solved Wall Street Journal: “Amazon to Launch Its Own TVs in

Wall Street Journal: “Amazon to Launch Its Own TVs in Push to Cement Itself in Living Rooms,” Link: https://www.wsj.com/articles/amazon-to-launch-television-lineup-in-push-to-cement-itself-in-living-rooms-11631192401?mod=djemCMOToday (Links to an external site.)
Please review the assigned materials for answering the questions below.
Questions ————————————————————————————-

How will launching Fire TV sets likely influence the organizational purchasing and supply management (P/SM) organization for Amazon (See Exhibit 5.2)?
Describe how Porter’s Five Forces (Exhibit 6.10) can be used to create a Strategy Portfolio Matrix for Category Management (Exhibit 6.12) that Amazon can use to create a competitive advantage in the market for television sets.
Discuss how Amazon can manage “Supply Chain Transformation” (page 237) utilizing the stages of supply management strategy evolution (Exhibit 6.13).
Please provide an insightful question about category strategy development.

The first discussion:
1. How will launching Fire TV sets likely influence the organizational purchasing and supply management (P/SM) organization for Amazon (See Exhibit 5.2)?
I believe that the launch of the new Amazon Fire TVs will cause Amazon to consider organizing in a centralized way. I say this because Amazon will be looking at having a competitive advantage (Monczka et al., 2020, para. 165) with the cost-friendly TV’s as well as having their own shipping service with Amazon Prime membership, this will allow consumers to receive the TV’s without having to leave their house, and in most cases allow them to receive the TV’s the next day which will make Amazon more efficient than their competitors. Amazon will also want to use a centralized structure because with multiple facilities throughout the world Amazon will want a standardized buying process at all of these locations which is a trait of the centralized process (Monczka et al., 2020, para. 165). However, Amazon will have to take into consideration current trends in the Smart TV industry and see which trends mesh with their business strategies, their management philosophies and what the interest is from customers with this technology (Monczka et al., 2020, p. 162). When it comes to their Strategies and objectives the purchasing manager at Amazon will most likely want to have hands on with their suppliers to make sure they can keep up with the expected demand of the TVs as well as having oversight on the cost of the units as Amazon is expected to sell these TVs as a lower price than a majority of their competitors. Amazon will also want to manage their global supply base with a centralized approach, especially with the number of facilities that they have worldwide. An organizational enabler that Amazon will likely want to use would be that of regional buying groups. With this they can ensure that all of their regional facilities have a stock of the TVs and reduce the risk of a stock out. With some of these tools being used by Amazon in a centralized structure it would help ensure that Amazon has a smooth transition into the television market.
2. Describe how Porter’s Five Forces (Exhibit 6.10) can be used to create a Strategy Portfolio Matrix for Category Management (Exhibit 6.12) that Amazon can use to create a competitive advantage in the market for television sets.
Porter’s Five Forces can be used to create a Portfolio Matrix for Category Management in order to gain a competitive advantage in the television market by researching their competitors and all of the five forces which are threat of new entrants, buyer bargaining power, pressure from substitutes, supplier bargaining power, and Market Internal Competition (Monczka et al., 2020, p. 222). By seeing what the competition is doing with Porter’s Five Forces, Amazon can use that information to develop the Portfolio Matrix and gain the upper hand on their competitors. By identifying the critical, bottleneck, routine and leverage categories on the Strategy Portfolio Matrix they can optimize items like who their strategic suppliers (critical), preferred suppliers are(leveraged), and bottleneck category (transactional supplier) (Monczka et al., 2020, pp. 223–225). By Identifying who/what lands in these categories, using Porter’s Five Forces to see what the competition in the market is, it will allow Amazon to spend less time in the routine category and more time in the higher risk and higher value potential categories, which will allow Amazon to gain an advantage remaining efficient and ahead of their competition when it comes to their suppliers in the short term and the long term.
3. Discuss how Amazon can manage “Supply Chain Transformation” (page 237) utilizing the stages of supply management strategy evolution (Exhibit 6.14).
Amazon can manage the supply chain transformation by recognizing milestones early in the processes in the strategy of supply chain evolution. Doing so will allow Amazon to recognize where they currently are in the stages of evolution and how they can advance to the next stage and operate at a higher level. Using the stages supplemental management strategy evolution will help better prepare Amazon to make the jump from Basic Beginnings all the way to Fully Integrated Supply Chains at a pace that will allow Amazon to operate at a high level within their current phase and take the next step to eventually reach the fully integrated supply chain step while also maintaining the reputation as an industry standard.
4. Please provide an insightful question about category strategy development.
For brand new that may be difficult to gauge requirements and research for to evaluate demand and markets for this product (i.e., smartphones at their conception), do you develop strategies that are more cautious than strategies that are more optimistic when it comes to demand and capabilities of the supply chain/suppliers?
The second one:

How will launching Fire TV sets likely influence the organizational purchasing and supply management (P/SM) organization for Amazon (See Exhibit 5.2)?

Launching the fire TV sets in the marketplace will increase customer demand. Innovation is the new way to succeed in the market and if Amazon launches their new TV set, consumers will want to try it out and it will have a huge impact on their sales. The organization’s purchasing will increase if customers are really interested in the product and are eager to buy it. The sales volume will increase at a high rate and company profitability too. This will increase workload for Amazon’s P/SM, they will need to achieve sales target by delivering the new TVs on time, their supply chain operations will increase.

Describe how Porter’s Five Forces (Exhibit 6.10) can be used to create a Strategy Portfolio Matrix for Category Management (Exhibit 6.12) that Amazon can use to create a competitive advantage in the market for television sets.

Amazon can have a competitive advantage by:

Influencing the buying power of suppliers – the company can offer the Television set at a lower cost as compared to others in the market, by influencing the supply chain in the source end.
With strong branding and competitive advantage, amazon can prevent new companies from entering the market by providing cost and price advantage to the customers can prevent the entry of new companies into the market.
Amazon can further increase its sales by matching the price with the price expectation of the buyers.
Amazon can have stock of different kinds and a variety of Television sets, in case of the consumer trying to move from LED to LCD tv, both the options are available with Amazon only. In this way, Amazon can have the category portfolio ready to meet all kinds of demand and customer requirements.

Discuss how Amazon can manage “Supply Chain Transformation” (page 237) utilizing the stages of supply management strategy evolution (Exhibit 6.14).

The process of supply chain transformation mainly involves aligning the supply chain to optimum efficiency with your overall company objectives. There are fewer material flows than changes in organizational responsibility, and as strategic strategy is needed step-by-step.
In the beginning stage, Amazon should focus on Total quality management of the TV set, they should make sure its up to par so competitors cannot have an advantage, 2nd stage for Amazon will be finding the right sourcing where they can sell volumes and a discounted rate. In the limited integration phase, Amazon can involve their suppliers and supplier can assist in the TQM process also. Lastly, fully integrated supply chain, this phase is a difficult one for most organizations, so Amazon has to be very strategic when implementing this phase. Amazon is a widely known company so it will make sense for them to develop their global supplier capabilities to insource core activities which will be beneficial.
4. How can the challenges of the poorly applied supply chain management strategy be solved especially in times where companies are frantically trying to have a competitive advantage in their sector?