Please read this article before reading my comments
http://money.cnn.com/2007/04/25/news/companies/pluggedin_taylor_deadbrands.fortune/index.htm?postversion=2007042613
This article is suggesting that GM has to shutdown brands - Buick, Pontiac, Hummer, GMC and SAAB. Any joker can say that. What should GM do to move the buyers of these "shutdown recommended" brands over to the remaining brands? That is the real question any productive article needs to answer if they are truly interested in the wellness of American manufacturing or know anything about running a profitable enterprise. These types of nonsensical, fill-the-page articles that do not give any insight into really anything bothers me. Especially coming from a senior writer in a magazine ironically called Fortune is very unfortunate.
Here are the 2006 US sales numbers for the brands that the article suggests that GM discontinue
Buick Sales Volume - 240,657
Pontic Sales Volume - 410,229
Hummer Sales Volume - 71,524
GMC Sales Volume - 481,222
Saab Sales Volume - 36,349
Let's see. Adding Buick, Pontiac, Hummer and GMC we are talking about 1,203,632 vehicles. Let's say we shut this down, how many jobs are affected? How much does the overall American economy lose? How much does the GM shareholders lose? What the author is suggesting is that GM reduce its total American sales by over 29% (total GM sales is 4,124,645).
I have just two questions to you Alex Taylor III - Are you STUPID? Who made you a senior writer at Fortune?
If the buying public did not like the choices offered by GMC, Pontiac, Buick they would not be buying 1.2 Million of them. What GM needs to do is not shutdown brands, but have lesser number of dedicated production bases for a particular model. What they need is more flexible manufacturing bases (where by more than one brand and type of vehicle can be manufactured in the same assembly line based on market needs so that idling and related costs are reduced). Then of course what they need - and are lately improving quite a bit - is better visual design and more importantly better execution (quality of materials, panel gaps, fit and finish, things that you do not see but feel like the thud that the door makes, the feel and sound of the indicator stalks etc.). They also need to better differentiate between their brands - end-to-end. They are doing this in pockets, but not end-to-end. An example would be - You cannot have showrooms selling GMC Acadia (btw, who the hell came up with that name?) and Buick Enclave being sold next to each other and serviced by the same dealership.
SAAB is a different story altogether. It is easy to misunderstand SAAB, especially by an American journalist who does not even understand American Brands or the people - 1.2M of them that buy them. SAAB is s a quirky Swedish brand that was sterilized by GM. There is a template for how to make SAAB successful and that was written by a company called Volvo. Just let SAAB be SAAB and it will grow. It needs money, just like how Ford pumped money into Volvo before it became what it is today. SAAB does not need a re-badged Chevy SUV - no matter what the interior, where the ignition key goes and grille looks like. I'm sure Lutz has learned his lesson. He is smart and I'm sure would not make that mistake again. If anyone wants to know how to do Badge engineering they need not look further than Ford. They have made their share of mistakes, but how many can say that Mazda 3, Volvo S40, Ford focus share the same platform. There may be other cars that share it too, but, that is the whole point, you just do not know.
So please stop writing such idiotic stories just to fill pages. Fortune - you too Brutus?
Thursday, April 26, 2007
Monday, April 2, 2007
Linux is not an Operating System
Linux is the new UNIX and the new VHS. Let me explain.
How did UNIX become the "cool" and enterprise standard operating system?. It was free and had, for lack of a better term, geeky credentials (Berkeley, Bell Labs etc.). When the university and the technical literati trickled down to enterprises, their operating system of choice - UNIX - spead its wings and became the standard for running business critical applications.
A similar, but a slightly different adoption behavior dictated the standard for recorded multimedia, i.e. Betamax vs. VHS. VHS became popular because of two reasons - its longer recording time and simpler mechanism (rewind/fast forward mechanisms) leading to wider adoption by the adult entertainment and home recording. This adoption was inspite of what is generally regarded as betamax's better quality and hence its reversal of roles in the professional industry where Betacam is a clear winner against competing VHS formats.
The above two examples from history tell us that two things are important for a product to be successful. Adoption cycle origination points, and how well the product resolves the issue/problem it addresses.
UNIX was always free. One can download a version from many university sources making it an open source operating system. It is still one of the most fully developed and mature operating systems. It is so good that most large enterprises of the world use it to run important applications. It is so good that many computer companies - SUN Microsystems, Hewlett Packard, IBM and a few other second tier players started to make their own versions of it and make money from it. And that is the problem with it.
Linux is free. Fairly easy to use for those that would attempt to use something like an Operating System. Has enough geeky credentials. So why is it the new UNIX?
Humanity, at least a section of it, many times for very valid reasons I must add, has problems with people or organizations profiting using their hardships. There are ample examples - Microsoft (at least until Bill started to spread his wealth), Rockefeller, the Colonial British etc. Here we have large companies making hordes of money using a free operating system called UNIX. This has to be put in check and here comes Linux.
With exactly the same adoption cycle originations as UNIX, i.e. enough geeky credentials, universities, free and making the usability a bit easier (than unix), Linux is a movement and not a workload or operating system to make money for large corporations. So please do not address it such. You merely join this movement with the right intentions. If not, it is only a matter of time before we have another operating system. So, like VHS, Linux solves the problem - large companies making money out of public property is not good - it is trying to address quite well. UNIX like Betacam will continue to serve the professional i.e. Enterprise application markets quite well.... Until of course DNIX (ala DVD) appears.
How did UNIX become the "cool" and enterprise standard operating system?. It was free and had, for lack of a better term, geeky credentials (Berkeley, Bell Labs etc.). When the university and the technical literati trickled down to enterprises, their operating system of choice - UNIX - spead its wings and became the standard for running business critical applications.
A similar, but a slightly different adoption behavior dictated the standard for recorded multimedia, i.e. Betamax vs. VHS. VHS became popular because of two reasons - its longer recording time and simpler mechanism (rewind/fast forward mechanisms) leading to wider adoption by the adult entertainment and home recording. This adoption was inspite of what is generally regarded as betamax's better quality and hence its reversal of roles in the professional industry where Betacam is a clear winner against competing VHS formats.
The above two examples from history tell us that two things are important for a product to be successful. Adoption cycle origination points, and how well the product resolves the issue/problem it addresses.
UNIX was always free. One can download a version from many university sources making it an open source operating system. It is still one of the most fully developed and mature operating systems. It is so good that most large enterprises of the world use it to run important applications. It is so good that many computer companies - SUN Microsystems, Hewlett Packard, IBM and a few other second tier players started to make their own versions of it and make money from it. And that is the problem with it.
Linux is free. Fairly easy to use for those that would attempt to use something like an Operating System. Has enough geeky credentials. So why is it the new UNIX?
Humanity, at least a section of it, many times for very valid reasons I must add, has problems with people or organizations profiting using their hardships. There are ample examples - Microsoft (at least until Bill started to spread his wealth), Rockefeller, the Colonial British etc. Here we have large companies making hordes of money using a free operating system called UNIX. This has to be put in check and here comes Linux.
With exactly the same adoption cycle originations as UNIX, i.e. enough geeky credentials, universities, free and making the usability a bit easier (than unix), Linux is a movement and not a workload or operating system to make money for large corporations. So please do not address it such. You merely join this movement with the right intentions. If not, it is only a matter of time before we have another operating system. So, like VHS, Linux solves the problem - large companies making money out of public property is not good - it is trying to address quite well. UNIX like Betacam will continue to serve the professional i.e. Enterprise application markets quite well.... Until of course DNIX (ala DVD) appears.
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