Strategic ManagementPerspective-NCR W

2011

Strategic Management Perspective

Critical evaluation of NCR and its contribution to the WIFI Industry
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Pampana Kedari Kiran Kumar MBA-Fulltime

Strategic Management Perspective

Contents
1. Introduction ................................................................................................................................... 3 2. Company Overview ........................................................................................................................ 3 3. Situational Analysis ........................................................................................................................ 3 3.1 Pestle Analysis ............................................................................................................................. 4 3.2 Porter s five forces analysis (Micro environment): ........................................................................ 5 3.3 Porter's Value Chain Model .......................................................................................................... 7 Primary Activities: .......................................................................................................................... 7 Support Activities:.......................................................................................................................... 9 3.4 SWOT analysis.............................................................................................................................. 9 4.Strategic issues and paradoxes ..................................................................................................... 11 4.1 Compliance vs. Choice:............................................................................................................... 11 Leadership Perspective: ............................................................................................................... 11 Dynamics Perspective: ................................................................................................................. 11 4.2 Competition vs. Cooperation:..................................................................................................... 13 5. Conclusion ................................................................................................................................... 14 6. Reflection .................................................................................................................................... 15 7. References ................................................................................................................................... 17

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1. Introduction
WIFI today has changed the way users connect to a network. The technology is currently widely used and NCR has been a key innovator in its creation while investing a large amount of resources (labour and capital) in bringing WIFI to the market. This report observes the paradoxes that are evident in the case while academically underpinning the observed conclusions. I will also look at the external and internal influences and how they affected the company's competitive advantage and operating environment.

2. Company Overview
NCR was founded in 1879 as the National Manufacturing company in Dayton manufacturing and selling cash registers (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p873). In 1884 the company was taken over and renamed to National Cash Register Company. It evolved into one of the first modern American companies introducing new, aggressive sales methods and business techniques. Right from the early 80's to the late 90's NCR played a prominent role in the development of wireless LAN and its security. With its continuous innovation, global reach and cross industry knowledge from 1884 till today it is a total solutions provider offering various solutions to both hardware and software requirements (NCR website, 2011).

3. Situational Analysis
According to James Brian Quinn (1998), strategy is the pattern or plan that integrates an organization's major goals, policies and action sequences into a cohesive whole. In order to plan strategically it is very important to analyse the Macro and Micro environmental forces of

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the organisation. Environmental analysis is a study of these forces, the relationships among them, and their effect and potential effect on the organization (Segev, 1977)

3.1 Pestle Analysis

The PESTLE framework allows an organisation to identify factors from its external environment that impact the creation of its strategy.

Political factors: With the US Federal Communication Commission (FCC) requesting the MITRE Corporation to investigate the potential civil usage of spread spectrum, a move to deregulate the market was put into motion (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p875). The FCC decided to open three radio frequency bands allocated for Industrial, Scientific and Medical (ISM) applications for the use by radio communication systems which also included wireless LANs. This allowed NCR to realistically develop a product for this market segment.

Socio-cultural factors: In terms of the socio-cultural perspective, potential customers were most concerned about privacy and security (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p882). Due to multiple companies talking negatively about the competition's product, prospective customers did not trust anybody with their valuable data while considering radio waves new and weird. Their attitude was to 'wait and see'. These security levels clearly showed a need for standards, higher speeds and lower costs. NCR responded to this driver of change by coming up with an authentication and encryption method called WEP (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p875).

Technological factors: NCR was a dominant market player in the retail industry where their points of sale terminals were very popular. However, a technological need arose due to the immobility of these terminals - every time a store changed its display format the POS terminals had to be rewired which was an expensive proposition. (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p874). This led NCR to look into the feasibility of wireless technology so that their POS terminals became portable. Legal factors: Various regulations and industry standards were adhered by all the organizations involved in the development of WIFI. European agencies like CEPT passed

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legislation that denied NCR's product to enter into the European market without the given modifications. This limited the company in having a global standard process of production.

3.2 Porter s five forces analysis (Micro environment):

This type of analysis is crucial to strategic planning. A major part of the analysis phase is a diagnosis of the external environment (de Swaan Arons, 1999). This framework identifies the five important factors in the micro environment of an organization that impact the competitive intensity and thus the attractiveness of the market (Porter, 1980). Many of these factors are structural factors are inherent to the industry and defy any attempts to change them (Bain, 1959; Porter, 1980)

Competitive Forces Model (Porter, 1980, p.4)

Threat of new entrants: NCR had always invested huge amount of money towards its Research and Development and marketing activities. At the same time they had to conform to numerous government regulations while setting many protocols in the

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standard that was developed by the IEEE and Task Groups. These factors ensured that the barriers for entry were very high. Although with the formation of the WIFI Alliance the barriers have reduced due to standard conformity to options such as 802.11b and thus the market is attractive for new entrants to capitalize on the industry potential (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p886).

Bargaining power of suppliers: Due to development being handled at NCR right from the stage of the feasibility report to the development of the standard and the eventual popularization of the product, bargaining power of suppliers would be low. This is because all these activities were carried out in-house by NCR themselves including funding from its corporate R&D organization. (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p877).

Bargaining power of customers: The initial clientele base of NCR was universities and corporate clients. The customers eventually demanded better products with higher data rates and thus exerting a pressure on NCR and other firms in the industry. Since the customers had the option to choose other technologies such as Wired LAN, it was critical for the organizations to constantly innovate and provide their services and products at competitive prices (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p880). This is also reflected in the security measures implemented in the technology to satisfy customer requirements. Therefore, it is evident that the customers had the bargaining power over the firms.

Threat of substitute services: This has always been a predominant threat to WIFI and NCR. The ubiquitous presence of wired LAN as well as the massive investment in 3G technology by established entities like Vodafone, Deutsche Telecom and AT&T led to the creation of a constant substitute available to potential customers. Wired LAN, 3G, Data cards etc. have developed at the same pace as WIFI and thus pose a huge threat to the growth potential of WIFI (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p886).

Rivalry among existing firms: There was intense rivalry within the industry during the evolution of WIFI (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p878-879). The product offerings of these organizations were similar in principle but resulted in numerous compatibility issues that led to direct competition with each trying to establish its product while discrediting the competitors. This potentially resulted in companies cutting into each others business.

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NCR adapted to this by following two strategies one of having a futuristic vision where they wanted their product to be adopted not only by their corporate clients but the market as a whole. The second was a price based strategy where they attempted to lower costs and prices.

3.3 Porter's Value Chain Model

Michael Porter came up with the concept of value chain in 1985 and defined it as a semiformal or textual representation of all value-adding activities of an individual, single organisation (i.e., enterprise). It is a well-established model to carry out an organisations situational analysis. It helps in analysing special activities through which an organisation can create value and competitive advantage. Below are the activities carried out by NCR with regard to its primary and support activities.

Value Chain Model (Porter, 1985)

Primary Activities: These are the activities that are directly concerned with a creation or
delivery of a product or service. Below are the activities that are directly concerned in developing WIFI technology by NCR.

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Inbound Logistics: NCR had a well-established skilled Systems Engineering Centre in Utrecht, Netherlands. The centre had two teams one for software development and one of experts that worked on areas such as telephone modem technologies. With respect to the WIFI project, capital was provided as seed money directly from the headquarters for the feasibility study and subsequent technology development (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p879-880).

Operations: Initially the radio part of the card was tested manually however the testing was completely done by the use of software. The reduction of components in the cards helped in increasing the production lever from 100 cards per week in 1991 to 100,000 cards per week in 2001. (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p886). This shows that NCR achieved a high standard in their operations within this time period.

Outbound Logistics: Due to the use of software technology for testing NCR could ensure that it can produce error free radio components (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p886). The company also came up with Security for wireless which helped in integrating the technology by Intel ((DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p887). These features added to the product offering to NCR's target market and this contributed to their competitive advantage at the time.

Marketing & Sales: Considering NCR's active involvement in the development of WIFI technology, their products would benefit from this USP when they are marketed. Word of mouth would also play an important part in the popularisation of their WIFI offerings. Becoming a part of AT&T also helped them to increase awareness of their product portfolio. NCR always gave importance to sales they have also come up a first sales training schools in the year 1984 (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p874). With a market share of 50% by 2001, the products were distributed through multiple channels include the OEM route (Original Equipment Manufacturers). Essentially NCR had created the technology and distributed it via their key partners to the end user.

Quality: Currently NCR is a provider of Inventory management, Innovation services and Networking services in which they maintain great standards of quality (NCR website, 2011). They incorporated changes to their products by responding to market demands (introduction of security measures) and this provided customers with a higher quality product.

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Support Activities: All the primary activities are linked to the support activities which
help in improving efficiency.

Firm Infrastructure: Infrastructure present at NCR allows them to carry out all the primary activities as they have software and hardware development in house. Their strong base in research and development (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p880) also provides them with the infrastructure to innovate.

Human Resource Management: Employees played a major role in the success of NCR, the human resource management was efficiently carried out as a part of it the employees were always given priority and the company also introduced a comprehensive social welfare programmes for its factory workers (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p873).

Technology Development: The Company developed technology not just to the benefit of the company but for the benefit of the IT sector. The company came up with many technical alternatives in the place of regular wired usage of internet (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p874). IEEE Task and Working groups were initiated by NCR and were responsible for the setting a standard for WIFI. Expertise in research and development as well as their centre in Utrecht contributed to NCR's technology development.

Procurement: NCR in the process of creating the Wireless Technology merged with different companies like AT&T and acquired companies like Teradata Corporation to take advantage of their commercial parallel processing technology. This led NCR Teradata to emerge as a powerful provider of data warehousing through their globally proven database systems (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p874).

3.4 SWOT analysis

Strength: Having the ability to invest in research and development along with impressive sales methods and business techniques was a key strength for NCR. They had the best engineering team who became de-facto leaders in the process of creating a new standard in IEEE 802.11 (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p879-880). They had the knowledge of processing

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signals along with the ability to design and develop hardware according to the market requirement. This strength was reflected in their constant effort to update the product when it was required. As an example, they used the 2.4 GHz frequency in Europe and America in order to capture the market.

Weakness: Though the concept of wireless technology is very fascinating, they operated at a lower speeds compared to that of the wired technology (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p882), since there was no strong signal between the transmitter and the receiver. The introductory price was very high as the company launched the product when costs were high and economies of scale were not possible. This was done to benefit from the new technology. NCR also initially used the 915 MHz frequency which minimised the channels that users could access and thus limited the technology's supply (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p880).

Opportunities: The FCC's deregulation of radio frequency was NCR's first opportunity to develop wireless LAN. Due to the failure of the HomeRF consortium with the failure of Intel's Anypoint wireless home networking and Proxim's Symphony HRF, a gap in the market developed for NCR to capitalise upon (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p875). Another key opportunity for NCR was with Steve Jobs wanting to integrate wireless LAN into the iBook (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p885). Successfully doing this at a groundbreaking price led to quick adoption by Michael Dell and other major players in the market (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p886). Further opportunities developed with community initiatives to provide internet at a low cost through the network (eg.: Wireless Leiden, Netherlands) (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p888). Hotspots were soon developed to provide free internet access to the customers who further helps in increasing the use of WIFI (Starbucks was a major brand to adopt this) (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p887). Public sector opportunities arose with the use of municipal networks with government involvement to improve the availability and affordability of broadband access (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p888).

Threats: A constant threat existed from high speed wired LAN as it was a constant alternative available to users. Security issues with the wireless technology were also a threat that required not only resolution but also assurance to the customer as to the effectiveness of implemented security measures. A newer threat for the technology was the popularity and

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heavy investment into 3G technology by telecommunication giants (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p882).

4.Strategic issues and paradoxes

4.1 Compliance vs. Choice:

The pressure for compliance has usually been presented as a form of environmental determinism, as the industry developments force organisations to adapt or be selected out (Astley and Van der Ven, 1983). The author argues that if the developments in the industry are inevitable for an organisation to follow then they have to adapt to the developments in order to sustain in the market. The freedom of choice has often been labelled as organisational voluntarism, to convey the notion that industry developments can be the wildful actions of individual organisations (Bettis and Donaldson, 1990) here the author argues that the organisation is free to follow any kind of approach that supports its objectives and the industry development can arise as a result of the organisational products.

The paradox of compliance and choice essentially deals with balancing between the industry dynamics perspective and the industry leadership perspective. NCR has managed to place its operations in such a scenario where salient features of both the perspectives are visible. This balance can be displayed by the following points:

Leadership Perspective:
The Industry development was a controllable creation process for the WIFI project with NCR creating the product and the industry. It has thus created a fitting environment to show change dynamics. With the introduction of new standards in the market NCR successfully innovated and changed the rules of WIFI (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p872).

Dynamics Perspective:
Yet its success was due to fitness to industry demands with the provision of security facilities and wireless networking. (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p884). The ability to shape was low and

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slow since the time taken to reach modern WIFI products was over a decade, Yet its profitability was largely industry dependent since the aim was to have a product accepted by the entire market and not just a niche.

According to Porter (1980) the evolution of an industry can be illustrated within the four stages of the Product Life Cycle: introduction, growth, maturity, and decline in an S-shaped curve (Vernon, 1966). During the introduction phase it is difficult for organizations to overcome buyer inertia and penetrate into the market. Similarly NCR had faced difficulties initially to develop its customer base. As the market for WIFI started growing the sales revenue reached its peak. As NCR has always thrived on innovation they ultimately decided to back out of the Wi-Fi industry in order to concentrate their research and development activities towards newer areas but they are strong on industry leadership perspective(DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p887).

The S shaped curve in the Product Life Cycle

According to de Wit and Meyer (2010) it is important for firms to be aware of one's industry context. The industry rules arise from the structure of the industry (Porter, 1980). Therefore it was crucial for NCR to adhere to industry standards and protocols especially because the industry was highly regulated. The vision of Don Johnson, Corporate R&D at NCR to develop a prospective market for wireless products could be worked towards realization after the deregulation act of FCC (1985). Although the strategy of NCR to work upon the wireless networks was emergent (Mintzberg et al, 2003) it was perseverance towards formulating its strategic planning (deliberate strategy) in order to concentrate on activities central to the development of Wi-Fi which was critical to its success. While formulating and planning its strategies NCR consistently made efforts to innovate and diversify into newer market segments. NCR had always invested heavily into its Research and Development activities. Even during the standardization of architecture of Wi-Fi NCR collaborated with Symbol

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Technologies and Xircom in order to propose a decentralized mechanism as opposed to the centralized approach proposed by IBM (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p879). The evolution of WiFi has been a dynamic process due to the constant technological developments in the industry. It is important for organizations to follow normative implications set by the industry (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p443). At the same time it is critical that organizations must come to see that in the long run the easy path of following the industry rules will be less productive than the rocky road of innovation and change (Hamel and Prahalad, 1994; Kim and Mauborgne, 2005) for example if NCR would not have come up with the new technology they might not have made such big contribution to the IT industry which will definitely have an impact on the productivity levels they have today.

4.2 Competition vs. Cooperation:

According to Porter,1985 competition is at the core of the success or failure of firms. Competition determines the appropriateness of a firm's activities that can contribute to its performance, such as innovations, a cohesive culture, or good implementation (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p264). He says that the profitability of an organisation depends upon how well an organisation defend against its opponents. Though porter makes a little mention of, or is apprehensive about collaboration with other firms, Hamel, Doz and Prahalad see collaboration as a useful tool for improving the organisations competitive profile (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p387) . There was intense rivalry prevalent within the industry throughout the evolution phase of WIFI. At the same time corporations had to create and adhere to an industry standard and protocols as the government regulations were numerous. In order to have a better understanding of how NCR had strategically balanced both sides of the Competition and Cooperation paradox we would be using the 3Cs model by Kenichi Ohmae (2005). According to Ohmae (2005) it is critical for organizations to focus on the customer, corporation and competitors in order to develop a sustainable competitive advantage. Any strategy planning needs to take into account these three factors. With respect to this case study, there is ample amount of evidence that the NCR Corporation itself had to cooperate and collaborate with other companies in the technology industry (most of them being its competitors) in order to reach an industry standard. This is also seen in the way proposals were discussed for the industry standard. Any opposition to a proposal at vote had to be

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accompanied with reasons explaining why and even then the entire Working Group worked as a collective to find ways to resolve the issue. Doing this would be beneficial to all parties involved. However, even within the cooperation there was competition (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p879). Fierce battles resulted from competing proposals. Three examples have been mentioned in the case, the first being a centralised architecture proposed by IBM while NCR along with Symbol Technologies and Xircom proposed a decentralised mechanism (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p887). NCR won this primarily due to the ad-hoc networking between terminals that was made possible through its proposal. The second example was when a decision had to be taken on Frequency Hopping and Direct Sequence. Since cooperation meant that a proposal needed 75% approval to be implemented, neither of these techniques were able to get this. Therefore, both were implemented into the standard (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p886-887) . The third example is when an alternate European standard was created for WLAN called HIPERLAN. Both versions of this eventually were not successful due to the IEEE 802.11 standard having a head start and the benefit of devices being mass-produced to this standard. Therefore, HIPERLAN could never catch up. However at the time it was proposed, competing views led to a large difference of opinion about it(DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p876,878). Ultimately NCR had to balance this competitive nature within the cooperation and create a product that was customer driven in order to introduce a new technology into the market that was both cost effective and easy to implement. Therefore, using Kenichi Ohmae 3Cs model of competition, corporation and customer we have explained the paradox of competition versus cooperation. Looking at the analysis I feel that NCR's management of this paradox is good as they have been successful.

5. Conclusion
Being an industry leader might sound very proactive, and even heroic, but it is potentially suicidal if the industry context defies being shaped. (DeWit & Meyer, 2010: p443). However there might be huge rewards and recognition if a firm can lead industry developments for example NCR which came up with a new technology which never existed (DeWit & Meyer,

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2010: p874). If we look at Industry leadership perspective it is adopted by the organisation when it takes the risk to innovate and lead. Initially when there was no WIFI technology many organisations looked at coming up with new developments, however it was NCR who could channelize and come up with a product with the resources available. Though Industrial leadership is evident and successful here, trying to break industrial rules may sometimes turn out to be immutable and can go bankruptcy if the product is a failure even after investing a large amount of money in developing it. The recommendation in this context would suggest a firm to escape the pitfall of organisational conformity which includes the adherence to the current industry rules with a need to understand the context in which they operate. Organisations should come up with structures, process and a culture in which the current industry recipe is constantly questioned, challenged and changed.

6. Reflection
This module helped me to understand the nature of the strategic issues and challenges facing organisations in the present and unfolding era of business management. It was a wonderful academic journey where I was introduced to a number of strategic issues from different perspectives. I have learnt how to apply concepts and techniques to analyse organisations and their environment in order to develop an integrated view of an organisation and its future perspectives. After looking at different perspectives I understood that there is no tailor made strategy for any organisation however the efficiency is achieved by selecting the right strategy appropriate to the organisations environment and the situation at hand. My personal reflection is further discussed using the SWAIN model of personal development:

Strengths: Now I have a clear understanding of a range of strategic issues from different perspectives. I am also confident that I have a good knowledge of concepts, tools and techniques to analyse an organisations resources and capabilities as well as their strategic decision making and implementation of that strategy.

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Weakness: At certain times I hurried my personal decisions and quickly arrived at conclusions before understanding the bigger picture represented through numerous paradoxes in the case studies that I read.

Aspiration: Though I have heard of the term 'strategy' I never had a chance to read strategy, so when I got an opportunity to learn from this module, I was expecting a single answer to the failure of my past organisation which was probably the result of a change in the management. But today I see many reasons for the failure as well as opportunities that existed for senior management to overcome it. My aspiration is to develop this skill and apply it to future organisations I work in and possibly my own family's business as well.

Interests: Though the entire module left me with great learning experience there are few things that interested me tremendously like the master class by professor Geoffrey Hodgson on Darwinian Conjecture was really interesting as for the first time I saw strategy relating to science, coming from a science background I could clearly relate to it. The master class by Angus Thirwell from Hotel Chocolat where he discussed about being responsible while maintaining profits. The leadership weekend where Ralph Stacey discussed about the leadership perspective which was once again observed in the case through NCR taking a leadership role in coming up with industry standards.

Needs: Coming from a technical background I felt the need for me to pursue this module was because of the necessity for me to gain managerial knowledge which could back me up with the practical knowledge i have gained over the years at work. This would be the next logical step in my career progression after the MBA.

I consider the entire module to be important to me as this learning would come in handy for the rest of my life. There are many things that I cannot explain in the report which I acquired as a part of my learning and all of it combined gave me the much needed confidence to work towards and achieve my goals.

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7. References
Astley, W.G., and van den Ven, A.H. (1983) 'Central Perspectives and Debates in Organization Theory', Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 28, No. 2, pp.245-273.

Bain, J. S. (1959) +Industrial Organizations. New York: Wiley

Betttis, R.A., and Donaldson, L. (1990) 'Market Discipline of Management', Academy of Management Review, Vol. 15, No. 3, July, pp.367-368

Business Model Foundry (2011) The Business Model Canvas [Online] Available at: http://www.businessmodelgeneration.com/canvas [Accessed on 7th June, 2011].

D`Aveni, R.A. (1994) Hypercompetition: Managing the Dynamics of Strategic Maneuvering, New York: Free Press.

DeWit, B. & Meyer, R. (2010) Strategy Process, Content, Context An International Perspective. 4th ed. Hampshire: Cengage Learning.

de Swaan Arons, H and Philip Waalewijn, P. (1999) A Knowledge Base Representing Porter's Five Forces Model. Erasmus University, Rotterdam

Hamel, G., and Prahalad, C.K. (1994) Competing for the Future, Boston: Harvard Business School Press.

Hamel. G. (1996) 'Strategy as Revolution', Harvard Business Review, Vol. 74, No. 4, JulyAugust, pp. 69-82

IFM (2011) Available at: http://www.ifm.eng.cam.ac.uk/dstools/paradigm/valuch.html [Accessed on 6th June,2011]

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Kim, W.C. and Mauborgne, R. (2004) 'Blue Ocean Strategy'. Harvard Business Review. October.

Mintzberg, H., Lampel, J., Quinn, J. & Ghoshal, S. (2003) The Strategy Process Concepts Contexts Cases. Global 4th ed. Essex: Pearson Education Limited.

NCR (2011) Available at: http://ncr.com/about_ncr/company_overview/history.jsp?lang=EN [Accessed 6th June, 2011]

NCR (2011) Available at: http://ncr.com/products_and_services/services/index.jsp [Accessed 8th June, 2011]

Ohmae, K. (2005). Next Global Stage: The: Challenges and Opportunities in Our Borderless World. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Wharton School Publishing.

Porter, M.E. (1980) Competitive Strategy: Techniques for Analyzing Industries and Competitors, New York: Free Press.

Porter, M.: Competitive Advantages: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance. The Free Press, New York 1985.

Quinn, James Brian., Mintzberg, Henry., Goshal, Sumanta., (1998), The Strategy Process, revised European edition. Prentice Hall Europe.

Segev, E., How to use environmental analysis in strategy making, Management Review, Vol. 66, 1977, pp. 4-13.

Vernon, R. (1966) International investment and international trade in the product cycle. Quarterly Journal of Economics 80, pp. 190-207

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