Business Model

Business Model:

External Agents Economy                      Media                    Government                     Environment
Strategic Partners Doctor TJ
Resources and Suppliers ·         Suppliers: Sharp Samsung Sony ·         Shippers ·         Employees ·         Shareholders			Internal Processes							Markets, Customers, and Products ·         TV’s, cell phones, sound equipment ·         Home entertainment, Small businesses, Hope offices, Electronics users, Small retailers
				Strategic Management Consumer retailer and wholesaler (“trans-shipper”)
				Primary Processes Large scale advertising and discount policy
				Resources & Processes Accounting management Investor acquisition
Competitors Wal-mart                      Best Buy                 Circuit City

Business Model: Discussion

External Agents

There are several external agents that could have an impact of SDE Inc.  One agent is the economy.  Since the downturn of the economy, there has been a decrease in consumer spending.  This impacts the sales of SDE Inc., especially if consumers view their products as luxury items as opposed to everyday necessities.  Another external agent that has potential impacts on SDE Inc. is the media.  SDE Inc. uses a wide spanning media campaign advertising its low prices.  If media outlets and news outlets uncover controversial business practices two things could happen.  The first thing is that these practices will be publicized causing damage to SDE Inc.’s image.  The second thing that could happen is media outlets may refuse to continue business with SDE Inc., thus resulting in the loss of its major advertising method.  Also, the government acts as an internal agent through its regulation of the company in several ways (e.g. labor regulation).  Finally, the environment acts as an external agent.  Consumers would rather see a company that is environmentally conscious as opposed to not.

Strategic Partners

A strategic partner that SDE Inc. has formed a relationship with is radio personality Doctor TJ.  They work together in order to advance joint objectives.  SDE Inc. gains more publicity and Doctor TJ gets further funding for his show.

Resources and Suppliers

Serving as both a retailer and wholesaler, SDE Inc. depends on several suppliers as well as employees with different skill sets, technology, shippers, and shareholders.  Potential suppliers of SDE Inc. are technology producers who generate products SDE Inc. sells.  These can include but are not limited to TV manufactures such as Sony, Toshiba, Samsung, and Sharp.  They include cell phone providers such as Sprint, Samsung, and Motorola.  They rely on shipping companies to ship orders from to them from suppliers and from them to smaller retailers.  They rely on employees to understand their different product lines and make sales.  Finally, they rely on shareholders for capital.

Internal Processes

Strategic Management: one key strategic management approach the SDE Inc. has adopted is its operation as both a individual consumer retailer as well as a wholesaler to smaller retail outlets.  SDE Inc. has therefore also taken on the role of trans-shipper.

Primary Processes:  Primary processes are the activities that help create customer value, such as marketing and customer service.  One main activity that SDE Inc. has adopted is its barrage of media advertisements that encompass its main region (California).  Also, SDE Inc.’s marketing strategy of announcing their low prices and discount policy help create customers.

Support processes: Support processes are the activities that are not directly related to operations but help in the success of the company.  The main support processes that we were able to identify for SDE Inc. were its accounting management, in terms of bookkeeping and its investor acquisition, in terms of continued acquisition of stockholders.

Markets, Customers, and Products

SDE Inc. is an electronics retailer that caters to the everyday electronics needs of consumers.  It does not provide large systems for big offices or companies.  Its main product lines are televisions, cell phones, and sound equipment.  Its market focus is on home entertainment, small businesses, home offices, and the individual electronics users.  Their customer target base would be home shoppers, small business owners and middle class consumers, usually a somewhat tech savvy individuals.  However, since SDE Inc. has expanded into somewhat of a wholesaler itself, it has added small retailers to its customer base as well.

Competitors

The competition in the consumer electronics industry tends to be very strong.  Not only does the US consumer electronics industry include 27,000 stores, but it is highly concentrated as well in terms of the 50 largest retailers accounting for 80% of sales. (Hoovers)  When we look at competition for SDE Inc, we must specifically look for companies with similar target markets and customers as well as similar product lines. (Knechel)  Since SDE Inc biggest product lines involve home electronics their biggest competitors include Best Buy, Wal-Mart, and Circuit City.