaction given above. Let us once again consider condition. With freedom of choice, no buyer will choose a particular seller if he perceives that other problem solutions offer a more favorable exchange ratio. The buyer will choose seller S if S offers a higher net benefit (the difference between benefits and costs) than a competitor SC. Therefore, S will have to have a positive difference between the net benefits of S and SC on the critical dimensions. Figure 1.21 summarizes the elements of such a net benefit difference.
...

From this perspective, it is not absolute values that affect purchase decisions—it is the relations between values that count.
...
Figure 1.22 shows the comparison. Cost differences and benefit differences between S and SC are shown. The price of seller S’s offer is slightly higher, but S offers the buyer significantly lower costs of use, maintenance, and disposal. Overall, the buyer is better off buying from S than SC, the difference being the “perceived cost difference S/SC.”
...

"the type of advantage, which may be by means of cost advantages or benefit advantages"

E continuo a minha leitura matinal de "Fundamentals of Business-to-Business Marketing - Mastering Business Markets" editado por Michael Kleinaltenkamp, Wulff Plinke, Ian Wilkinson e Ingmar Geiger.

"the sources of competitive advantage. In competition, every seller has certain capabilities or competencies based on its skills and resources, including all the people and their knowledge, the plant and equipment, customer relationships, and corporate image and reputation. Competencies are all the factors a seller can use in order to achieve its goals. It is essential for success in competition that the capabilities it has fit with the problem solutions desired by buyers. A seller who strives for competitive advantage will try to develop or acquire better talents and resources than competitors and will try to protect them against imitation.
Also essential for competitive success is the way in which processes within a firm are organized.
...
Competencies and processes together determine the output of a company and we call this a firm’s program. It includes the outputs offered to the market and what it expects from others in return. The program is the firm’s total offer including the nature of the product, the product range, services, communication, distribution, and price. The program is what distinguishes one firm from others. It is its visible source of differentiation for the buyer. Once achieved, a company usually tries strongly to defend an established differential advantage.
Competencies, processes, and programs together are the means by which a seller tries to create and defend differential advantage over his competitors. Every effort to improve a firm’s competitive position has to start at one or more of these three components.
...
As a result of its particular mix of competencies, processes, and program, a seller achieves a certain competitive position. This position has various dimensions. First is the type of advantage, which may be by means of cost advantages or benefit advantages. The former describes the seller’s average costs as compared to competitors; the latter describes the net benefits perceived the buyer, compared to buyers’ perceptions of competitors’ offers."

Uma pregação em prol da ... concorrência imperfeita

Continuo a minha leitura matinal de "Fundamentals of Business-to-Business Marketing - Mastering Business Markets" editado por Michael Kleinaltenkamp, Wulff Plinke, Ian Wilkinson e Ingmar Geiger.

Estão a ver o choradinho e a falta de noção deste senhor, "Boas notícias, Portugal a ser abandonado pelo negócio do preço (parte II)"?

Imaginem o que diria desta linguagem:

"We have come to understand the market process as a never-ending process of learning for all involved, a process that is kept running by the entrepreneur who detects profit opportunities. Entrepreneurs sense differences in the market, they discover the possibility to sell something at a higher price than they can buy it for, and they disperse this knowledge—voluntarily or involuntarily—to other market participants. This process is a competitive one that rewards the capable and punishes the less able. Competition among sellers, therefore, has a selection function that creates better problem solutions for the buyer.
The Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises described the situation in the following way: “The entrepreneur can only act a step ahead of his competitors if he strives toward serving the market more cheaply and better. More cheaply means richer supply; better means supply with products not yet in the market”"

Depois, o livro apresenta esta figura:

Sabem o que vem aí?
Uma pregação em prol da ... concorrência imperfeita.

"Homogeneity: The offers in a market are homogeneous if they resemble each other in all aspects, so that the buyer perceives no difference among them. Offers are heterogeneous if they differ either objectively or as perceived by the buyer.
• Knowledge: Buyers have complete market knowledge if they know without delay about all offers in the market.
• Barriers: Barriers hinder free market entry: new sellers cannot enter the market without entry costs or constraints, and sellers already in the market cannot imitate the characteristics and behavior of other sellers.
...
Information shortages and quality differences that initially exist will tend to disappear, and the temporary profits of cases 2–4 will disappear, shifting the situation to case 1.
.
Cases 5 and 6 differ from cases 1 to 4 because barriers exist. Barriers act as an obstacle to competition for new entrants as well as for those already in the market. Market entry barriers are always disadvantageous for new entrants compared to incumbent sellers, because the latter can approach buyers more easily than new entrants. And if a seller has a first mover advantage compared to its competitors then others cannot catch up—either because they are unable to (the advantage is too great) or because they do not want to (e.g., they are afraid of the first movers’ response).
...
Hence, barriers are, among other things, the reason for sellers earning profits significantly higher than competitors.
...
The picture of competition created in cases 5 and 6 provides the basis for an analysis of competitive advantage. Dynamic seller competition means that sellers are permanently searching for and experimenting with new products or services in order to find or create ones that distinguish themselves from those of other sellers, in terms of value to the buyer and/or the costs they incur. If a competitor succeeds in operating with lower costs than its competitors, then it can offer lower prices to buyers, which can increase its market share and profits. If a seller succeeds in offering a better product or service without higher costs, then it can increase prices and earn higher profits. This never-ending search and experimentation has only one aim: By differentiation, the seller wants to avoid being substitutable. Furthermore, a seller strives to establish a difference that is sustainable; it wants to avoid being imitated."

Indicadores e e estratégia

Esquema da primeira folha que vai animar a reunião de hoje:

O balanced scorecard.
A importância de indicadores relacionados com a estratégia.
O que ter em conta ao desenhar uma estratégia.
Diferenciação e perceber quem são os clientes-avo.
Curva de Stobachoff.

Não é por serem grandes que as empresas exportam! (parte II)

Parte I.

"The good news with unfair advantages is that you don't need one from the outset. When you are just starting out, embrace obscurity to build something valuable without calling out too much competitor attention. Identify an unfair advantage story and if one is not readily apparent, it is always better to leave the unfair advantage box blank than stuffing a weak unfair advantage as a placeholder.
.
The bad news with unfair advantages is that once you get some traction, your unfair advantage will get tested -- by your competitors and copycats."

Trecho retirado de "What is an Unfair Advantage?"

A vantagem competitiva

Considerar esta mensagem:

"WE HAVE AN UNFAIR ADVANTAGE:
.
We care more."

E recordar:

"Customers often think we are different not because we are different, but because we recognize what makes them different"

Trecho retirado daqui.

o vector tempo não é irrelevante (parte III)

Na parte II sublinhámos:

"the conviction that the coarse structure of the economy can exhibit no regularities that are not results of the fine structure, and that those aggregates or mean values, which alone can be grasped statistically, give us no information about what takes place in the fine structure."

Sou um acompanhante e promotor da idiossincrasia das empresas como grande factor competitivo. Por isso, apreciei muito estes trechos:

"Competitive  advantages  and  superior  resource positions are the outcome of an idiosyncratic and path-dependent process. In the extant literature scholars have argued that this path is both enabled and  constrained by firms’ knowledge and capabilities. Our arguments suggest that superior market positions and superior resource complementarities may also act as self-reinforcing mechanisms that shape a firm’s evolutionary path and may amplify differences in competitive positions (at least in the absence of discontinuous environmental change).
...
ultimately, it is managers that must make decisions about acquiring or building resources. Managerial judgment concerning the value creation potential of a resource and the factors that enable and constrain it are key factors in determining what resources a firm acquires or builds and, thus, what path toward a distinct competitive position it takes
...
Arriving at a position of competitive advantage often requires the orchestration of complex resource acquisition, development, and disposal strategies consistently over an extended period of time. We can depict managers as using the mechanisms of superior market position, superior resource complementarities, and superior network position strategically to turn initial asymmetries to their advantage through a set of resource orchestration decisions that evolve and unfold over time. Managers can shape their firm’s resource base in a way that allows for competitive improvement at a later stage—for example, through anticipating future market positions or future complementarities and through acquiring at an early stage some of the resources that are needed for building a market position later..These resources will not be as valuable unless the firm successfully acquires or builds other complementary resources in the future. Such a strategy may be particularly beneficial when resources take time to develop..Our arguments suggest that, under uncertainty, resource value is subjective and at least partly depends on the identity and characteristics of managers. Given their unique knowledge and experience, managers differ in terms of how much value they attribute to a resource and, subsequently, how much value they are able to create with a resource.…our results highlight the role of value creation in strategic management theory, as opposed to value capture, which depicts strategy as a zero-sum game, where the gain of one is the loss of the other. Value capture implies a focus on bargaining and pricing but neglects demand-side opportunities and taking into account or even influencing what customers are willing to pay. Considering value creation opens up new perspectives on demand-side opportunities that firms are able to exploit—for example, through diversification. Recently, both in the marketing literature and the strategy literature scholars have suggested that attention to how customers perceive value, how value is created from using products, and how firms are able to boost customers’ willingness to pay are key contributors to firm performance. Strategies aimed at increasing value creation by taking into account demand-side factors, as well as aimed at shaping such factors, are central to strategic management (and not only to marketing) but are very much an understudied topic..Furthermore, the demand side entails an opportunity space that allows firms to establish, enhance, or retain the value of their resources. Understanding the environment, particularly customer preferences, allows firms to acquire or build those resources or extract those services from resources that generate the most value for customers."

Trechos retirados de "What Makes a Resource Valuable? Identifying the Drivers of Firm-Idiosyncratic Resource Value" de Jens Schmidt e Thomas Keil, publicado por  Academy of Management Review, 2013, Vol. 38, No. 2, 206–228

Do abstract retiro:

"We further emphasize how the role of demand-side factors, [Moi ici: Heterogeneidade da procura] as well as the understanding and active shaping of such factors by managers, is a source of heterogeneity in firms’ resource endowments. [Moi ici: Heterogeneidade de recursos] Thus, our results show how two  understudied  areas  in  strategic  management—the  role  of  managers  in  resource  management and the role of the demand side as an opportunity space — can  be  fruitfully  combined  to  gain new insights into how firms achieve positions of competitive  advantage."