Case Study on "Managing Explosive Growth Within the Business Paradigm"

Case Study 4 pages (1101 words) Sources: 4

[EXCERPT] . . . .

Managing Explosive Growth

Within the business paradigm, it is often ironic that at times the old Confucian maxim of "be careful what you ask for, you may get it," becomes true. The goal, of course, for any organization is to grow and prosper. However, there remains quite a fine line between slow growth, managed growth, and the explosive growth of a product or service. All have their merits and problems -- if growth is too slow and expenses to bring to market too high, the company fails; if growth is exponential, it may require additional infusion of capital, staff, and a rapid ramping of manufacturing -- sometimes without adequate planning, and products are produced without sufficient quality control or not shipping fast enough to keep up with consumer demand. The goal, of course, is that elusive middle ground of managed growth, strategic planning, and tactical implementation.

Case Study - RIM Technology (Research in Motion) is a Canadian-based company founded in 1995 and shipping some of the first models of what would become the famous Blackberry in 1998. RIM reported almost $15 billion in income for 2010, making it one of the top telecommunications companies globally, still holding about 11% of the global market (Sweeney, 2009). For years, the Blackberry devices were the premier choice of the business world, able to channel email and connectivity in a way no other device at a similar price could. Continually pressured to "do more," though, by the mid-2000s RIM faced a business conundrum -- what to do about explosive growth. Because it was not just the Blackberry platform that was growing so quickly, the very idea of an ultra-competitive marketplace complicated matters. RIM could not just be content with it market share, any lack of competitive zeal and it would likely lose what gains it had already made, which were considerable. RIM had already been embroiled in patent litigation with a number of companies who were trying to utilize its technology for their own use and, as recently as January, 2010, Motorola suing RIM for ostensibly infringing on some of Motorola's technology for Wi-Fi and power management (Patel, 2010).

Market Demands- Blackberry's two real advantages were its ability to integrate with network servers of all kinds for group email and the ability to seamlessly utilize SMS technology to allow users to communicate with others with the same capability. In the United States alone, we find:

US Mobile Content Market = 68.7 million text users

86% of individuals over 16 own a mobile phone

There are almost 300 million phone users

240 include MMS capability

Despite freedom of cost, 70% of users actively use text phones.

Figure 2 -- Total U.S. Messaging Users

(Source: http://www.cellsigns.com/industry.shtml)

With this kind of volume increasing each year, RIM faced several choices when deciding upon ways to remain an aggressive player within the market. There are always, of course, limitations in funding, production, distribution and internal staffing that must be considered. Any of the options would require new and innovative team members. With several options, a few of their choices included:

Improve line, but improve it quicker -- the Better Unit Option -- RIM has a campus recruiting program as well as a fairly successful networking approach to finding talent. However, to quickly improve and become more competitive, RIM could… READ MORE

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