Apple Business Marketing Strategy

Apple Business Marketing Strategy |1 1 Introduction Apple is one of the leading companies in IT industry and during the last decade it has created a high level successful brand image and blazed the trail for the personal computer industry with its innovative products and strong marketing strategies.Apple Inc. has incorporated numerous features that are unique and well known in the market today. We consider that there are several Apple products with several appealing features such as: iMac, iPod, iPhone and iPad. These products represent a revolutionary era for the development of Apple. By placing such products in the market, Apple Inc. has attracted a lot of customers in one way or another. Highly advanced technology, simplicity and design, and the sense of luxury are the main features integrated in these products. Moreover the comfort and convenience that these products provide are very crucial.This market plan aims to analyse the marketing strategies that have been used by Apple In c. in order to develop its worldwide domination in all aspects of the computers (PC, Laptops and Tablets), digital music players, mobile phones, and multimedia and telecommunication industries. Furthermore, the core competence and company mission will be analysed in order to determine which focus points Apple should try to enhance in the future. 1. 1 Company Background Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne established Apple on April 1, 1976 in order to sell the Apple 1 computer kit that was hand built by Steve Wozniak.Demand convinced Jobs that there was a distinct market for small computers and with a clear vision and consumer friendly product, Apple went public in 1980 and became the most successful initial public offering since Ford Motor Company in 1956. Meanwhile, Steve Jobs left the company and stiff external competition with other companies such as IBM and Microsoft throughout the 1980s nearly forced apple into bankruptcy by the mid-1990s. However, to stay afloat, Apple started to innovate their PC products lines and expand into the digital music players industry. Apple was a company that was based on innovation and when I left Apple we were ten years ahead of anybody else. It took Microsoft ten years to copy Windows† said Steve Jobs. In 2001, apple introduced its new innovated iPod portable digital audio player. The product was phenomenally successful at the time (over 100 million units were sold within six years). In the last decade, Apple has achieved unparalleled success in different markets and now designs, manufactures and markets PCs, Mobile Phones and Music player with its unique applications and iTune software.However, Apple’s revolutionary CEO, Steve Jobs, passed away in 2011, and today Apple continues to lead in industry in innovation with its award-wining computers, OS X operating system and iLife professional applications. Apple Business Marketing Strategy |2 2 Situational Analysis Apple makes enormous efforts to different iate its products from its competitors by developing products that have already been out in the market, making them exclusive and giving them new features. In most of the scenarios Apple has not been the first to the market and as a result, the risk of being first to the market is lower.Moreover, Apple always focuses on one rather than many. Compare to their closest competitor, Samsung, Apple make people and customers excited and wait for their new technology and product. For instance, by introducing Siri technology (which had already been existed before Apple iPhone 4s) Apple could make the iPhone 4s special from other smartphones at the time which the leads Apple commands a one third share of the smartphone market. However, the iPhone and iPad have combined to help iOS dominate competing mobile operating systems with a two-thirds share of the market.The graph below indicates that after Apple introduced the iPhone 4s, the iOS market share has reached to the peak of 61% among all th e smartphones. Figure 1: Smartphones Market share *Retrieved from http://seekingalpha. com/article/839661-the-iphone-s-growth-rate-has-peaked on 24/11/2012 2. 1 Market Growth Apple Inc. ’s Market started growing in 1997 then decreased slightly, until 2000. From then on it is steeply growing. Starting in the U. S. , after the comeback of Steve Jobs, Apple started selling overseas as well.Since many of Apple’s parts and products are produced outside the U. S. (Europe and Asia), not only are the production costs lower, but Apple also got to have better insights in those markets According to the latest Apple annual report announcement, Apple Inc. has made the total net sales of 156,508 million dollar in 2012 which as compare with 2010 it is considerably increased by 240%. The financial history of Apple over the past three years is shown by the table below which illustrates a very successful growth. Apple Business Marketing Strategy 3 Figure2: Apple annual financial report *Retrieved from http://investor. apple. com/financials. cfm on 24/11/12 However, the largest income of the Apple has come from the iPhone product which approximately consists of 58% the entire products have been sold by them. Furthermore, the enormous increase of Apple income is done by introducing iPad mini as their one of recent product. According to the Apple announcement in November 2012, they have sold three million iPads in just three days which is their biggest achievement in the last decade. . 2 Porter Five Forces Analysis Porter five forces analysis will be used to determine the attractiveness of the market and to analyse the needs and trends in the macro-environment. It is also used to identify the situation of iPhone, iPod, iPad and iMac among its competitors and customers, and clarify what the general environment for their operations is. 2. 2. 1 The Bargaining Power of Buyers Generally, Apple buyers have not many options for a specific product and one of the biggest issu e for the customers is the high price.In this market segmentation, the buyer concentration is medium, since a lot of young people are using iPod or Mac from apple, so they think iPhone will be a revolution mobile phone that contains a lot of especially features. Apple intends to introduce one model per year whereas Samsung gives variety of options with lower prices. As it is mentioned earlier, Apple focuses on â€Å"One† rather than â€Å"Many† which it makes customers think this is something special from the others. 2. 2. 2 The bargaining power of suppliersAlmost 90% of the Apple products are procured and manufactured by other suppliers which are mainly the chipmakers and touch-sensitive display producer (for touch screen products). Apple Inc. has been cooperated with many chipset produce manufactories for long time, including Intel Apple Business Marketing Strategy |4 (Provided CPU), Micron Technology (Provided digital camera CMOS) and Samsung (Flash memory chip). A lot of chipset producers have a good long term relationship with Apple Inc. Therefore, the bargaining power of supplier is low. 2. 2. The threat of new entrants Since there are considerable investments to be made for setting up PC industry, new entrants would be reluctant. Though there is scope for white-box PC’s having a share of 35% world-wide in 2006, but since the existing companies have created strong branding awareness, this threat would be low. 2. 2. 4 The threat of substitute products The more differentiation of product the less likely the switch to a substitute will occur. Of prices are higher then, the company with the higher price has to provide justification for the increase.But what makes Apple the winning company among the very competition intense sector in several industries that they work in, is their unique brand image and customer loyalty. However, with technology undergoing paradigm shifts, coping with these changes can make life difficult for the players i n the sector. 2. 2. 5 The intensity of competitive rivalry Apple faces stiff competition from Dell, HP, IBM and Microsoft in the computer industry and Samsung and HTC in the mobile and tablet industry. However, in the Digital Music industry apple dominate among all its competitors.Moreover, there is one important factor which makes industries less competitive including the brand equity and expensive switching costs. Overall, the intensity of competitive rivalry is medium high in most of the markets that apple is involved in. 2. 3 SWOT Analysis 2. 3. 1 Strengths Apple’s current strengths are the huge market share they possess when it comes to music players, iTunes as well as mobile phones (iPhone), tablets (iPad), and personal computers (MacBook and iMac). 2. 3. 2 Weaknesses A weakness that recently occurred is that one of Apples founders passed away.Steve Jobs, one of the big inventors and main persons in Apple died earlier this year after a long time struggle against his can cer. Timothy D. Cook was announced as the new CEO, after being chief executive officer. Critics have claimed Timothy does not have the same charisma and visions like Steve Jobs had, and it is just a matter of time before Apple will lose its edge to their competitors. Apple has also been criticized for its latest product, the launch of Apple iPhone 5. 2. 3. 3 OpportunitiesTo reverse this downward trend of negative critics, Apple has to continue developing its product and be extra cautious about what the market and consumers want. They have to be more creative in design and invent new and improved products to meet the expectations from the market. They do not have to necessarily invent the iPhone or iPad again. But to meet the threats they would have to improve their products and create an urge for their new products so they can conserve their market shares and sell more products and eventually capture bigger market shares. Apple Business Marketing Strategy 5 2. 3. 4 Threats As it is mentioned earlier, Samsung lead position in the mobile phone market after they released their new mobile phone Galaxy S3. Their products are based on the Android operative system, while Apple’s system is based on their OS X system. Sony and Nokia (Windows mobile phone) have also recently managed to capture huge market shares from Apple and Samsung and in the future they might overtake them. 3 Marketing Strategies 3. 1 Products Apple has a solid track record of innovation in different markets, often changing the way we view those markets entirely.Apple in most of the time has not been First to the Market and according to the â€Å"five secrets of the world’s best marketing machine† by Steve M. Chazin the former Apple Marketing executive, Apple tries to make something good greater. A clear example for this could be the iMac. At the time iMac was introduced by Apple there were Windows All-in-one computers competing with Apple but what actually made iMac so special was its unique design, free of noise and being fast CPUs inside a thin monitor.Steve Chazin believes that The Mac, iPad, iPod, iTunes and iPhone are all successful because they were late to market and improved on existing designs and functionality. Apple does one thing very well and that is, making complex things easy and elegant, It is no coincidence that Apple users compliment about the exceptional user interface of their iPads, iPods or iPhones. In addition, Apple tries to exert control over the users’ experience with its products. So, apart from the hardware, the company also develops the software so that the user has the best possible experience. . 2 Pricing Strategy Apple is usually referred to as the technology industry’s â€Å"high-price† leader. However, of late, the company has been offering its products at lower price points in a clear effort to expand its market. Even so, Apple, at the launch of its products, targets early adopters with higher-than-c ompetition prices. It initially adopts skimming strategy and later launches lower-price versions with fewer features or launches a newer version while continuing to sell older versions at lower price. 3. 3 Promotion StrategyApple’s promotion strategy is centred on creating hype. The late Steve Jobs, founder of Apple, was known for hyping up. His theatrical style and panache were successful in creating excitement before the launch of Apple products. These efforts have succeeded in making Apple products aspirational. 3. 3. 1 People Buy what Other People Have If you look at when apple was promoting iPod on TV adverts, they did not show and focus on the product like other adverts you would watch on television, instead there were a long white headsets that could show other people you have an Apple iPod.The other reason that Apple only advertise Apple Business Marketing Strategy |6 long white headsets with white iPods and they did not show a closed-up picture of their product is th at they do not want to only sell their product to customers; however, they want people to experience of joining to a special and exclusive Apple lifestyle and to become a part of iPod community which allows them to buy music through their unique software program (iTunes) and put their music in whatever order they want. 3. 3. 2 Help your Customers Help youWhen Apple first introduced their PowerBook, they made them outstanding buy making them in silver colour and have big Apple logo at the back so owners can feel proud and to be different therefore they try to show it off to other people. Apple earned nearly 40% market share on the back of early PowerBooks users. 3. 3. 3 TV shows and Movies Apple relies heavily on working closely with Hollywood in order to promote their product. This gives them opportunity to get their product used by Hollywood stars which have an enormous influence on public. . 4 Placing and Distribution Channels Apple works with number of network providers that they deal with the placing. However, online shopping from Apple. com or giving order in store for a new launched product can take up to two weeks due to the high demand. 4 Conclusion â€Å"An Apple computer on every desk† –Steve Jobs. Apple Inc. states its vision very clearly. They have changed our life with their products and services. They have demonstrated the world, that a human has a strong capacity to create huge things with a big impact.The analysis of the different elements of a marketing plan outline the various aspects involved in the penetration of a new market and the successful launch of a new product or service. Being aware of its own position and capabilities, and seeing opportunities in a new trend a company can enter a new market and develop. On its way, the company has to use its strength, respect its internal weaknesses and consider the outer world with its opportunities and threads Apple Business Marketing Strategy |7 5 Bibliography ? 5 secrets of world 's best marketing machine. 2007). Retrieved 11 24, 2012, from Marketing Apple: http://www. marketingapple. com/Marketing_Apple_eBook. pdf ? Apple Sells Three Million iPads in Three Days. (2012, November 5). Retrieved 11 24, 2012, from Apple: http://www. apple. com/pr/library/2012/11/05Apple-Sells-Three-Million-iPadsin-Three-Days. html ? APPLE THREE-YEAR FINANCIAL HISTORY. (2012, October ). Retrieved 11 21, 2012, from shareholder: http://files. shareholder. com/downloads/AAPL/2199577444x0x444195/E7A8FE5F-883546AB-ACC2-6FA28DFB546D/Three_Yr_Financial_History. pdf

Analysis of First Love by John Clare

First love is a poem, which encapsulates the experience the poet has falling in love for the first time. It is rejoicing the love he attained for a woman named Mary Joyce however there is sadness and a feeling of dissatisfaction hovering in the background. This feeling exists, as the love was unrequited. The poem has an underlying tone of innocence and flurry of emotions as it is the poets very first attempt at love exhibiting his feelings for Mary. The opening of the first stanza only shows how sudden and unexpected the feeling was as he was never ‘struck before that hour’. This is followed my sibilance alliteration ‘ so sudden and so sweet’ further emphasizing on the shock and bewilderment of the overwhelming feeling confirming it is a new experience. He uses his ‘heart’ as a symbol that she has ‘stolen’ completely ‘away’ however unknowingly. The paragraph continues to describe how he physically felt ill as his ‘face turned pale a deadly pale’. Generally when a person falls in love the first instinct is that the ‘blood [is] rushed‘ to the face, which occurs as a latter reaction. This could be because he probably already sensed that the love could not be returned as he didn’t say anything to her instead he hoped that his eyes would convey the message ‘words from my eyes did start’. He never came close to even touching or talking to her however the line ‘all seemed to turn to clay’ conveys the strong affection he attained for her. He also shows how the woman is in control of their (hallucinated) relationship as she could mould and re-mould him as per her wish. In the second stanza he goes on to describe more of his emotions brought forward by this interaction. He makes it quite visual for us of how the love has its affect on him and how he flushes with embarrassment so much that for a moment he feels blind. The physical impact of love relates the experience of love and loss. His life, his emotions were all now just focused on this one girl so much so that it ‘seemed midnight [to him] at noonday. This stanza ends on a very sad but dramatic note when he says that ‘blood burnt around my heart’ because he was in terrible pain emotionally as well as physically. The pace of the poem is however slows down in the last stanza. The poet seems depressed that the love he encompasses for Mary will never be fulfilled. The stanza begins with the poet asking rhetorical questions. In the first question he refers to flowers again like in the first stanza when he says ‘her face bloomed like a sweet flower’ it shows how innocent the love is and as they were never in physical contact even virginity. Also Clare admits that him and Mary could never be together as shown forth by the comparison of ‘flower’ and ‘winter’. According to him it will be as hard for their relationship to bloom as it would be for a flower in winter and slowly it will wilt and die. The second question shows his desperate depression. It clearly implies love as cold, deceitful and to be treated with caution. But he himself dove into it and continually obsesses about her. Love has a very strong physical impact within his body. These new feeling seem to have shaken him with surprise. The line ‘my heart has left its dwelling place’ exhibits the sense of loneliness and desertion that he feels. It includes rhetorical questions such as â€Å"are flowers the winters choice? † and I†is love;s bed always snow? † the reference to flowers takes us back to the simile in the beginning of the poem where the blooming of her face is compared to that of a flower suggestive of the blossoming of his love for her . it is in sharp contrast to the second reference of the flower which can only wilt and die in winter rather than blossom suggesting the lack of any possibility of the two coming together. Also read: In Exile Poem Analysis Arthur Nortje He refers to her face blooming like a sweet flower signifying the blossoming of his love which contrasts with the second reference to the flowers which is compared to winter suggests the lack of any possibility of them coming together just as the flower. the second question shows his desparate depression implying that love is cold deceitful and to be treated with caution . having drowned him in her live now it seems impossible for him to come out of it as my heart has left its dwelling place there is a sense of loneliness and the desertion that lurks towards the end of the poem making the reader to almost empathize with the poet. We are made to go through the experience and as the poem uses a diary form, it almost appears as if the poet is pouring his heart onto the paper. This is what makes the poem stand out as one can really suffer with him. He uses similes ‘her face bloomed like a sweet flower’, metaphors ‘my life has turned into clay’, alliterations such as ‘so sudden so sweet’ and realistic and effective images to make that possible. The rhyming structure of the poem is AB-AB-CD-CD. In each paragraph his feelings keep developing and we are made to witness this experience. The realistic images the poem has, helps the reader to understand the physical effects of being in love. The love he has was the sweetest, noblest and deepest love he has witnessed in his entire life so much so that it later drove him to insanity. Therefore more than first love I would consider it to be his true love. I feel as if the poet has been successful in conveying the impact of his emotions throughout this poem.

Whie lies Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Whie lies - Essay Example Where is the morality in lying? What if it is discovered later that that you lied to save a face? I remember an instance during my first grade when I had to lie to a teacher to prove that my best friend, suspected to have stolen a classmate’s book, was innocent. I wanted to save him from shame, but ended up bearing the whole burden of shame when the book was found in his backpack. Another incidence is when I tried covering for my brother, Jack, who had gotten drunk in the company of his friends. He had gone straight to bed for fear of being reprimanded by our father, who could never condone such a behavior. After telling dad that Jack was just feeling unwell, he went straight to our room to check on Jack and a minute later, I was called by him and what followed still has a permanent place in my mind. That slap still reminds me to date of my responsibility to be honest in my statements. Lying promotes immoral and irresponsible behavior. In order to live in a society with a culture of honesty, where moral principles direct people’s behavior, we must keep off lies, whether harmful or

Executive Pay Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Executive Pay - Essay Example While there is diversity across industries, sizes of organizations and countries, executive pay includes the common features of base pay and bonus based on performance. CEO compensation has become one of the most important issues of concern in the field of corporate governance. With ever increasing economic activity and companies transcending all boundaries, geographic, economic and technological, the person in charge of steering the company has been thrust into focus. Typically, huge compensation packages were a phenomenon of the golden days of dotcom glory. The period of Internet boom may safely be termed the era of exorbitant pay-outs. The Internet made millionaires of people in a matter of days. In the Internet-rush' of the late 1990s, a number of small companies mushroomed redefining the principles of economies of scale and scope. The CEOs (as well as the employees) of dotcoms often burnt the midnight oil trying to float their talents. For their efforts, they were compensated handsomely, when the company took off and reaped rewards. However, even after the burst of the Internet bubble and the decline of the software industry from its top position on the list of the most happening industries, huge pay-outs have remained. A quick recap of the origin of CEOs will give us a better understanding of the topic. When economic systems evolved from sole proprietorships to the company form of business, a need for a distinction between the owner of the resources and their managers arose. In some cases, owners stopped playing an active role in managing the business resources and turned them over instead to paid managers. These paid managers acted as agents of the owners and took up the responsibility for the success or failures of the business. As businesses grew in size and scope, the manager attained the glorified title of a CEO. The compensation system also became more complicated, evolving from a simple salary to benefits like bonus, perks and stock options. As time passed, the compensation packages grew in size until t hey attained such astronomical proportions that people began feeling the need for some control. This leads us to the question of whether CEOs merit the huge compensation they receive or not. In the US, historically, CEO's in "utilities earn significantly lower levels of compensation than their counterparts in other industries, while CEO's in financial services earn higher pay" (Ashenfelter, et al, 1999, p. 5). Yet the relationship between firm size and executive pay is weakening. A comparison of executive pay in 23 countries shows that executives in the US receive a greater proportion of their pay from bonuses and incentives than from base salary. Another reason for high CEO compensation was the fact that a major portion of their compensation package consisted of stock options and stock grants. In some cases, nearly two-thirds of the CEO's pay assumed the form of stock options. Some companies offered options packages to compensate for low salary and risk associated with the company, especially in case of a start-up company. Stock options had emerged as one of the most important factors, which made the CEOs salaries in big companies in the US to swell to almost 458 times the

Examination topic Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 6000 words

Examination topic - Essay Example The idea that informed the process of European integration was to establish institutional framework of shared sovereignty within EU economy. The eventual aim of the integration process is to foster economic integration which will ultimately form a framework for political integration at a later stage. European integration is informed by the regional integration theory whose greatest proponent was Stanley Hoffman (Cini, 2006, p. 19). According to Hoffman, regional integration theory asserts that national governments (which are sovereign) should control the speed and level of integration in the region that they exist in. This is evident in the European Union integration where the national governments are playing active role in controlling the speed and level of European integration. Hoffman argues that this theory requires any amplification of power at â€Å"supranational† be a result of member states’ direct decision. European integration was formed on the basis of region al integration theory which believes that integration which is driven by national governments are based on the economic and political issues that affect individual member states at a given period of time (Wiener and Diez, 2009, p. 33). ... He goes further and states that the existence of control usually allows the member states to make decision on the nature and extent of the cooperation between them without undermining directly their sovereignty. From this definition it can be deduced, therefore, that inter-governmentalism is a concept that treats national governments as primary actors in the process of integration. The proponents of inter-governmentalism see the integration terms and the rules that guide the process, as well as its institutions as a reflection of the relative bargaining power of different national governments who â€Å"pool† its efficiency and effectiveness without abnegating their sovereignty (Sweet and Sandholts, 2007, p. 298). Based on the concept of intergovernmentalism, the European Union has assigned implementation and monitoring of intergovernmental agreements responsibilities to international courts and secretariats as a way of locking each national government into integration commitme nt. This aspect is informed by the logic that through international courts and secretariats, national governments will be made to be the promulgators, initiators, mediators, promoters, and legislators of broadening and deepening of the European integration (Cini, 2006, p. 89). EU laws are divided into three interdependent forms of legislation: primary legislation which are produced through direct negotiations between national governments; secondary legislation which is based on the EU treaties and often take the dimension of decisions, recommendations, directives, or regulations; and the Council of the European Union which is the main body of legislation and

My Interactions with the Jesuit values Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

My Interactions with the Jesuit values - Essay Example Also, a compassionate and loving heart if not tempered by the logic and decorum emanating from the heart is but a rudderless ship, incapable of reaching its destination, being most of the time trapped in the morass of indecision and wavering. It is in the divine unity of the mental and emotional faculties that lies the true future of humanity and mankind. The Jesuit model of education actively inculcates the unity of human understanding and emotions. When the human personality is not amply mature and had not attained the ripeness ushered in by continual and persistent contemplation and education, the heart and the mind tend to be in a state a conflict. This is many a times markedly signified by having a strong desire to do something or engage in some activity that innately seems to be inappropriate or wrong. I believe that a preponderance of such instances in human life gives way to ample emotional and mental problems, which if allowed proceeding beyond a certain limit could degenera te into some kind of neurosis. Yet, ironically, I feel that this is the actual dilemma of the modern civilization so open to the winds of materialism and a deluge of information. Many a times in my life I felt that though I had everything that I materially desired and had access to most of the modern freedoms and rights, still there was something lacking within me that restrained me from evolving into a complete person. It is only after learning about, understanding and meditating upon the Jesuit value of the unity of body and mind that I realized that it was possible to pull myself out of this dilemma. I realized that the purpose of human existence and education is to aspire for a holistic development, the kind of evolution where the aspirations of the heart are shaped and molded by the discipline and formality emanating from the mind. This may seem nice to read, but, believe me, achieving such a state of existence is easier said than done, and requires continual practice and dedic ation, not to mention the immense need for prayer and self evaluation. It is only when a person has the good luck to be placed in the circumstances that are imbued with just the right values and ethics that one is able to instinctively realize the unity and harmony existing between the mind and the heart, the body and the soul. However, if, by the grace of God, one turns out to be blessed enough to placed under the tutelage of experts and institutions that encourage the flowering and evolution of the whole person rather than lopsidedly encouraging the segmented faculties of the human personality that one is able to evolve into a complete person in whom the yearnings and aspirations of the heart are propitiously tempered by the wisdom and maturity of the mind, leading to happiness and completeness in most of the spheres of life, are they spiritual, social, academic, economic or domestic. In that context, the Jesuit value of the unity of mind and the heart had a profound impact on var ied facets of my life. It not only helped me to proceed on a journey that promised happiness and grace, but also endowed me with the much required qualities like humility, patience and persistence. It encouraged me to engage with the complexities of the outside world with a deeply felt and morally

The competitive nature of the big supermarket chains in the UK Essay

The competitive nature of the big supermarket chains in the UK - Essay Example It will further discuss whether the market structure is beneficial or has a negative impact to the customers. The four brands take more than seventy-five percent of the market shares with Tesco enjoying the largest share of the UK market. The supply of commodities is always on demand; hence, the production scale tends to be large to have space to accommodate the economies of scale. When the issue of economies of scale comes into play, the variable cost is always low due to the advanced technology that results to full utilization of the investment. The consumers get more products at lower prices. The oligopoly market structure tends to attract large manufacturers. In addition, the manufacturers are required to have higher levels of technical and financial strength in production of commodities (Obitz, 2009, p. 59). It results to more benefits to the people as evident in the large quantities of low price products. The oligopoly market in United Kingdom supermarket chains does possess an aspect of interdependence. If a company makes a price or market strategy that has influence on the other companies, the whole market particularly the firms, become interdependent (Leahy & Neary, 2010, p. 25). This means that if one supermarket decreases or increases the price of its commodities, the other supermarkets will also adjust their price. The supermarkets, in most instances have a common agreement of how they make changes on the output and the price. In addition, most of their strategies seem to be similar in order to maximize on their profits. This results to a non-price competition in oligopoly market and price rigidity. The supermarkets in the UK avoid engaging in price wars. The prices are relatively same in all the large supermarkets. In the business world, some firms will tend to lower their price than the others while the quality of their goods is not securitized. This makes the consumers buy t he products at low prices and

Development of Project Proposal Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Development of Project Proposal - Assignment Example (2011) explains that change control procedures include the steps for what and how modification of official company standards, policies, plans, and procedures, project documents would be approved and validated and made part of final project management plan. Project manager and project team is mainly responsible to identify the change control procedures at all level and their inclusion in the plan. PMBOK (2008) suggests that Integrated Change Control procedure includes the following activities based upon the current status of the project. Changes to project scope always impact the components of the triple constraint i.e., cost, schedule and scope. A scope creep is likely to be associated with increase in cost and time required but may or may not impact the motivation of the project team (PMBOK 2008). In our project, it is essential to have a formal change control procedure in accordance with the steps described below. Initial project duration was calculated to be 61 days with an estimated cost of 5630 â‚ ¬. Please see appendix ‘A’ and ‘B’ for reference. After the approval of change request, change to the project schedule and cost were recalculated as a result of project scope creep. The analysis revealed that now the project duration would be 71 days with an estimated cost of 8235 â‚ ¬. Please see Appendix ‘C’ and ‘D’ for reference. This indicated that project duration increased from 61 days to 71 days but was well within the promised duration of 14 weeks (14X7=98 days). However, as a result of adding a new wing to the building the cost increased from 5630 â‚ ¬ to 8235 â‚ ¬, an increase of 46% in project cost. Contractor, with expertise in construction, will work in conjunction with the client (Smith) to manage the construction of a house building with an additional wing. The contractor would assist the client in developing detailed construction project plan, schedule, resource plan and execution of the project. The contractor would identify and track

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard Movie Review

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard - Movie Review Example The death of the two minor characters is very tragic and depicted in a manner similar to the death of a major character in any play. The deaths are given some importance even though they are not very meaningful, every man is mortal and will at one time die (Stoppard 110).the play is also full of humor and the use of suspense which brings about the need for the people wanting to watch more of the play. For the play to be produced, it will seek funding from various places like the corporate support. Private institutions and business help in the funding through the PBS general fund though the funds are very limited and cannot sustain the whole production. In addition, the production of the play funded by the program also funds television based programs and those projects that have goals and objectives that are well established. The other source of funding is the national endowment for arts, which promotes art in various countries. In addition to that, the national media engagement centre can also help with the funding of the production of the play. Many I TVS today really come in to fund the production of programs that will promote the economy of the country and bring on TV what people like watching. Centers are ready to promote art in the world, and these centers provide the funds for the production of their work, and discover talent and promote it fully by funding it. The public broadcasting corporation also funds projects, which entertain, and are media related. They funds play knowing that they will also benefit in return. The grant makers in film and electronic media also assist artists by funding the production of their work. The stakeholders in the company look at the project and if it qualifies, they can fund the production. Another source for the funding is national endowment for humanities, which help many artists by funding and promoting their work. When approached, they do not take much time in supporting the production if the work is appealing to

Political Discussion Coursework Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Political Discussion - Coursework Example President Nixon’s Watergate Scandal was considerably destructive because it earned him the lowest ratings in the second term as compared to other presidents. The current president, President Obama threatens to break this trend because he enjoys a conspicuous upward trend in his approval ratings since the 2012 election. Even so, the second term, riddled by the "second-term curse", is considerably rough because of the over expectations of the public. Special interest groups are good for the nation because they exert influence on the political and legal systems. They encourage democracy and ensure that decision makers settle on decisions that serve the common good. A healthy democracy is possible because of the efforts of interest groups, who neutralize bad policies, and represent minority groups. Although they have too much influence on policy, the existence of several interest groups ensures that their negotiations results in the best policies. Even so, the presence of too many special interest groups is bad because the government may fail to achieve anything substantial. They have other advantages too, such as misrepresentation of cultures, but the advantages of special interest groups make them good. From www.opensecrets.org, I learned about the influence of money on U.S. public policy and elections. Some politicians often finance most interest groups, and they use them to push their own agenda and political

Outsourcing Information Technology and Security Essay Example for Free

Outsourcing Information Technology and Security Essay This can be defined as the employment done to another company by an organization for the service provision in information technology or security services rather than the use of the corporate workers in the performance of such a duty. With the growing intensity of commercial activities the concepts of strategic management has been of importance in formulating various structures and economies in the business activity. Managers have consistently understood the role played by external outsourcing. Such is done is the recognition of the economies of scale and economies in the cost factor which the organization would have been affected. The Elite Supercars can be voted in as one of the global organizations where outsourcing has never been compromised. However a deep concern into the principles of economies of cost factor have been put into consideration. Firstly, an importance is attached to the scale of adequacy in terms of levels of ability for the service provider. Since the provision of both the information technology and security services call for technical pursuits from the providers, the choice of service providers has been in recognition of their technical abilities and competencies. Either, the outsourcing activity has still been in evaluation of the cost parameters. Through this activity, the company was to get a relatively lower scale in its costs. However, a scrutiny and evaluation was done by the management in accordance with the cost factors in choosing various clients against their quality of services. The choice of the clients by the company was indeed a compliment of lower costing service sales above high quality service inputs. Above all other factors, the evaluation of the environmental factors in the activity was a factor. However the two choices were complimentarily environmental friendly within the organizational setup With Elite Supercars, outsourcing information technology and security has been important complements in its activities. This is a car manufacturing company with its roots at Singapore. However to it, outsourcing of the above two corporate factors draws a question of high concern. Firstly, with its increased manufacturing activity, the company had to outsource development of various software useful in the organization’s processes. In the 1st November 2006, the company’s CEO released a press release, where it had contracted the Northern Ferrari Hire for developing an outsourcing program through the web marketing. This was to involve various software on strategic marketing modalities. Perhaps, the impressive sales turn over embraced by the company can be credited to this fact. Through the program, the company is able to adequately provide an attractive package of marketing services to its customers. Through this method, customers have closer relationship with the company where it can adequately communicate with them through the Internet. Suchan, Charles, 2006) Some various examples show the implementation success of this activity. This activity by the organization’s implementation of the program has even driven it to its extended boundaries of its activities. The program was provisional and to a strategy in various accounting components. Firstly, it was a way of optimal costing. As an important tool in an organization, optimal costing implies efficiency in the activity performance. Optimal costing is also seen as the economical method in use of organizational resources. To the Elite Supercars, outsourcing of information technology is a complement of various efficiency-costing benefits. The information outsourcing therefore shows a big success in the company’s costing system where it has obtained various efficiencies related to the program. Through use of an external supply, the organization had various benefits ascribed to it in terms of the costs. Like an external contract, the activity itself was less costing than the use of its own staff. Either, this activity by its own required a high scale of technological know how about it. In regard to its inexperienced employees, outsourcing is still fundamental in the implementation success of the program. Elite Supercars was not strong and able enough to provide the set of competent staff allied to this facility. Either well, to the organization, the provision of a set of technical staff on information technology was not economical enough in relation to the cost factor of the broad organizational activity. However to the company, perhaps the greatest benefit from the project was the consequent development and growth of its sales turn over. Since the enactment of program, the company has continued to experience high sales volume. Above this, there have been various efficiencies in terms of the marketing factor. There has been a continued reduction in the cost of marketing through the various effecienciess and economies of scale borne out of the process. (Cantwell, Alfonso, Granstrand, 2004) Outsourcing, by the Elite Supercars on security has been fundamentally one its management activities. From the past experience in insecurity and theft of its cars at their manufacturing site, the company had to seek refuge of finding a storage facility for its cars. To the company, it chose to use the facility of storage that had been constructed by Dutch Authorities. With the same storage facility, the organization experiences lower cases of theft (if any) to its highly priced cars. Formerly, the increasing state of loss of cars had become a problem which threatened the company in being out of the industry. It had continued to get higher levels of losses through the theft of its cars. At one level therefore, the facility offered cost saving attributes through reduced scales of care theft. (Domberger, 1998) The move to use the storage facility provided by the Dutch Authorities was perhaps one of it strategic management goals. Construction of its own facility was a factor seen as increasing the level of its cost factor consequently. The construction of its own shortage facility was to involve a high level of cost factor compared to the level of its operational capacity. This is an attribute of success in the implementation of the program. Since prevention of car from theft was still a factor of consideration, the opportunity cost of not constructing its own facility was basically to be through the use of another facility. Otherwise, the loss that could accrue from the loss of the cars through theft was far beyond the cost outlay got from the payment to the external shortage. Therefore, the security outsourcing program was itself a factor of high attribute in the success of the company’s activities. To the current period, security problem is no longer an issue and the company continues to embrace the broad economies allied to these out sources. Broadly therefore, outsourcing activity by the company shows a strategic management tool towards the organization activity. The company embraces the long run benefits of these two programs.

An Adoption Of Ebusiness In Thai SMEs

An Adoption Of Ebusiness In Thai SMEs Chapter 1: Dissertation Introduction Background to research In order to increase business opportunities, many large companies invested in information systems (IS). Because the high return from investment have seen in many cases. Also, Porter (2001) claims that the e-business which one kind of information systems can term as the way to management business by applying the Internet to support business activities. However, in small and medium sized enterprises have only small amount of evidences to prove those benefits (Levy, Powell Yetton, 2002). However, presently the internet was changed the way of running business, the small and medium enterprise (SME) have higher opportunities to survive in various markets (Levy Powell, 2005). Consequently, these researches are inspired this research to explore how to improve SME in Thailand which is one of the most significant business sectors in the country. Therefore, the idea of improving Thai business by integrating an e-business into SMEs has been studied. Furthermore, there are some amount of resear ch for developing e-commerce in Thailand but rarely seen for e-business. In my opinion, e-business could change and improve the way of running business better than ever due to it supports the coordination between suppliers and partners, operation performance, and also included e-commerce (Beynon-Davies, 2004). Aims and objectives Research objectives To discover which kind of small and medium companies should integrate e-business and what are the critical success factors in adopting it. This research also aims to develop the road map of e-business integration for the case study company. Research questions How to adopt e-business to Thai SMEs? Why only some companies should integrate e-business? What are the characteristics that specify the appropriation? How e-business can improve the company performance? What are the critical success factors? What are the main barriers for these kinds of small size business? Do suppliers or customers of the company agree with integrating e-business? Do they have significant influent to change? What are the case study tell us about the literature? How the business can apply in the future? Area of Focus Structure Chapter 2: Literature Analysis and Dissertation Questions Value chain Dynamics of SMEs to information systems Important of e-business E-business integration Thailand SMEs Critical susses factors Chapter 3: Context and Methodology After the previous chapter critical analysed various relevant academic literatures. This chapter illustrates the qualitative research methodology applied in this dissertation in order to analyse and design the roadmap for adopting e-business system in SuperBag Company. In this context and methodology part is combined with three main sections: paradigm and research methodology, research design, and research ethic. The chapter explains the process of research planning in the same logical with the research onion in figure 3.1 (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, 2008 cited in Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill 2009, p.108). By the reason that this model possible to show the approach of management research clearly. Figure 3.1: The research onion (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, 2009, p.108) As can be seen in figure 3.1 the research onion divided to two colours in order to distinguished the layer of thinking method. In the first two layers are philosophies and approaches which can be thought of as paradigm and research methodology. The next three levels are strategies, choices, and time horizontals. These three layers are concerning on research design process (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, 2009). In the innermost layer, data collection and data analysis are discussed in the next chapter. Paradigm and Research Methodology This research has the purpose to investigate the critical success factors in applying e-business in Thailand SMEs. Consequently, to get the richness of information and enhance the validity of the outcome, the research will utilise interpretive philosophy (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, 2009). In addition, the philosophy results in inductive approach. To begin with first layer, this qualitative research applied an interpretivist philosophy. Referred to Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009) explain that interpretivism suitable for the research topic that has some particular interests and difficult to understand such as human being. For this reason, to comprehend the case study is aligning with interpretivism that supports to view the situation in-depth. Additionally, Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009) suggest three views to clarify the research philosophies including with ontology, epistemology and axiology. In interpretivism, ontology represents the nature of reality as subjective that varies to change. Next, epistemology explains that the details of subject contexts are important to the research implication. Lastly in interpretivism paradigm, axiology shows a value-laden and research is part of the research that might lead to biased outcome (Blackmon and Maylor, 2005). In conclusion, interpretivism is appropriate with this research as this philosophy demonstrates the richness of data and subjective as well as high validity (Harwood, 2010). Moreover, as Greener (2008, p.17) stated, à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“an interpretivist researcher aims to see the world throught the eyes of the people being studied, allowing them multiple perspectives of reality, rather than the à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“one realityà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬? of positivismà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬?. This statement supports the idea that interpretivism is ultimate for business research which supports to generate the framework from the many participants views. In the second layer is inductive approach was used in this research as parallel way of interpretivism. This approach is more appropriate to deal with a small sample size. As it spotlights attention to the contexts of subject. In addition, a number of researches support inductive approach is closer understanding of social word than deductive approach (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, 2009). Research Design This sub section explains three layers of research onion; strategies, choices, and time horizontals. Firstly, as the dissertation topic analysed SuperBag Company, the research design was fixed as a case study. As well as the Research Philosophy and approach those were devised to find the most appropriate paradigm to produce the reliable outcome. The strategy used in the research is a single case study. According to Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009) state that this strategy can be explained descriptive, explanatory and exploratory research types. However, this research is concerned as exploratory more than others because it discovered new knowledge for the case. More details about the case study company are described in the chapter 4. Secondly, reference to Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009) reveal that while using case study strategy, both qualitative and quantitative should be collected. This technique called as triangulation and it is possible to reduce the bias decision from the point of researchers view. Therefore, this research used mixed-method design in order to increase the research reliability. The qualitative data were collected by using semi-structured interviews and the quantitative data were gathered from internal and external company data resources. Thirdly, the time horizon that was used in this paper is cross-sectional study. Main reason of selecting the cross-sectional study instead of longitudinal study is the research question (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, 2009). The research question is about to develop the implementation plan in the particular time, so that cross-sectional study would be more suitable than longitudinal time horizontal. Moreover, as Greener (2008) point out, when the research faced with time limited same as this dissertation case, cross-sectional study would be more preferable too. Ethic Consideration The ethic is one of the main concerns in producing this research. As Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009) have indicates that ethically research should be performed since the authority to access the participants, gathering process, analysis, and the way to present research data. For example, the voice record are started after the interviewees were consent to do. Moreover, researcher used the natural tone while interviewing in order to reduce the interviewees stress. In addition, interview time was selected by the interviewees to provide the most convenience time for them. Furthermore, both interviewees and companys name are anonymous due to the privacy concern. Hence, instead of its read name, this case study company referred as SuperBag. Chapter 4: Data Collection and Data Analysis As mentioned in previous section, this chapter explains in the innermost of the research onion that is techniques and procedures of the research. Those discussed in this chapter are highlighted as (1) case description, (2) sampling method, (3) Data collection; secondary data and primary data, and (4) data analysing technique. Case Description This dissertation focuses on SuperBag Company as a case study. This company was selected for examination since it is a Small and Medium Enterprises in Thailand. Thai SMEs is à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦. SuperBag Company is a filter bags manufacture. The company was established since 1983 and it is a first expert manufacture of filter bags in Thailand. As the first company and its size and profit are increasing continuously that made SuperBag is the leader of this market. Recently, the firm has a client base of over 100 companies including Thailand and some neighbour countries. Additional, the numbers of customers are constant growing. However, SuperBag has not converted to big company yet. The company was owner and formed by an enthusiastic entrepreneur. In addition, SuperBag operated as family business which has 40 à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" 50 employees. Also, the main communication ways are using the traditional ways such as fax and telephone The company provides a full range of associated filter products and accessories. The main product is filter bags which are using for dust control in various industries such as food processing, pharmaceuticals, and mining quarrying cement. SuperBag offers an assortment of services included; designing suitable bags, onsite fitting, producing made to order products, maintenance, and advice for problem solving. Majority of the products SuperBag manufactured are mainly sold in Thailand. On the other hands, SuperBag imports raw material from many countries included; Germany, Taiwan, Korea, and China. The materials from different country of origin are significantly affected to the product quality and profit margin. The aims and visions of SuperBag are promised to high standard filter bags, fast service, made to order by specialist, concern the customer relationship, in order to achieve the highest customers satisfaction. (SuperBag, 2010) à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“most management and organisational researchers suggest that you are more likely to gain access where you are able to use existing contactsà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬? (Buchanan et al. 1988; Easterby-Smith et al. 2008; Johnson 1975 cited in Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill 2009, p.176) Sampling Method After the sample case was explained, this section describes the sampling technique that was applied to this research. According to the research question that what to know how to adopt e-business to Thai SMEs which are a numerous number of this kind of enterprise in Thailand. Therefore, the entire population cannot be collected and analysed, the sample case is necessary. Additionally, an alternative of probability, this dissertation decided to use non-probability sampling technique. As Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009) indicate that non-probability sampling techniques are allowed to choose the sample purposively. With this reasons the research question could be answered from rich information that usually gains from small sample size. Finally, when combined various supported reasons and the opportunity to access the SuperBag Company data, made this research applied a non-probability with purposively selected SuperBag Company as a case study to simplify the general idea of how to ado pt e-business in Thai SMEs. Data Collection Data were collected from two major types included secondary data and primary data. Firstly, secondary data which are the existing data could be collect from either external or internal company database. Referred to Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009) internal data are data that can be obtained from the firm. External data could be conducted from many sources such as internet, library, and some publishing media (Harwood, 2010). Another data source is primary data which is data that first collect in the research. As mentioned in sampling method that the research will use a single case study, which will be the good source of primary data. Secondary data As McQuarrie (1996) suggested that before planning to spend time and money to collect data, the researchers should look for secondary data first. Even though the secondary data were gathered for different purposes, they were ready to be used. Moreover, secondary data can be the firm internal data such as investment plan, company annual report. Also, wide ranges of existing knowledge are provided, in this dissertation was focused in four areas consisted; information systems (IS) and information technology (IT), e-business adoption, Thai SMEs, and business strategy. There are a choice of sources to review such as public and university library, and opened online sectors. These secondary data were valuable to the research if they are related, reliability and validity (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009). Primary data This type of case study suits when the case provides authorities to access their data (Yin, 2003). The information was gathered from two interviewers that are the owner and the successor of the company. Furthermore, the interview will use face to face and virtual face techniques. In detailed, these qualitative interviews will be prepared as semi-structured interviews. According to Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009), the semi-structured interviews useful when new aspect from the interviewers are very significant to the research outcome. Because new questions can be added or omitted depends on the conversation. Moreover, the conversions would be recorded by audio-recorders and paper notes. Data Analysis Technique Data Analysis All records will be transcribed into word files and then get through the data cleaning process. Next, these data will be answered the research questions. Nevertheless, the process of data collection and analysis will be repeated until all questions were answered. Resources Although, various secondary data can be found in opened online sector such as Webcat and TDnet, some of useful information has to pay for. Moreover, this research was prepared by individually, so the researcher has to pay for all cost which happens during this project. The free online articles and journals which involve in the topic will be used in this research that can find from intranet at Library of University such as TDnet, Webcat. Time management and location Location Location could have significant impact to the data that was collected, so this research will conduct the information as virtual face and face to face. For virtual face means the interviewee and interviewer can see each other and have real time communication (Skype, 2010). In this research will use the software called Skype. Also, international call will be used in emergency situation. An Adoption Of Ebusiness In Thai SMEs An Adoption Of Ebusiness In Thai SMEs Chapter 1: Dissertation Introduction Background to research In order to increase business opportunities, many large companies invested in information systems (IS). Because the high return from investment have seen in many cases. Also, Porter (2001) claims that the e-business which one kind of information systems can term as the way to management business by applying the Internet to support business activities. However, in small and medium sized enterprises have only small amount of evidences to prove those benefits (Levy, Powell Yetton, 2002). However, presently the internet was changed the way of running business, the small and medium enterprise (SME) have higher opportunities to survive in various markets (Levy Powell, 2005). Consequently, these researches are inspired this research to explore how to improve SME in Thailand which is one of the most significant business sectors in the country. Therefore, the idea of improving Thai business by integrating an e-business into SMEs has been studied. Furthermore, there are some amount of resear ch for developing e-commerce in Thailand but rarely seen for e-business. In my opinion, e-business could change and improve the way of running business better than ever due to it supports the coordination between suppliers and partners, operation performance, and also included e-commerce (Beynon-Davies, 2004). Aims and objectives Research objectives To discover which kind of small and medium companies should integrate e-business and what are the critical success factors in adopting it. This research also aims to develop the road map of e-business integration for the case study company. Research questions How to adopt e-business to Thai SMEs? Why only some companies should integrate e-business? What are the characteristics that specify the appropriation? How e-business can improve the company performance? What are the critical success factors? What are the main barriers for these kinds of small size business? Do suppliers or customers of the company agree with integrating e-business? Do they have significant influent to change? What are the case study tell us about the literature? How the business can apply in the future? Area of Focus Structure Chapter 2: Literature Analysis and Dissertation Questions Value chain Dynamics of SMEs to information systems Important of e-business E-business integration Thailand SMEs Critical susses factors Chapter 3: Context and Methodology After the previous chapter critical analysed various relevant academic literatures. This chapter illustrates the qualitative research methodology applied in this dissertation in order to analyse and design the roadmap for adopting e-business system in SuperBag Company. In this context and methodology part is combined with three main sections: paradigm and research methodology, research design, and research ethic. The chapter explains the process of research planning in the same logical with the research onion in figure 3.1 (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, 2008 cited in Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill 2009, p.108). By the reason that this model possible to show the approach of management research clearly. Figure 3.1: The research onion (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, 2009, p.108) As can be seen in figure 3.1 the research onion divided to two colours in order to distinguished the layer of thinking method. In the first two layers are philosophies and approaches which can be thought of as paradigm and research methodology. The next three levels are strategies, choices, and time horizontals. These three layers are concerning on research design process (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, 2009). In the innermost layer, data collection and data analysis are discussed in the next chapter. Paradigm and Research Methodology This research has the purpose to investigate the critical success factors in applying e-business in Thailand SMEs. Consequently, to get the richness of information and enhance the validity of the outcome, the research will utilise interpretive philosophy (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, 2009). In addition, the philosophy results in inductive approach. To begin with first layer, this qualitative research applied an interpretivist philosophy. Referred to Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009) explain that interpretivism suitable for the research topic that has some particular interests and difficult to understand such as human being. For this reason, to comprehend the case study is aligning with interpretivism that supports to view the situation in-depth. Additionally, Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009) suggest three views to clarify the research philosophies including with ontology, epistemology and axiology. In interpretivism, ontology represents the nature of reality as subjective that varies to change. Next, epistemology explains that the details of subject contexts are important to the research implication. Lastly in interpretivism paradigm, axiology shows a value-laden and research is part of the research that might lead to biased outcome (Blackmon and Maylor, 2005). In conclusion, interpretivism is appropriate with this research as this philosophy demonstrates the richness of data and subjective as well as high validity (Harwood, 2010). Moreover, as Greener (2008, p.17) stated, à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“an interpretivist researcher aims to see the world throught the eyes of the people being studied, allowing them multiple perspectives of reality, rather than the à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“one realityà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬? of positivismà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬?. This statement supports the idea that interpretivism is ultimate for business research which supports to generate the framework from the many participants views. In the second layer is inductive approach was used in this research as parallel way of interpretivism. This approach is more appropriate to deal with a small sample size. As it spotlights attention to the contexts of subject. In addition, a number of researches support inductive approach is closer understanding of social word than deductive approach (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, 2009). Research Design This sub section explains three layers of research onion; strategies, choices, and time horizontals. Firstly, as the dissertation topic analysed SuperBag Company, the research design was fixed as a case study. As well as the Research Philosophy and approach those were devised to find the most appropriate paradigm to produce the reliable outcome. The strategy used in the research is a single case study. According to Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009) state that this strategy can be explained descriptive, explanatory and exploratory research types. However, this research is concerned as exploratory more than others because it discovered new knowledge for the case. More details about the case study company are described in the chapter 4. Secondly, reference to Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009) reveal that while using case study strategy, both qualitative and quantitative should be collected. This technique called as triangulation and it is possible to reduce the bias decision from the point of researchers view. Therefore, this research used mixed-method design in order to increase the research reliability. The qualitative data were collected by using semi-structured interviews and the quantitative data were gathered from internal and external company data resources. Thirdly, the time horizon that was used in this paper is cross-sectional study. Main reason of selecting the cross-sectional study instead of longitudinal study is the research question (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, 2009). The research question is about to develop the implementation plan in the particular time, so that cross-sectional study would be more suitable than longitudinal time horizontal. Moreover, as Greener (2008) point out, when the research faced with time limited same as this dissertation case, cross-sectional study would be more preferable too. Ethic Consideration The ethic is one of the main concerns in producing this research. As Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009) have indicates that ethically research should be performed since the authority to access the participants, gathering process, analysis, and the way to present research data. For example, the voice record are started after the interviewees were consent to do. Moreover, researcher used the natural tone while interviewing in order to reduce the interviewees stress. In addition, interview time was selected by the interviewees to provide the most convenience time for them. Furthermore, both interviewees and companys name are anonymous due to the privacy concern. Hence, instead of its read name, this case study company referred as SuperBag. Chapter 4: Data Collection and Data Analysis As mentioned in previous section, this chapter explains in the innermost of the research onion that is techniques and procedures of the research. Those discussed in this chapter are highlighted as (1) case description, (2) sampling method, (3) Data collection; secondary data and primary data, and (4) data analysing technique. Case Description This dissertation focuses on SuperBag Company as a case study. This company was selected for examination since it is a Small and Medium Enterprises in Thailand. Thai SMEs is à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦. SuperBag Company is a filter bags manufacture. The company was established since 1983 and it is a first expert manufacture of filter bags in Thailand. As the first company and its size and profit are increasing continuously that made SuperBag is the leader of this market. Recently, the firm has a client base of over 100 companies including Thailand and some neighbour countries. Additional, the numbers of customers are constant growing. However, SuperBag has not converted to big company yet. The company was owner and formed by an enthusiastic entrepreneur. In addition, SuperBag operated as family business which has 40 à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" 50 employees. Also, the main communication ways are using the traditional ways such as fax and telephone The company provides a full range of associated filter products and accessories. The main product is filter bags which are using for dust control in various industries such as food processing, pharmaceuticals, and mining quarrying cement. SuperBag offers an assortment of services included; designing suitable bags, onsite fitting, producing made to order products, maintenance, and advice for problem solving. Majority of the products SuperBag manufactured are mainly sold in Thailand. On the other hands, SuperBag imports raw material from many countries included; Germany, Taiwan, Korea, and China. The materials from different country of origin are significantly affected to the product quality and profit margin. The aims and visions of SuperBag are promised to high standard filter bags, fast service, made to order by specialist, concern the customer relationship, in order to achieve the highest customers satisfaction. (SuperBag, 2010) à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“most management and organisational researchers suggest that you are more likely to gain access where you are able to use existing contactsà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬? (Buchanan et al. 1988; Easterby-Smith et al. 2008; Johnson 1975 cited in Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill 2009, p.176) Sampling Method After the sample case was explained, this section describes the sampling technique that was applied to this research. According to the research question that what to know how to adopt e-business to Thai SMEs which are a numerous number of this kind of enterprise in Thailand. Therefore, the entire population cannot be collected and analysed, the sample case is necessary. Additionally, an alternative of probability, this dissertation decided to use non-probability sampling technique. As Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009) indicate that non-probability sampling techniques are allowed to choose the sample purposively. With this reasons the research question could be answered from rich information that usually gains from small sample size. Finally, when combined various supported reasons and the opportunity to access the SuperBag Company data, made this research applied a non-probability with purposively selected SuperBag Company as a case study to simplify the general idea of how to ado pt e-business in Thai SMEs. Data Collection Data were collected from two major types included secondary data and primary data. Firstly, secondary data which are the existing data could be collect from either external or internal company database. Referred to Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009) internal data are data that can be obtained from the firm. External data could be conducted from many sources such as internet, library, and some publishing media (Harwood, 2010). Another data source is primary data which is data that first collect in the research. As mentioned in sampling method that the research will use a single case study, which will be the good source of primary data. Secondary data As McQuarrie (1996) suggested that before planning to spend time and money to collect data, the researchers should look for secondary data first. Even though the secondary data were gathered for different purposes, they were ready to be used. Moreover, secondary data can be the firm internal data such as investment plan, company annual report. Also, wide ranges of existing knowledge are provided, in this dissertation was focused in four areas consisted; information systems (IS) and information technology (IT), e-business adoption, Thai SMEs, and business strategy. There are a choice of sources to review such as public and university library, and opened online sectors. These secondary data were valuable to the research if they are related, reliability and validity (Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009). Primary data This type of case study suits when the case provides authorities to access their data (Yin, 2003). The information was gathered from two interviewers that are the owner and the successor of the company. Furthermore, the interview will use face to face and virtual face techniques. In detailed, these qualitative interviews will be prepared as semi-structured interviews. According to Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill (2009), the semi-structured interviews useful when new aspect from the interviewers are very significant to the research outcome. Because new questions can be added or omitted depends on the conversation. Moreover, the conversions would be recorded by audio-recorders and paper notes. Data Analysis Technique Data Analysis All records will be transcribed into word files and then get through the data cleaning process. Next, these data will be answered the research questions. Nevertheless, the process of data collection and analysis will be repeated until all questions were answered. Resources Although, various secondary data can be found in opened online sector such as Webcat and TDnet, some of useful information has to pay for. Moreover, this research was prepared by individually, so the researcher has to pay for all cost which happens during this project. The free online articles and journals which involve in the topic will be used in this research that can find from intranet at Library of University such as TDnet, Webcat. Time management and location Location Location could have significant impact to the data that was collected, so this research will conduct the information as virtual face and face to face. For virtual face means the interviewee and interviewer can see each other and have real time communication (Skype, 2010). In this research will use the software called Skype. Also, international call will be used in emergency situation.

The Development Mechanism And Trading Of Sukuk Bonds Finance Essay

The Development Mechanism And Trading Of Sukuk Bonds Finance Essay A Sukuk bond is an Arabic word for financial investment certificates, or sometimes can be refer as Islamic bonds. It is the famous element in the Islamic Finance among the Muslim and non-Muslim. Other than that, sukuk also refer to trust certificates and participation securities. Moreover, it is one of the fastest growing tools in the Islamic capital market that triggered the desire of research and writings of many researchers and scholars, as a result of which is the existence of many academic writings and publications [1]. It has become one of the most dynamic tools for capital mobilization in both the Islamic and conventional capital markets (2007, Umar). For your information, base on their Islamic law, it is not allowed fixed income and interest bearing bond. After that, Islamic Finance comes out the sukuk bonds to fulfill its investment principles, which is charging or paying the interest. Besides that, it is similar to the financial bonds in the conventional bank, which are proof of ownership title to the investor and utilized by financial institution to raising the fund. For both conventional bonds and sukuk bonds are structured to generate revenue on the physical assets. However, the differentiation between both bonds is sukuk bonds can be consider as modern application of Islamic financial. Malaysias fully experience and concrete fundamentals in Islamic finance developed over 30 years, tied with its strength in the domestic sukuk market, offers strong exciting value propositions to government agencies, multinational corporations and multilateral development banks or financial institutions across the world to originate sukuk out of Malaysia.  Malaysia leads the global sukuk market, represented by 61% of total sukuk outstanding at the end 2008.2 Development of Sukuk Bonds What is Sukuk? Sukuk is an Islamic financial certificate bond but it refuted to conventional bonds, which is debt based instrument and Sukuk is asset based instrument. Sukuk securities adopt the Islamic laws referred to as Shariah and it own principles, Islamic religious law, which no all interest can make and its forbid the charging or payment of interest such as fixed income, interest bearing bonds are not permissible in Islam . Sukuk instruments are like a middleman or a bridge to issuers, primarily sovereigns and corporations in other foreign countries such as in the Middle East and Southeast Asia, with a large pool for investor to finding diversify their holdings beyond traditional asset classes. In Sukuk market, fund raised can classified in two way which is an efficient and transparent way in over 100 non-member countries in the world. Diagram 1: Different between conventional financial and Islamic financial Selected Historical Highlights Key Highlights in Malaysias Islamic Capital Market: 1990: Issuance of first Islamic Corporate bond by Shell MDS Sdn Bhd 1993: Launch of first Islamic Equity unit trust fund by Arab-Malaysian Unit Trust Bhd 1994: First full fledged Islamic stockbroking company, BIMB Securities, was established 1999: Launch of the KLSE Syariah Index 2000: Launch of the first Islamic bond fund by RHB Unit Trust Management 2001: Issuance of the worlds first Global Sukuk by Kumpulan Guthrie Source: Bloomberg (based on Sukuk issued out of new and existing programmes for the YTD ) Global vs Malaysia Sukuk Issuances 2005- 1H20112002: Issuance of the worlds first Global Sovereign Sukuk Figure :Global vs Malaysia Sukuk Issuances 2005- 1H2011 In 2005 to first half of 2011, global Sukuk market and Malaysia Sukuk market was faced few economic growth and crisis, therefore it was effect issued Sukuk bond. Based on the data, Malaysia Sukuk market doesnt showed significant growth compared with global Sukuk market between 2005 to first half of 2011. However Malaysia Sukuk market looks more stable than global market. In 2008, global Sukuk faced financial meltdown, it is global financial crisis and the Dubai debt woes, therefore it dropped from US$31 billion to US$14.2 billion, dropped around 54%. Besides that, Malaysia Sukuk market also dropped, but the dropped amount lower than global market, around 41%.Apart from that, in 2009 Malaysia Sukuk market of the total Sukuk issuance growth around 31%, it was showed those investor have confidence to Malaysia Sukuk market. http://biz.thestar.com.my/archives/2009/9/9/business/p8-sukukcht.JPG Figure 2:Sukuk issuance by country in 2009 In 2009, Malaysia is the largest country issuer Sukuk bond compare with Indonesia, Sausi Arabia and Bahrain.Malaysia almost having around 45% of issuer Sukuk bond. The second largest is Saudi Arabia, they has around 22% for issuer Sukuk bond. Figure 3 Malaysia: Outstanding Sukuk vs. Bonds In this several years, Sukuk continues growth but compare with normal bond, amount of outstanding Sukuk still lower than bond. In 2011, Sukuk still not famous for the investor or issuer therefore the number was just had small amount for the outstanding Sukuk. Besides that, between 2001 and 2007 the amount of outstanding Sukuk was growth significantly. In 2007, outstanding Sukuk was catching up the normal bond and after year 2007 outstanding Sukuk still having a positive growth in the market. This three chart showed that investor have confidence with Malaysia Sukuk market because it has its potential. In 1990s, Malaysia already had a powerful and transparent Islamic structure. Other than that, Malaysia also do more effort to promoted to foreign investor show that Malaysia is an international Islamic financial hub and had recognized by worldwide and continues lead at the front of the development of Sukuk bond. The strength of Sukuk is lies in its own unique framework. Sukuk can carry distinct value position to issuers and investors. The Sukuk growths rapidly because had few factors. 1. Structure growth sophistication. Sukuk have a good superiority which is it had the flexibility of Sukuk structure to lead its growth continuously and it also can meet the requirement and preferences of investor and issuers by tailored suitable Sukuk to them. Now a day, Malaysia have more than a types of Sukuk in the market such as profit and loss sharing (Musyarakah), cost plus financing (Murabahah), deferred payment (Al-Bai Bithaman Ajil), leasing (Al-Ijarah), agent(Al-Wakalah) and so on to wider range of investors. Figure 4: Type of Sukuk apporeved in Malaysia In 2011, Malaysia has few types of Sukuk approved in Malaysia Sukuk market and types of Sukuk in Malaysia market can classified to Contracts of participation and exchange. Contracts of participation are such as Mudharabah Sukuk and Musyarakah Sukuk. Contracts of exchanges are such as Murabahah and Ijarah. The largest number of investor invest is Musyarakah, the number is around 63% in Sukuk market. The second largest is Ijarah, its around 15% in Sukuk market. 2. Clarity on the regulatory treatment. Excellent regulatory treatment in Sukuk structure has provided regulatory certainty to Islamic financial institutions with regard to their investments.The adherence of the Capital Adequacy Standard was accomplish and issued by the Islamic Financial Services Board (IFSB) 3. Strategic centralize to develop overall Islamic financial system. Every investor or issuers have it own demand or requirement therefore Sukuk can base on each investor or issuers to choice suitable own Sukuk to themselves. For example, in takaful operators the investors can choice medium or long-term liabilities of takaful funds. 2.1 Introduction to Mechanism of Sukuk Bond Sukuk bond is one of the Islamic financial products which grow rapidly nowadays. It is generally known as Shariah compliant  [1]  bond as it is structured according to the Islamic principles. The Accounting and Auditing Organization for Islamic Financial Institutions (AAOIFI) has defined sukuk as the certificates of equal value that represent an undivided share in the ownership of the underlying asset, usufruct, services or investments in particular projects or special investment activities. (Institutions, 2008) Besides, sukuk bond also can be described as an asset-based investment because the investor which is the sukuk holder owns the undivided interest in the underlying asset even if bad situation occurs. Sukuk bond is not a debt certificate, hence, the claim of sukuk bond is not just a claim to cash flow but it also represents the ownership claim on a pool of underlying assets. However, under the various types of sukuk which structured based on different Islamic principles, the investor has different rights and obligations. When the sukuk is represent the ownership of the underlying asset such as Ijarah sukuk, the investor can claims not only on the underlying asset. But, at the same time, it can be claimed against the cash flow and revenues generated from the sale of the asset. Besides, for the sukuk which issued as the sale of asset-based through the contract of exchange such as the Murabahah and Istina sukuk, the investor has the rights to claim against the cash flow from the contract of exchange but not on the physical asset. This is due to the transfer of ownership which is now to the obligator. On the other hand, for the type of sukuk which provide funds for projects such as Musyarakah sukuk and Mudharabah sukuk, the investor has the rights on the undivided interest in the specific investments. The difference in both of this sukuk is just that the musyarakah sukuk holder shares both the profit and loss however the mudharabah sukuk holder share only the profit while loss will not be sharing. (Bank Negara Malaysia and Securities Commission Malaysia, 2009) Therere many types of sukuk bond which is structured based on various approved Islamic concepts and principles. Among the 14 types of sukuk which are identified by AAOIFI, the most common sukuk included Ijarah sukuk (leasing of specific assets) and the Musyarakah sukuk (profit loss-sharing scheme). Therere also other types of sukuk which included Murabahah sukuk (cost-plus sale), Istina sukuk (project finance), Mudharabah sukuk (profit-sharing), Salam sukuk, Hybrid sukuk and so forth. In the end of October 2011, Musyarakah sukuk leads the biggest proportion among the various types of sukuk bond which is 59%. It then was following by Ijarah sukuk (13%), Murabahah sukuk (10%), Mudharabah sukuk (9%) and Wakalah sukuk (9%). (Team, 2012) 2.2 Similarities and Differences between Sukuk Bond and Conventional Bond Sukuk bond shared some similar characteristics with the conventional bond. For instances, both of these bonds have a fixed term maturity, can bear a coupon and are tradable on the normal yield price. Besides, both of the sukuk bond and conventional bond have similarities in the following features: marketability, rate ability, enhance ability and also the versatility. (What is Sukuk?) Both of them are liquid instruments, therefore can be easily transferred and tradable in the financial markets. Furthermore, both of these bonds are structured based on the assets that generate revenues. The revenue generated from the underlying asset is the source of income to pay for the profit on the sukuk bond. (Bank Negara Malaysia and Securities Commission Malaysia, 2009) However, there still have differences among the sukuk bond and the conventional bond. First of all, conventional bond is structured in such a way that the interest is the main point of all those transactions. The issuance of conventional bond is based on the exchange of paper and it doesnt represent the ownership of conventional bondholders in the enterprises that issue the bond. Rather, it represents the interest-bearing debt owed to the conventional bondholders. Consequently, the issuer of conventional bond has the contractually obligation in paying the interest and also the principal to the bondholders on a specific date. On the other hand, sukuk bond is structured in a way that the issuance is based on the exchange of an approved asset. Because of the prohibition of interest charging by Islamic law, sukuk bond allows the sukuk bondholders to claim an undivided ownership in the underlying asset and share the revenues generated from the underlying asset. Furthermore, sukuk bond is different with conventional bond due to its asset-based features. When the situation occurs where the issuer of conventional bond is unable to pay for the debt they owed to the bondholders, the bondholders which is the investors will face a great loss on their investments. This is because the contract usually doesnt guarantee that the asset can be secured and be used to recover at least partial of the investments. However, for sukuk bond, because it is asset-based and the sukuk bondholders have undivided ownership on the underlying asset, even how bad the situation, the investors can claim against major part of their investment. Hence, the sukuk bondholders are more protected from this kind of risk compared to the conventional bondholders. Besides, the issuance of sukuk bond must compliant with the Islamic law in its nature and use. However for the conventional bond, it can be issue for almost any purposes as long as it is legal under jurisdiction. Next, for the sukuk bondholders, the expenses that related to the underlying asset may be attached to them while the conventional bondholders are not responsible in these asset-related expenses. 2.3 Benefits of Sukuk Bond Sukuk bond which structured compliant with the Islamic law have the following benefits. First of all, it acts as a tool for banks and Islamic financial institutions in liquidity management. (Benefits of Sukuk) When the bank and financial institutions have excess amount of liquidity, they can use these excess money to purchase and invest in sukuk bond. Meanwhile, when theyre in the need of liquidity, they can choose to sell their sukuk bond through the secondary market. This clearly shows the features of sukuk bond which is liquid and hence can be easily traded in the financial market. Besides, sukuk bond provides a way in raising funds. It allows the corporate to raise funds through the issuance of sukuk bond. However, the sukuk bond can only be issue for any purpose that complaint with Islamic law. Furthermore, due to the asset-based feature of sukuk bond, it offers a lower risk and hence reduces the cost of financing. This is because even when bad situation happen to the issuer of sukuk bond, the investors can claim against the ownership on the underlying asset and get recover from major partial of their investment. 2.4 Sukuk Guidelines Starts from 1 July 2000, any issuance, offer or invitation of sukuk has to get approval from the Securities Commission Malaysia (SC) under section 212 of the Capital Markets and Services Act 2007 (CMSA)  [2]  (Malaysia S. C., Introduction, 2011) The following information are the guidelines which stated by Securities Commission Malaysia (SC) and effective from 12 August 2011 (Malaysia S. C., 2011). Any corporation that wishes to issue, offer or make an invitation of sukuk has to first appoint a principal adviser who specified by the SC in the Principal Adviser Guidelines. The purpose of appointing a principal adviser is to help the corporation to seek approval from SC for the proposed issue, offer or invitation of sukuk. (Malaysia S. C., Issuers Submission of Proposals, 2011) Therere a set of documents and a declaration letter that SC requires the issuer to submit through the principal adviser. These documents and the declaration letter are needed to obtain the approval from SC. (Malaysia S. C., Appendix, 2011) Two hard copies and one electronic copy of these documents should be submitted. Within 14 working days after SC receives the required documents and declaration letter, SC will either grant its approval or reject the proposal which doesnt fully follow the guideline. Once the issuer obtains the approval from SC, they should submit another set of documents (Malaysia S. C., Appendix, 2011) to SC through their principal adviser. (Malaysia S. C., Documents and Information Required, 2011) Besides, the issuer is required to conjunct with the principal adviser in appointing a Shariah adviser to make sure that the documentation, structure and the mechanism of sukuk are following the Islamic law. Therere plenty of Shariah rulings that have to follow for all types of sukuk as well as some specific type of sukuk in the requirement of underlying asset, asset pricing, compensation and so forth. (Malaysia S. C., Appointment of Shariah Adviser Shariah Rulings Applicable, 2011) Meanwhile, the underwriting of any issue, offer or invitation of sukuk will depends on the decision of the issuer. (Malaysia S. C., Underwriting, 2011) The implementation time frame for sukuk issuance is within one year from the date of the approval of SC except for the case of shelf registration scheme which must be implemented within two years. (Malaysia S. C., Implementation Time Frame for Sukuk Programme or Sukuk Issuance, 2011) 2.5 Sukuk Market in Malaysia From the journal, we know that the sukuk market has been developed rapidly in this decade with the evidence that more than 50% of Malaysias bond market belong to the sukuk market. Sukuk market in Malaysia successfully attract the attention of international corporations and multilateral agencies and drawn a lots of participation of these parties in raising funds and as well as investing in the sukuk market. Moreover, sukuk market of Malaysia is now having continuous innovation such as it offers the chance for international corporations to participate and plays a role in our Islamic financial system. As mentioned before, there have a greater development compared to the beginning of Malaysias sukuk market which our country started with a RM125 million of issue size by Shell MDS Sdn. Bhd.. The improving development once again can be clearly proven by the shoot up of the value of sukuk issue which is at RM15.4 billion by the Binariang GSM Sdn. Bhd. Besides, Malaysia is the fastest growing country in the global for the area of sukuk market with 22% of average annual growth within the period of 2001 until 2007. Therere a lots of efforts that has been put in the sukuk market to enhance its stability. First of all, to ensure the financial stability, Malaysia had cooperated with several regulatory authorities and participates in Islamic Financial Services Board (IFSB), Islamic Financial Stability Forum (IFSF), Islamic Development Bank (IDB) and also involve itself in the International Islamic Liquidity Management Corporation (IILM). Besides, the introduction of new type of financial instruments which has the extended maturity profiles has brought the Malaysias sukuk market to become more innovative. This is because it increases the diversity of both local and foreign participants and also meets the requirements of both issuers and investors so that there will be a win-win situation. Meanwhile, the increasing number of issuance in foreign currency had successfully extended the international gateway and attracts the participations from foreign countries in Malaysias sukuk market. This in turns s peed up the development of our sukuk market and also facilitate a good relationship with the international financial markets. The development of Malaysias sukuk market brings the economy to become more diversified and more driven by the private sector than the government. This is shown by the increasing demand for the financing requirements from private sector compared to the market which is previously mainly control by the Government debt securities. In a nut shell, Malaysia leads the development of sukuk market not only in terms of total sukuk issuance which accounted 68.9% of total global outstanding at the end of 2007, but at the same time showed excellent performance in the innovative sukuk structure and is more competitive in attracting the investors. In the future, Malaysia will continue its efforts to enhance the relationship with others international financial markets through ways such as partnership or maybe cooperation. (Technology, Sukuk Market in Malaysia, 2011) 2.6 Challenges of Sukuk Market According to the journal, we understand about few challenges that occur in sukuk market. First of all, the sukuk market faced the problem when there is lack of uniformity in the procedures that applied Shariahs principles. The lack of professional in Shariah standards and also the lack of awareness of the employers and manager of sukuk even make the things worse. Besides, when it comes to the collaborations among the countries, things become challenges because each country has their own laws and some of their laws will conflict with Islamic financial system and has to be amending in order to operate the system. Furthermore, therere still occur the gap of knowledge even though AAOIFI, Central Bank of Malaysia and also other organizations have put efforts in distributing the information to the public. Therefore, more focus have to put at the information dissemination through ways such as forums, training as well as set up more education center. Last but not least, it is difficult to maintain the unique features of sukuk. This is because those who already get used with the characteristics of conventional products will tend to request for the products which has the same characteristics with conventional products. This in turns will neglect the identity of the unique sukuk bond. (Technology, Challenges in Sukuk Market, 2011) Trading of Sukuk Market in Malaysia Between these ten years, the institutional arrangements particular gave a greater focus to develop the sukuk market. The sukuk market now accounts for more than fifty percent of Malaysias bond market. The market has drawn the participation from a wide range of international corporations and multilateral agencies in raising funds and investing in the sukuk issuances out of Malaysia. More lately, there has also been continuous innovation and an increasing number of issuances in foreign currency. As Malaysia offers international participation in the Islamic financial system, also offer to be an international gateway, particularly in strengthening the link between the two important dynamic growth regions of Asia and the Middle East. (Zeti Akhtar Aziz, 2010) Shell MDS Sdn. Bhd. started Malaysias sukuk market with a simple issue size of RM125 million in 1990 and is growing in size and increasingly sophisticated now. This development is evident in the largest sukuk issue recently valued at RM15.4 billion which is USD4.7 billion by Binariang GSM Sdn. Bhd. Now, the sukuk market in Malaysia with an average annual growth of 22% issued for the period 2001-2007 is among the fastest growing in the world. Malaysia has continued it success by introducing innovative sukuk structures such as convertible sukuk musyarakah by Khazanah Nasional Berhad, the Malaysian government investment holding company after introducing the first sovereign global sukuk in the world in 2002. This combines the features of the first full convertibility is usually only used for conventional equity-linked transactions is a historic issue of the first of its kind in the world. (Central Bank of Malaysia, 2007) Malaysia also continues to collaborate with other regulatory authorities to ensure financial stability in the Islamic financial system. This will be through Malaysias active involvement in the Islamic Financial Services Board (IFSB), the Islamic Financial Stability Forum (IFSF), the initiatives by the Islamic Development Bank (IDB), and finally in the newly formed International Islamic Liquidity Management Corporation (IILM). Depth and liquidity of the market has increased by secondary trading in the Malaysian sukuk market with the participation of more companies, including foreign-owned companies continued use of this market for funding purposes. Long-term funding needs are financed by a large number of corporate issuance. The diversity and size of the sukuk transaction was the increasing value proposition is very attractive to investors who want to diversify their asset portfolios, therefrom creating a vibrant secondary market. The Malaysian sukuk market has also grown to become more sophisticated and innovative to meet the multiplex risk-return requirements and profiles of both investors and issuers. Diversified range of players have been generated by the proliferation of new types of instruments with extended maturity profiles , both local and foreign to participate in the market. This was facilitated by the liberalization of the market in 2005 to allow for issuance of debt securities by foreign corporations and multilateral agencies in ringgit denominated papers. This was extended to foreign currency denominated issuances in year 2007. Actually, this has attracted many multilateral agencies, multinational corporations and foreign corporations to raise funds and invest in origination and issuances out of Malaysia, therefore enhancing the Malaysian market, and strengthening Malaysias inter-linkages with other international financial markets. The transformation of the Malaysian economy has been accompanied by the development of the sukuk market in Malaysia that has now become more private and diversified sector driven. The Government debt securities initially dominated the market, now reflects the growing demand for the long term financing requirements of the private sector. Now, the corporate sector raises 58% of their financing requirements through the sukuk market and debt securities compared to ten years ago is about 33%. The presence of a liquid and deep debt securities and sukuk market thus contributes towards the stability of the financial system. Now, with a number of Malaysias sukuk issues by 68.9%, or USD62 billion (or RM213 billion) of total global outstanding at the end of year 2007, Malaysia is the worlds largest sukuk market. Amount of corporate sukuk in Malaysia more than RM30 billion in year 2007. Malaysia not only lead the development of the sukuk market in terms of total sukuk issuance, even in terms of the introduction of innovative sukuk structures and competitive to attract more individual or corporation investors. Moving forward, Malaysia will continue its efforts in strengthening our international linkages in the global Islamic financial system through cooperation and collaborative partnerships with the objective of contributing towards greater economic integration and international financial. Certainly, sukuk ( Islamic bond ) proved that it is among the most successful Islamic financial product in the industry and be one of the fastest-growing sectors in the global financial landscape. Type of Sukuk Bonds Ijarah Sukuk Ijarah sukuk is an Islamic alternate of conventional leasing. Ijarah is a contract the distribution of funds to use right transfer (benefit) of an item within a certain time to the lease payments (ujrah), between the finance company as the lessor (muajjir) with tenants (mustajir) not followed by transfer of ownership of the goods themselves [1]. These are sukuk that represent ownership of equal shares in a rented real estate or the usufruct of the real estate. In other words, issuing certificates of ownership of assets, leased to a particular consumer is known as Sukuk Al Ijarah or simply Ijarah Sukuk. Other than that, Ijarah sukuk also is a bond between a bank with consumer to take on an item or even object leases and bank-owned banks have a service fee for items which is rent, and at the end with the purchase of leasing object by the consumer. (In Shaukats (2010) article, Common Structures of Sukuk, Ijarah sukuk were described as Ijarah sukuk are the securities representing ownership of well defined existing and known assets tied up to a lease contract, rental of which is the return payable to sukuk holders. (p. 10).) Ijarah sukuk have a main concept which means selling the benefit of apply or service for a fixed price or salary. Base on this concept, the Islamic bank make it available to the consumer applies of service of assets or equipments for a fixed period of time and also the price. 1Source: Sharia Economy Journal, Ijarah Definition (2011) Figure 5: The process of Ijarah SukukSukuk al-Ijarah.png The chart above shows few stages of the transaction process. First stage is Contract of Cash Sale. SPV purchases property from obligator as the step 1 above, such as SPV purchases hospital from government. After that, the assets purchased by the SPV are funded by the issuance of sukuk which is trust certificates which represents beneficial  ownership in the assets and the lease as the step 3 shown above. Besides that, government received cash proceeds as step 7 while Stage 2 is Contract of Leasing (Ijarah). At first, SPV rents property to the government for specified period which is step 2 shown above. After that, step 6 shows that SPV collects rentals. During the tenure, SPV passed the rentals to investors as the step 9. For your information, example is periodic distribution or coupon. Continually, at the maturity, SPV sells the property to the government at an agreed price. Government pays cash to SPV. Lastly, SPV simultaneously pay investors cash for sukuk redemption. Musharakah Sukuk Musharakah sukuk is a structure of partnership which is used in Islamic finance instead of interest-bearing loans. It is also a mode of financing against which Sukuks can be issued for. It does not differ from the Mudaraba sukuk except in the organization of the relationship between the party issuing such sukuk and holders of these sukuk, whereby the party issuing sukuk forms a committee from the holders of the sukuk who can be referred to in investment decisions [1]. Musharaka Sukuk are used for mobilizing the funds for establishing a new project or developing an existing one or financing a business activity on the basis of partnership contracts (Shaukat, 2010). Moreover, Musharakah Sukuk have a specified maturity date, and are negotiable in the secondary market. In the assets of the Musharakah sukuk, for every sukuk would have a representative holders proportionate ownership. These Musharaka certificates can be treated as negotiable instruments and can be bought and sold in the secondary market [2]. Musharakah sukuk  allows each party involved in a business to share in the profits and risks. Other than that, profit earned by the Musharakah sukuk is shared according to an agreed ratio between the Issuer and Investors at an agreement. Although the profit and loss is sharing, while it shared between the investors as per investment ratio only. Besides that, to ensure the tradability of Musharakah sukuks, all the assets should not be in liquid form. 1Source: Accounting and Auditing Organization for Islamic Financial Institution, AAOIFI 2Source:Common Structure of Sukuks, Mughees Shaukat Figure 6: The process of Musharakah SukukSukuk al-Musharaka.png From the above shown that, at the beginning, Corporate and the Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) enter into a Musharakah Arrangement for a fixed period and an agreed profit-sharing ratio. Thus, the corporate undertakes to buy Musharakah shares of the SPV on a periodic basis. First, Corporate (as Musharik) contributes land or other physical assets to the Musharakah. After that, in 2 a b shown that SPV (as Musharik)