Managing Growth and Development

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Introduction of company

Amazon is an American international technology company which is based in Seattle, Washington, US and mainly deals in e-commerce, cloud computing, digital streaming and AI. Amazon is the world's largest online retailer which enables people to shop efficiently through the website or online app of Amazon. The company provides various services ranging from online shopping, AI assistant provider and cloud computing platform. It is the largest internet company in terms of revenue and is the second largest private employer in US. The company is among top big 4 technical companies which are Apple, Google and Facebook. Amazon.com is well known for its lightning speed of selling virtually anything online and is also known for its Kindle book store where book lovers can find a large number of online books. The company purchases all its inventory from various brands either directly or from traditional wholesalers and factories so that customers can be provided with branded products. The vision of the company is to become world's most customer-centric company and also offer them with a variety of thousands of products while increasing their convenience of online shopping (Liu, Kimree Technology Co Ltd, 2016).

Background information of company

The company was founded by Jeff Bezos in Bellevue, Washington in the year 1994 in the garage of their rented home. Bezos' parents invested $250,000 in the start-up. The company was established in Seattle as Microsoft was also located there which could help it in technical assistance. The company began its business by selling music and videos in 1998 and it also began operating at international level by acquisition of book sellers in UK and Germany. The company then began selling video games, consumer electronics, home renovating items, software games and toys etc. Amazon name was chosen as Amazon is the largest river in the world and Bezos planned on making Amazon the biggest book store in the world. When Amazon was founded first Jeff Bezos had called it his “regret minimization framework” as it was the effort which helped him in defending against his inability to participate earlier in internet business boom (Shahar, Satar and Bakar 2019).

Products and services of company

Amazon is the world's largest online retailer and a salient cloud service provider. The company is an American multinational technology company which mainly focus on various online services. The products and services of Amazon ranges from several media including videotapes, software, apparels which are suitable for people of different age and sex, baby products which are clinically proven, consumer electronic items, beauty products which are clinically tested against any side effects etc. The company also gives various internet services that cater to fulfil the requirements of different domains of which some most widely used domains are computing, storage, database, analytics, networking etc. Thus it can be seen that Amazon is a big company which offers a wide variety of products and services which are able to fulfil the requirements of customers as per their needs and wants while increasing their convenience of online shopping (Xu and et. al. , 2013).

Analysis of competitive environment of company

Porter's five forces is a model which help in determining the competition of business in market which will help in evaluating the overall attractiveness of industry. The model was first published in Michael E. Porter's book "Competitive Strategy: Techniques for Analyzing Industries and Competitors" in 1980. as per this model there are five forces which work on a company and helps it in analysing its competitiveness in the market. The model thus help in formulating corporate strategies so that the negative factors which affect the company can be eliminated strategically which will help it in maintaining its profits. Amazon competes against a variety of firms from the small and large online and offline retail stores which means that it has to continuously determine its competitiveness in market. Following are the five forces that can affect the business of Amazon in market:

• Rivalries: Amazon competes in a market where a large number of rivalries are present both in the e-retail sector and in the form of traditional retail stores. All its competitors are aggressive in their nature which are trying to capture the attention of customers by offering discounts and offers on all the products they offer (Schnoll, 2015). The switching cost of customers is also less which means that they can easily switch to other e-retailer for purchasing their products. The rivalries give tough competition to Amazon as they continuously change their strategies so that their sales can increase (Singh and Teng, 2016). There are many e-retail competitors of Amazon like e-bay, Alibaba, Flipkart and many others. Also many traditional stores have started selling online which adds to the competition of Amazon. Thus it can be seen that Amazon face strong competition from existing rivalries in market which can affect its sales. It is important that Amazon focus on strengthening its brand imager in the market which is the strongest among all its rivalries (RODZI 2014). Chain stores, new online book retailers, e-retailing etc. are other competitors of Amazon who can affect company by offering the same quality products to customers at competitive prices. Also Walmart's physical stores act as rivalry for Amazon's online retail service. Customers can easily switch to its customers thereby influencing its sales.
• Bargaining power of customers: Amazon's vision focuses on providing customer-centric products and services so that the needs and wants of customers can be significantly satisfied while enhancing their convenience of online shopping. Also as the brand image of Amazon is strong and it is believed on providing products which are of high quality the customers can be attracted towards company easily (Spraakman and et.al., 2015). However as there are many other e-retailers present in the market it makes it easier for customers to switch to them if they offer the same product at a lower cost than Amazon. Due to the presence of various alternatives in market it becomes easy for customers to switch to other retailers which affect company sales (Madon and Krishna, 2018). Thus it can be seen that the bargaining power of customers is high which makes customers strong in this industry. It becomes important for the company to improve its quality of service so that the customers can continue shopping from it and do not easily switch to other company (Hasanagas 2016). This can be done by facilitating easy return service, fast shipment and delivery of items, providing products to customers which are high on quality, different modes of payment must be made available etc. For example customers can easily switch to other retailers like Walmart stores as they offer products to customers at reasonable prices.
• Bargaining power of suppliers: Suppliers control the availability of supplies or materials in the market which can be bought by Amazon to further supply them to customers. The bargaining power of suppliers in the online retail industry is moderate. There are a large number of suppliers present in market from where Amazon can purchase its products (Senft, Gallegos and Davis, 2016). It is important that the suppliers of company follow a set of rules and regulations that are laid down by Amazon. It is also important that the suppliers follow ethical working principles so that they offer ethical and legal products and services to its customers (Blassin and et.al., 2019). The suppliers cannot integrate with each other to increase the product costs which means that they offer as Amazon has a large number of suppliers. Also the switching cost of suppliers is low as Amazon is a large purchaser and no supplier would want to loose Amazon as their main customer which purchase their products in bulk. Thus it can be seen that suppliers do not possess a threat for Amazon in the e-retailing industry (Tsohou and et. al., 2015).
• Threat of substitute: Amazon has a large number of substitutes in the market who possess a threat to company as they divert the customer traffic of customers leading to loss of Amazon's customer base. As there are a large number of substitutes present in the market customers can easily switch to others thus decreasing the company sales (Daly and Nataraajan, 2015). The company performance is also affected by the presence of large number of substitutes which means that customers can easily switch to other brand products. It is important that Amazon closely monitors the activity of number of substitutes so that their prices can be tracked and competitive prices can be maintained (Han, 2015). The strategies of company must be thus designed in such a manner that the competitiveness of company can be maintained which can help it in enhancing its brand image and also its profits. The company can make its services more efficient by increasing the usability of its website to optimize their experience and also increase their convenience of shopping online (Tang and Zimmerman 2013). Flipkart, E-Bay etc. possess threat to Amazon and the company needs to trace the prices at which these sites sell their products to customers. This will help Amazon in offering prices at competitive prices which will help in increasing company sales.
• Threat of new entrant: The entry of new players in market can affect Amazon's market share in online retailing. The threat of new entrant for Amazon is low as it has a strong brand image in the world which cannot be matched by any budding e-retailer (Pandey, Seth and Varshney, 2019). In order to match the level of Amazon a huge amount of investment, time, efforts, marketing, logistics, distribution etc. will be required. Also as many retail brands have started their online shopping apps so that customer can directly purchase branded products from their websites it has become more difficult for online apps to be able to compete strongly in the market. Thus the threat of new entrants for Amazon is low (Lee Lanting and Rojdamrongratana 2017).

From the above graph it can be interpreted that even when there are many threats present in the market like rising competition from rivalries, threat from substitutes etc., Amazon continues to increase its sales with an efficient use of IT in company. Also the company is able to provide its customers value for money which help in increasing company's loyal customer base and increase its sales over the years. Order assignment help from our experts!

Inbound and outbound logistics and operations

Logistics are all the processes which help a business in coordinating its supply chain operations so that the monitoring of how raw materials or inputs are acquired and transported to business, their storage and further transportation within business and beyond can be well managed. Inbound logistics refers to sourcing and storage coming into a business whereas outbound logistics is the warehousing, packaging and transportation of goods going out of the business. It is important that the management of company manages efficiently the inbound and outbound logistics so that efficiency of distribution networks can be maximized. It also help in minimizing the transport and storage costs of the goods that are ordered by company. Amazon has a very efficient supply chain management which helps it in managing its inbound and outbound logistics so that customers can be provided with their orders on time. Managing of the company logistics is important so that strong brand image of company can be built by acquiring qualitative products so that high quality of goods can be made available to its customers on time.

In Amazon both the inbound and outbound logistics are carefully managed so that high quality and speed can be maintained which help it in acquiring the ordered products in its warehouses on time which it thereafter transport to customers(Rauscher 2017).

Analysis of support activities in Porter's value chain

There are various activities that are carried out in an organisation so that functions like designing, production, marketing, delivery etc. can be efficiently done. Value chain analysis help businesses in examining activities so that competitive opportunities can be gained in the market by focusing on these activities. According to this model there are two kind of activities which are primary activities : inbound logistics, operations, outbound logistics, marketing and sales and service; support activities : which help in running the business smoothly but are not actually related with company products. Following are the support activities of Amazon which help the company in running its business smoothly:

• Firm infrastructure: Amazon is one of the largest e-retailer in the world with about 43% share of online retail market. The company sell different kinds of products to a range of customers which help it in increasing its sales and also the customer base is increased. Amazon operates in 16 countries in the world and provide its services to customers, sellers and developers through its retail website. The company is able to increase its revenue over $23,288.7 crore by offering a large variety of services to its customers which helped in building its strong brand image in the market (Shetty and Naik, 2016). The company's infrastructure makes it easy for customers to place their orders which help them in gaining high quality products from the website and at a high speed (Marbury 2014).
• Human resource management: The company has over 798,000 full time and part time employees who work in the company and helps Amazon in becoming leading online retail brand in market. The HRM of company helps in managing the employees of company in such a manner that their potential, skills and talents can be efficiently used which help the company in improving customer satisfaction (Iqbal and et.al., 2019). Also the managerial policies adopted by the company helps in smooth and effective working of employees of company which help in their new and innovative thinking which is important to bring continuous innovation in its services. The HRM activities and functions of company help in integrating and coordinating their work so that effective results can be drawn. These HRM practices help in boosting the confidence of workers so that strong brand image of company can be developed and company services can be improved (Karthikayini and Srinath, 2017).

Identification of key value adding activities

Value adding activities are those which help in improving the customer satisfaction and enhancing their experience so that strong brand image of company can be developed. With these activities the raw materials are converted into final products with which the customer needs and wants can be satisfied and also value can be added to them. High quality of services provided by Amazon help in adding great value to its customers and increasing their satisfaction. Operational efficiency help it in gaining a competitive benefit in the market and also in improving its performance (Thamhain 2013).

How IT and innovative ideas help to improve business processes

IT plays an important role in businesses in improving its processes through automation which improves the accuracy and efficiency with which company related data and information is stored and processed. IT also help in making the process speedy and help in reducing the cost of errors for business which is important so as to achieve a competitive advantage in the market. It is important to integrate IT in business operations and functions so that work can be done in real time and with accuracy which help in circulating correct information in business so that all the departments can work closely and efficiently. With the use of IT innovations in business also increase as IT can be integrated with human knowledge to develop innovative ideas which can be converted into products and services which can fulfil customer demands. Thus IT help in achieving higher customer satisfaction by creating more value for them (Cuganesan Hart and Steele 2017).

IT has also helped businesses to expand and grow in the market through the use of online applications which helps customers to purchase company's products and services as per their convenience irrespective of their global presence. Businesses can achieve a competitive edge in the market by using IT and gaining better information about the market and customer needs and wants so that they can be provided with such products that can help in increasing their satisfaction. Amazon has increasingly used IT in improving its brand image and gaining the highest customer base in online retail market. With the use of IT Amazon is able to handle a large database of customers belonging to different nations, cultures, religion etc. so that their likes and dislikes can be traced which help in positioning company's products. Thus IT is an essential tool which is increasingly used by businesses so that the technological advancements can be used to their full potential which can help business in growing and expanding in market (Kim 2018). Get Dissertation help london from our qualified experts!

CONCLUSION

From the above report it can be concluded that IT play an important role in growth and development of business in the competitive market. Companies can simplify their processes and use the information in an efficient manner so that such products and services can be developed which help in satisfying customers. Logistics of company can also be efficiently managed which help in improving the supply chain of company so that the procurement and delivery of items can be done on time. IT thus needs to be integrated in contemporary businesses so that a competitive advantage can be gained which can also help in building strong brand image and thereby increasing company profits.

Read more - Managing Information and Technology

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