Category: Business

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Business

One company, multiple faces

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AAPL: is Apple a computer maker, an eletronic (fashion) gadgets maker, or music store? It’s all of the above. I did not realized it’s the No. 3 music retailer in the US until a few weeks ago (behind Wal-mart and Best Buy). The reason is it created the digital music market: iTune.

For graphical designers, Apple is a computer maker; for music lovers, Apple is the new “Sony” because the iPod is the new “Walkman”. For musicians, record and movie companies, iTune is the retail channel. I think that relation is similar to that between Cocacola and McDonald (Coke relies on MCD to sell its coke, Sprite etc.)

GOOG: many people misunderstood it when it went public in Summer 2004, it’s just another technology (search) company, right? Now we all know it’s the world largest advertisement broker (Internet). For many small business owners, it’s the place to put target ads (AdWord); for publishers and bloggers, its adSense let them make money. Of course for web users, it’s arguably the best search engine. For Bill Gates and his troops in Redmond, it’s the biggest threat.

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Business Fun

More about Nike NKE

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I wrote about Nike (NKE) a while ago during NBA finals. I joked about Nike is the loser in this NBA finals because their super star James’ team lost. Obviously in the real world Nike is doing very well, especially internationally (Europe and Asia, specificialy China). Here is their quarterly report. This is not surpising consider my mom, who is not into fashions or sports, asked me “buy a pair of Nike shoes” for my 12 years old niece. Note when she talked about the Nike shoes, she was referring to the shoes in sneakers category. Just like when people talked about “google something”, they are referring to “search something on the web”.

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Business

Chipotle and Panera

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Went to Chipotle Mexican Grill in my neighbourhood yesterday. I heard about it because of its stock (CMG) has done very well since IPO early last year (up 88%). I was curious about the food and the atmosphere so I went. It seems there are lots of young people, I mean people in 20s (Generation Y), which are generally younger than Panera crowd. At Panera, there are many older people in the morning. Also there are people working and gathering at Panera because of its free Wifi access and community feeling.

chipotle pic

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Business

Week in Review 06-17 to 06-23

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Brown Shoes goes to China (STLtoday): Brown Shoe Co. late Tuesday announced that it has entered a joint venture with a Chinese company to open more than 500 shoe stores in China by 2012.

MSFT modifies source for Vista (Reuters): Microsoft Corp. has agreed to modify its new Vista operating system in response to complaints that its desktop search function puts Google Inc. and other potential competitors at a disadvantage, a source familiar with the case told Reuters on Tuesday.

Retail woes: Both Circuit City and Best Buy reported disappointed earnings amid price wars on LCD TV etc.

Yang takes driver seat @Yahoo: Jerry Young, became the CEO of the company he co-founded 12 years ago.

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Business China Web

Software Localization in China

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Here is the definition from Per Dohler, a software localization guru: Localization is the process of adapting a product, in our context a software program, to a specific locale, i.e., to its language, standards and cultural norms as well as to the needs and expectations of a specific target market. A properly localized product also meets all the legal requirements in force in the user’s region. Wikipedia also has a good description. GiltWorld is a Chinese site dedicated to the software localization in China.

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Business China

New Oriental Education EDU ?

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I received an email from a friend asking me whether New Oriental Eudcation (EDU) will be a good investment or not. I was not warm to it initially, changed my mind and bought it in Jan., sold it in Feb., because I did not know how to evaluate it.  

First I want to say EDU is in a very sweet spot in Chinese private education market: English and test preparation. A little background, English is a very important skill in finding good jobs in China these days: from multinational companies to domestic companies, from private sector to goverment, and non-for-profit, all because the increasing interactions between China and the west in last 20 years.

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Business

Piper Jaffray Consumer Conference

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Here is a link to their 27th annual conference. I only listened to CROX session. One thing come out of it is they just completed a $10 m plant in Dong’guan, China; and they have a design team in China, in addition to teams in US, Canada and Italy. Crocs employs 3,500 people worldwide at this time.

CROX_cn_plant 

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Business

Is Advertisement too Invasive ?

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Ad is everywhere these days, from Newspaper, TV to Internet. In China there is such thing called LCD sreen ad. Focus Media (FMCN) made big money out of this, although recently some residential home owners got a bit tired of this because they want some peace in their apartment’s elevator.

In the US it appears to me TV is coming to Internet more and more, I mean, the video clips, such as this one from Fisher Investments, a wealth management firm managed by Ken Fisher. I used to receive (junk) mails from them, now I can see the ad on Forbes. Fisher was a columnist on Forbes.

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Business China

Shanghai Composite Index 8000 ?

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You know I am kidding, do you? We all know the bubble is there, but how much bubble do we got? Is bubble going to burst very soon? These are the questions the investors (more accurately speculators) in China should ask.

In my mind, there are fundamental reasons for this rising of Chinese equity values: over liquidity (too much money, too little stocks); improvement of company fundamentals including rapid growth; Gu Gai (the stock reform which remove cloud from the floating shares), etc.

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Business Fun

Ted Drewes, CompUSA and Dell-Mart

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I stopped by the Ted Drewes today, the best Ice Cream place in St. Louis. Surprisingly, it only has two stores in St. Louis, and the owners intentionly kept it that way. In other words, they don’t want to grow into Hagen Dazs, or something like that. By keeping it small and community-involved, they provided ice creams for St. Louisans and visitors since 1931. Today I saw the sign, where the Mayor of St. Louis declared Feb 17 as “Ted Drewes’ Day”. WOW.   

Ted Drewes

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