Situation

• Leading electronics and consumer electronics company with over US$50 billion in annual revenues.
• Over the past 30 years, market leadership in consumer electronics has shifted from Europe/US, first to Japan, and then to Korea/Taiwan.
• Chinese companies with a strong position in the domestic market are starting to emerge as competitors on the global stage.
• The client wanted to assess the risk of leading Chinese companies forcing the client out of global competitiveness in key product categories.

Approach

• Worked closely with client’s strategy team to develop approach and methodology.
• Identified main competitors with the strongest capabilities for global expansion.
• Mapped capabilities, strategies and objectives of leading Chinese competitors in key product categories.
• Assessed the likelihood of competitors reaching targets within specified time periods.
• Developed regional and global market share scenarios for specified periods.
• Approach relied on extensive industry interviews.
• Primary research conclusions fed into quantitative scenario-based model forecasting market shares.

Result

• The project deliverables gave the client a clear picture of the competitive strategies of each of its key competitors, including their future product category and geographical focus; this was in itself an important deliverable given the previous lack of reliable information about Chinese competitors.
• Our scenarios identified, for each of our client’s product categories, which regions and countries were most at risk.
• The client is currently developing response strategies for the threats identified by our team.
• The client is also looking at how it can build some of the strengths that the Chinese competitors have developed in the local Chinese market.