Eliot Rosewater

â€Å"God bless you Mr. Rosewater† is a phrase spoken but never meant. Eliot Rosewater serves a purpose to everyone but himself within the God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater standing as a back post for the weak and merciful poor, and as an undeniable powerhouse amongst the wealthy. Eliot Rosewater is as confused about himself as all others are around him, having enough money to take care of an entire family, yet spreading the wealth amongst his community. He lives alone inside of himself, standing by the telephone day and night, waiting for a phone call. This is what makes Eliot Rosewater the unlikely hero, he is a fool and a criminal in the minds of his father and his colleagues yet he stands as a god amongst his community, the people he cares about more than life itself. Eliot Rosewater stands out to the reader and the characters within the novel due to his lack of the one trait we all share, greed. The actions of Eliot show that he is a man that has struggled to do more than is expected of him, feeling guilt; he is a character that is struggling to make things right in a world he does not understand. Eliot Rosewater inherits the Rosewater fortune after his father sees him fit to do so, leaving Eliot in charge while his father remains senator of Rosewater, Indiana. Rosewater begins as a man that’s apparently very intelligent but feels lost in the world that surrounds him. He sees no purpose for himself, as of this time he was not head of the Rosewater Foundation. Eliot attends schools such as Harvard during his young adult life. After graduating from Harvard, Eliot deems himself unfit to continue through the motions of society and instead enlists himself into the military. After returning home from the war he marries a woman named Sylvia and tries to begin a new life. However, he is plagued by his responsibility for the death of a child during the war. Rosewater begins to drink while trying to maintain a life with his new love and be the head of the Rosewater Foundation. Eventually Eliot is an alcoholic and his marriage is in pieces, the only thing thriving being his foundation. Sylvia becomes obsessed with the wealth, feeling indifferent to the struggles of those less fortunate, breaks down and is told by her doctor to divorce Eliot and leave the county. Eliot becomes a volunteer fireman and a philanthropist, struggling to help the community due to the fact that his life is in shambles. Eliot realizes that his greatest purpose in this world is to take care of his family, the community of Rosewater, Indiana. Eliot takes care of his community through actions such as donations and help money. Sleeping by a telephone, Eliot is awakened each night with a phone call from someone in distress, asking them how much it would take to keep them alive for one more week. Eliot begins to act simply for his community, often times ignoring his own needs such as hunger and thirst. Eliot’s later actions show how he has changed as a person throughout the book, beginning life lost, he maneuvered through life without meaning or purpose. Eliot enlists in the army, showing that he feels that there is something better that he could do with his life. Eliot then lives the rest of his life in regret, hating himself for what he did to that child during the war, disconnecting himself from Sylvia and his father, hating that he can have so much money with the awful thing he did while so many of the good innocent hard working people of his community have nothing. By Eliot giving money to the members of his community we can tell that he is truly sorry for what he has done and is seeking forgiveness for his actions, perhaps trying to pay a debt to God or even to that child. This changes him from an innocent man with no purpose in life, to a guilty man who has a debt to repay, therefore pushing his life in a direction, toward helping his community. His feelings and actions can be seen on page 193: â€Å"Hello, babies. Welcome to Earth. It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It's round and wet and crowded. At the outside, babies, you've got about a hundred years here. There's only one rule that I know of, babies — â€Å"God damn it, you've got to be kind. † The significance of Eliot Rosewater is more than just a character, if you can call him that. Eliot Rosewater stands as a symbol, a purpose and an idea set in motion, a breathing thought. As Kurt Vonnegut says: â€Å"A sum of money is a leading character in this tale about people, just as a sum of honey might properly be a leading character in a tale about bees. â€Å" Money stands as a leading character in the novel; Eliot simply stands as the hands that hold it. Mr. Rosewater can’t really be put into the categories of â€Å"flat† or â€Å"static† because he simply does not act like a character within a novel should act. Eliot never shows his guilt or feelings to anyone, and instead the reader must find out about it through the narrator, Kurt Vonnegut. To the reader Eliot seems completely sane and almost appears as the hero of the tale, where as his relationship to the other characters tells a different story. Eliot stands as a radical, a man with no purpose or understanding of the cast system. Eliot Rosewater begins with a clean slate, going nowhere in his life. He ends with a few chips on his shoulder, yet with a purpose in his life more important than any of the other characters. Rosewater gives his fortune away to his community, claiming them as his children. Eliot’s characteristics stand him apart from every other character, being the only selfless character within the entire novel. His suffering leads him to completely happiness at the climax of the novel, leaving his friends and family in with misunderstanding stares.

The Effects of Various DDT Residue Levels Found in Infants via Breast Milk

The effects of assorted DDT residue degrees found in babies via chest milk sing their overall wellness hazard and safety, for malarial bar in developing states. Malaria is known to be a dangerous disease transmitted to people via bites of septic mosquitoes, and besides really common in insanitary environments. For malarial bar, a relentless insect powder called DDT was used worldwide as a inexpensive and effectual agencies of vector control ( Walter et. Al, 2005 ) . An acceptable sum of DDT is by and large non toxic to worlds, but it was banned in 2001, chiefly for ecological grounds ( Walter et. Al, 2005 ) . Some researches have shown that exposure of DDT at needful sums for malarial control, can do pre-term birth and early ablactation in in order to cut down infant mortality from malaria ( Walter et. Al, 2005 ) . As Indoor Residual Spraying ( IRS ) of insect powders tends to be the lone feasible option to eliminate malaria in certain states, an exposure to occupants and babies which is of higher hazard, is difficult to forestall ( Bouwman et al. , 2006 ; Bouwman et al. , 2009 ) .This exposure of DDT to babies was through chest milk which in some instances found exceeds the acceptable consumption degrees, thereby potentially consequences to infant mortality ( Bouwman et. Al, 2009 ) . With appraisal and consideration of World Health Organization Pesticide Evaluation Scheme ( WHOPES ) , safety and hazards of these chemicals was taken into history for tolerable and acceptable steps ( Bouwman et. Al, 2009 ) . Assorted surveies have shown that the consumptions exceed maximal acceptable degrees of consumption induces inauspicious effects on babies, which have been convincingly proven to be a menace to encephalon and endocrinal systems ( Azeredo et al. , 2008 ; Bouwamn et al. , 2009 ; Walter et al. , 2005 ) . It is during the chest eating period that any baby may be exposed to the highest lifetime concentration of insect powders, hence pregnant and/or female parents, babies and yearlings are largely prone to wellness hazard in developing states with high malarial infection rates ( Bouwman et. Al, 2009 ) .This paper will concentrate on DDT residue degrees found in human breastmilk from malaria infected countries such as South Africa and Brazil, and placental transportation of DDT in mother-infant braces from Northern Thailand. The end was to analyze the exposure and consumption of DDT residue degrees by babies in chest milk associated with hormone and neurological effects Methods Participants Harmonizing to the research survey done by Bouwman et Al. ( 2006 ) , a sum of 152 female parents successfully donated at clinics situated in Ubombo and Ngwavuma territories of the Northern parts of the Kwazulu-Natal Province of South Africa. However, merely around 10 female parents from Mkuze did non take part. None of them had any inadvertent exposure to pesticides, except for working on farm lands or through malarial control. Bouwman et Al. ( 2006 ) mentioned that the cognition known by these female parents sing pesticide usage and safety was limited. There were no important differences ( P & lt ; 0.05 ) for maternal age, between para I and multiparae ages in the three towns ( Bouwman et al. , 2006 ) . Besides, there were no important differences between the ages of the babies of these female parents, and degrees of milk fat between any of the groups ( Bouwman et al. , 2006 ) . In another survey made by Azeredo et Al. ( 2008 ) at Medeira River basin in Brazil, they have collected a sum of 69 different breastmilk samples. These samples were collected through broad oral cavity flasks and stored in deep-freeze for farther analysis. Similar nutrient diets were taken by these female parents, chiefly based on cassava flour, some fruits, and majorly fish ingestion ( Azeredo et al. , 2008 ) . Notably, Azeredo et Al. ( 2008 ) reported that fish ingestion was a chief beginning of DDT to worlds, due to taint and exposure of DDT on fishes. In add-on, they assessed that there were no pesticide usage in Amazonian agribusiness, and no female parent was prior exposed to DDT. Last, from the survey tested by Sapbamrer et Al. ( 2008 ) on Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane degrees through placental transportation from female parent to infant in Chiang Dao ( Thailand ) , a sum of 88 pregnant adult females who had normal bringing and full term gestation were taken as the studied topics. Hence, sum of 88 cord and maternal serum samples were examined utilizing gas chromatography-electron gaining control sensing ( GC-ECD ) . Materials and Procedure All surveies followed similar process in sample aggregation, analysis and statistical comparings. The aggregation of milk samples were put manually into glass beakers ( Azeredo et al.,2008 ; Bouwman et al. , 2005 ) . However, Sapbamrer et Al. ( 2008 ) collected 10 milliliter of maternal blood extracted by venipuncture about 2 to 5 hours prior to being sent to bringing room, and 12 milliliter of cord blood taken after bringing. The milk samples were so put under stop deading procedure and stored until analysis. After deicing the milk samples, analysis measure was assessed. Here, deproteinised was done by utilizing 30 mL propanone and extracted with n-hexane in African samples ( Bouwman et al. , 2005 ) . However in Brazil samples, homogenisation was done by hot bath at 37Â °C anterior to analysis, and deproteinization procedure occurred utilizing 10 mL propanone and extraction with 10 milliliters n-hexane ( Azeredo et al.,2008 ) . On all three surveies, DDT residues found were analyzed utilizing gas chromatography-electron gaining control sensing ( GC-ECD ) . DDT compounds were categorized in 5 constituents such asP, P-DDE ( 1,1-dichloro-2,2-bis ( p-chlorophenyl ) ethene ) ,P, P-DDT ( 1,1,1-trichloro-2,2-bis ( p-chlorophenyl ) C2H6 ) ,P, P-DDD ( 1,1-dichloro-2,2-bis ( p-chlorophenyl ) C2H6 ) ,O, P-DDE ( 1,1-dichloro-2- ( o-chlorophenyl ) -2- ( p-chlorophynyl ) ethene ) , andO, P-DDT ( 1,1,1-trichloro-2- ( o-chlorophenyl ) -2- ( pchlorophynyl ) C2H6 ) ( Azeredo et al.,2008 ; Bouwman et al. , 2005 ; Sapbamrer et al. , 2008 ) . Quality control method specifically method-detection bounds was so completed for analyses on chromatograms and standard divergence between group samples to detect any significances. Finally statistical comparings were laid out between sample groups to find any significance on degrees of DDT found in breastmilk and mother-infant blood samples. Consequences Bouwman et Al. ( 2006 ) yielded consequences from samples that indicate all African female parents contain DDT residues in their breastmilk. Specifically, the metabolite nowadays in all these DDT compound found in the breastmilk samples wasP, P-DDE. All female parents had noticeable sums ofP, P-DDT, except for 2 from para I group signifier Mkuze, but non all of them had noticeable sums ofP, P-DDD. The degrees of O, P-DDT, DDE, and DDD were lower than the P, P degrees, which was expected. Overall, the entire DDT per centum obtained was highest in Jozini multiparae ( 42.65 % ) compared to Mkuze para I which had low Numberss due to really few participants accounted at that place. Azeredo et Al. ( 2008 ) found that all samples contained DDT taint, as evident from the figure below. The DDT metabolites ranged from 25.4 to 9361.9 nanograms of entire DDT/g lipoid, with a median of 369.6 nanograms of entire DDT/g of lipid and 8.7 of estimated day-to-day consumption ( EDI ) of entire DDT exceeded the acceptable day-to-day consumption by the World Health Organization ( WHO ) . The highest value of DDT observed was 9361.9 nanogram, taken from a primapara female parent of 27 old ages of age. Note. This is where the writers show that all samples collected in Madeira River ( Brazil ) contain DDT, runing from 25.4-9361.9 nanogram of entire DDT/g lipoid. Sapbamrer et Al. ( 2008 ) has besides shown that all cord and maternal blood samples extracted contain DDT compounds. This can be shown from the tabular array 1 below, majorly bespeaking thatP, P-DDE compound were found in all cord and maternal samples andP, P-DDT in about every cord and all maternal samples. Overall, there were highest degrees ofP, P-DDE, followed by 2nd and 3rd highest degrees detected wereP, P-DDD andP, P-DDT. In footings of correlativity coefficients analyses between DDT compounds in cord and maternal blood samples shown at table 2 below, important differences were observed. The ratios calculated ofP, P-DDE,P, P-DDD andP, P-DDT were less than 1, thereby meaning high correlativity coefficients. Whereas, the ratio for O, P-DDE was higher than 1, meaning low correlativity coefficients, and in conclusion the ratio forO, P-DDT was & gt ; 0.05 P rendering it non-significant for analysis. Therefore, acocording to Sapbamrer et Al. ( 2008 ) , the analysis of correlativity coefficients between DDT compounds in cord and maternal samples showed the ability of DDT chemicals to be transmitted from female parents to foetuss via placenta with respects to metabolic rate alteration, blood flow and lipid content of mother-infant. Note 1.The writers show concentrate on marked % DDT detected on DDT compounds highest to lowest such asP, P-DDE,P, P-DDD andP, P-DDT. Note 2.For the ratios ofP, P-DDE,P, P-DDD andP, P-DDT lower than 1 show high correlativity coefficients, whileO, P-DDT compound show opposite consequences andO, P-DDE as non-significant. Review/Discussion All research surveies mentioned above yielded the presence of DDT compound found in the samples. Despite the forbiddance of DDT usage in agricultural activities and malarial control plan, DDT win an ability to prevail in environments for long periods of clip, the exposure and taint of the chemical is inevitable, and notably can be transmitted through nutrient concatenation ( Sapbamrer et al. , 2008 ) . DDT degrees found in breastmilk from Brazilian female parents, indicated that the chemical was transmitted from their fish diet, as suggested by Azeredo et Al. ( 2008 ) . Consumption of fish is considered a good beginning of DDT and other pesticides. The presence of DDT in the fishes in Brazilian Amazon can be accounted due to malarial vector control used in those countries. Babies are high hazard to malarial transmittal, and there are factors that have to be considered to minimise the inauspicious effects on their wellness. The chief factor would be the usage of malaria control at chemical degrees transcending acceptable sums. As evident in the tabular array below, utilizing the appraisal and consideration of World Health Organization Pesticide Evaluation Scheme ( WHOPES ) , the consumptions exceed maximal acceptable degree consumptions found in chest milk samples ( Bouwman et al. , 2006 ; Bouwman et al. , 2009 ) . Therefore these transcending degrees of DDT will bring on inauspicious effects on babies, convincingly proven a menace to encephalon and endocrinal systems ( Walter et al. , 2005 ) . Toxicological grounds shows endocrine upsets on unsafe high sums of DDT exposure, this can be shown in the drumhead chart below. Malaria remains to be a hard job to eliminate with no side effects. Although Indoor residuary crop-dusting ( IRS ) could be effectual, the method is improbable to raise the full malaria mortality in babies and kids. DDT spraying induces addition in pre-term births, early-weaning and besides chiefly affects the female parents as bearers to convey DDT to their foetus, babies via nutrient concatenation ( Sapbamrer et al. , 2008 ; Walter et al. , 2005 ) . The effects such as lessening in musculus, neurological defects, delayed pubescence, behavioral defects and generative defects possibly contributed as wellness menaces to babies when exposed to high degrees of DDT via breastmilk ( Bouwman et al. , 2009 ) . Note.The writers by and large show that entire DDT collected from breastmilk samples exceeds the acceptable consumption bound. Note.This is a sum-up of the hurtful wellness hazards contributed by DDT compounds, with relation to babies. Conclusion/ Future positions It is safe to reason that babies under malarial control conditions are however exposed to chemical combinations particularly DDT, that would hold inauspicious effects if the consumptions were high plenty, likely to be above acceptable consumptions suggested by WHO. DDT is non precisely unsafe if the usage of it follows proper wellness policies that is much below the maximal consumption, yet can still continue the bound to command malaria. Breastfeeding is a good illustration of DDT residue scrutiny from female parent to infant, to demo that transmittal is really critical and usage of DDT should be maintained at a certain bound that will decrease wellness hazards of dwellers. However, a possible note to be considered in future surveies will be the opposition to DDT chemical of septic mosquitoes, and how they can come upon happening better methods alternatively of increasing the DDT sum sprayed. An improved practical attack and effectual usage of chemicals to forestall deceases and inf ant wellness hazard should be farther implemented. The add-on of infant wellness and exposure of DDT through breastmilk to WHOPES safety consideration, IRS chemicals safety and guidelines and possible hazard decrease methods should be farther studied and improved if possible ( Bouwman et al. , 2009 ) .Plants CitedAzerado, A. , Torres, J. P. , De Freitas Fonseca, M. , Britto, J. , Bastos, W. , Silva, C. E. , . . . Malm, O. ( 2008 ) . DDT and its metabolites in chest milk from Madeira River basin in the Amazon, Brazil.Chemosphere, 73, S246-S251. Bouwman, H. , & A ; Kylin, H. ( 2009 ) .Malaria Control Insecticide Residues in Breast Milk: The Need to See Infant Health Risks.Retrieved October 1, 2014, from ProQuest: hypertext transfer protocol: //search.proquest.com.myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/espm/docview/222658845/fulltext/698CF9ABCB774376PQ/1? accountid=14771 Bouwman, H. , Sereda, B. , & A ; Meinhardt, H. M. ( 2006 ) .Coincident presence of DDT and pyrethroid residues in human chest milk from a malaria endemic country in South Africa.Retrieved October 1, 2014, from University of Toronto Libraries: hypertext transfer protocol: //journals2.scholarsportal.info.myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/pdf/02697491/v144i0003/902_spodapmeaisa.xml Rogan, W. J. , & A ; Chen, A. ( 2005 ) . Health hazards and benefits of Bi ( 4-chlorophenyl ) -1,1,1-trichloroethane ( DDT ) .Environmental Sciences amd Pollution Management, 366, 763-770. Retrieved from www.thelancet.com Sapbamrer, R. , Prapamontol, T. , Prakobvitayakit, O. , Vaneesorn, Y. , Manklabruks, A. , & A ; Hock, B. ( 2008 ) . Placental transportation of DDT in mother-infant braces from Northern Thailand.Journal of Environmental Science and Health Part B, 484-489. 1

Ethics Harassment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Ethics Harassment - Essay Example In today's world, organisations and workplaces have become extremely diversified and have adopted varied stance s in terms of job processes and the general outlook. What is striking in such a scenario, is the prevalence of organizational or work ethics. Ethics has evolved to become an important aspect fo organizational functioning, since it deals with the self-esteem and the very importance attached to employees in an organisation. Is it but well known, that an employee is the building block of an organisation and the importance attached to ethics in today's organisations are a reflection of the same. In today's workplaces, harassment has become a very repetitive occurrence, with cases being reported every now and then. The various forms of harassment range that come under the purview have increased by the day, with sexual harassment topping the list. The issue came to the fore-front, in the 1970s and ever since, a number of committees, benches and organisations have come into the picture, to outline the relationship between work ethics and harassment. Sexual harassment as an abuse of power has become front-page news in the U.S. business press. Recently, BusinessWeek detailed the sexual harassment endured by salespeople at the U.S. subsidiary of Astra AB, a major Swedish pharmaceutical firm (Maremont 1996). This harassment was perpetrated by people at the highest levels of the organization and salespeople who did not comply found life at the firm extremely difficult. The attention to workplace sexual harassment generally focuses on harassment of employees by others within the same firm. [Insights into Sexual Harassment of Salespeople by Customers: The Role of Gender and Customer Power Leslie M, Fine, C. David Shepherd and Susan L. Josephs] When workplaces become diversified and new parameters of work assessment emerge, it is important to maintain workplace ethics. However, when cases of favourtism and sexual harassment emerge, it certainly goes against what is legally permissive in the ethical nature of actions in workplaces. It becomes difficult when talented individuals are put down, on account of the sexual favours received from other quarters. Besides this, when bosses do harass their subordinates and the like, it goes against moral codes of conduct. Organisational Behaviour is often considered at four different levels. Individual Behaviour, which deals with the single fundamental unit of the organisation, talks about the individualistic perspective. It revolves around an individual's perceptions, actions, notions, temperament and contribution to the organisation. At a higher plane, we have the Group Dynamics, that involves interactions of a group. It is inclusive of team work and team-bonding, while also delving into the nature of interactions, inter-group interactions, departmentalization and the like. An organisation can also be demarcated in terms of the diverse processes and the clubbing of

Entrepreneurship Solves Low-income Housing in Chicago Essay

Entrepreneurship Solves Low-income Housing in Chicago - Essay Example This violence did not stop as they continued for long, whereby it claimed the live of a seven-year old boy in the year 1992. The boy was downed by a stray bullet as he was on his way to school. However, the most aggressive attack that was experienced in the area happened in the year 1997, when a nine-year old girl was cruelly attacked, choked, raped and then poisoned, which left he in a position that she could not be able to talk or walk. The then mayor of Chicago, Jane Byrne, in the year 1981 decided to move into the complex and stay there for some few months so as to ascertain and see for herself the seriousness of the problems of the housing project (Venkatesh, et al 37). Abolishing the project to eradicate the problem The arrangement to demolish the Cabrini-Green project was part of an extensive program. The Chicago Housing Authority, in the year 2000, made an announcement on an arrangement to bring down ass the public housing projects that were in the city as part of the Hope VI , which is a national project aimed at abolishing housing projects across the nation due to their apparent failure in solving the problem of cheap and affordable housing in the city and country as a whole (Venkatesh, et al 41). Notwithstanding the terrible conditions of the Cabrini-Green, the people who lived there ganged up against the plans of redevelopment that had been offered by the planners of the city. Nevertheless, the community was apprehensive of the fact that the new mixed-income housing project would force out the longtime residents of Cabrini-Green. However, some individuals decided to stay in their units vowing never to vacate, instead of moving to what to what they perceived as the same conditions of living further removed from the center of the city. Whereas their schemes were successful in delaying of the demolition of numerous buildings, the interference did not last longer. At present, the area whereby the famous Cabrini-Green stood at one time has been changed an d what is currently there is a mixed-income neighborhood, which is only a few minutes away from one of the most developed or affluent areas of Chicago known as the Gold Coast (Brian & Beauty 20). Majority of the former residents have ultimately been replaced. In total, they consist of about twenty thousand apartments, nearly half of the funded housing units that are under the management of Chicago Housing Authority. The drab flats are heavily concentrated in the deteriorated areas just beyond the flourishing central business district, and confront several commuters that are Loop-bound everyday. Their broken elevators, garbage, crime, stairwells that are urine-stained and crime just show the several years of desertion and neglect, and deride the dreams that established them. As initially considered by the reformers, we find that public housing program was supposed to be a place whereby the people of low-income category lived until they were in a position of affording something better . The idea was establishment of decent and integrated homes; but instead, Chicago’s public housing is characterized by communal despair, poor conditions of living, poverty, segregation and criminal acts (Brian & Beauty 24). This is much common in the projects of high-rises. They were at one time conceived as ideal for the housing of

Corporate and global strategy Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Corporate and global strategy - Essay Example Finally the study tried to some useful recommendation in terms of research & development and value chain cost for the company. Table of Contents Table of Contents 3 1.0 Procter & Gamble 5 2.0 Corporate Strategy 6 2.1 Core Competency of P&G 7 2.2 Overall Scope 8 3.0 Business Level Strategy 8 4.0 Internal Analysis 10 4.1 Porter’s Value Chain 10 4.2 Barney’s VRIN model 13 5.0 External Analysis 16 5.1 PESTLE 16 5.1.1 Political Environment 16 5.1.2 Economic 16 5.1.3 Social Environment 16 5.1.4 Technological 16 5.1.5 Environment 17 5.1.6 Laws and Regulations 17 5.2 Porter’s Five Forces 17 5.2.1 Threat of New Entrants 17 5.2.2 Buyer Power 18 5.2.3 Supplier Power 18 5.2.4 Competition 18 5.2.5 Threat of Substitutes 18 6.0 Evaluation of Strategy 19 7.0 Conclusion 20 7.1 Internationalization of P&G 20 7.2 History of Global Expansion of P&G 21 References 22 1.0 Procter & Gamble Proctor & Gamble is a famous American consumer product company. The organization is headquartered at Cincinnati, Ohio, USA. The company was founded by William Procter and James Gamble in the year 1837. The company operates over ninety five countries internationally. Sales volume of the company has crossed a record mark of $82, 00 billion in the year 2011. The organization has established product leadership in various categories such as Skin Care, House Care and Oral care. More than 125,000 employees work in the Procter & Gamble. The consumer product company sells more than two hundred and sixty brands across the globe. The organization enjoys leadership in more than twenty four brands globally and able to obtain billion of dollars per annum from each of the product category. The consumer product organization has established more than twenty eight technical centres internationally (PG-Global, 2012). Proctor & Gamble emphasizes on adopting modern technology integrated with state of art research and development facility in order to achieve competitive advantage over competitors. Th ey have incorporated market research intelligence process in order to take strategic decision to expand business in foreign market (Kotler, 2009, p. 253). The company has expanded their business extensively in last twenty years and achieved phenomenal sales growth from their international business operation hence analyzing their business and corporate level strategy will help management practitioners to understand key ingredients required to develop a sustainable strategic model. Strategic analysis of Procter & Gamble will not only help management practitioners to gain insight about strategic choices but to gain knowledge about global business practices. These study will do strategic analysis of Procter & Gamble in the below mentioned manner. Step 1- Analyzing corporate strategy of P&G, Step 2- Analyzing business strategy of P&G and Step 3- Internal and External environment analysis. 2.0 Corporate Strategy The Cincinnati based company has realized the significance of globalization t o survive in the hyper competitive market and adopted themselves (read Clay Street Think Tank) according to the prerequisite of situation (Weiner, 2006, p. 22). The organization has shifted focus from delivering products to American consumers and established SBU or strategic business units internationally. Procter & Gamble has increased level of plant capacity with the intention of achieving economies of scale and deliver product mix in cost effective manner (Lofgren, 2005, pp. 102-115).

Entrepreneurs Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Entrepreneurs - Essay Example The basic attributes of an entrepreneur comprise risk taking, opportunity seeking, innovation, high degree of motivation, unconventional, positivism, goal-oriented, leadership skills, team management, problem solving skills and most importantly, ability to take initiatives. The innovative nature and ability to take measured risk differentiate entrepreneurs from other business owners (Cuervo, Ribeiro and Roig, 2007). Entrepreneurs are considered extremely important for social and economic development. The main advantages of entrepreneurial development are effective utilisation of resources, employment generation, creation of human and social capital, development of backward and rural areas, minimisation of power and wealth inequality, reduction in regional imbalance and economic growth. Cantillon’s theory suggests that involvement of risk in entrepreneurship helps in maintaining equilibrium in demand and supply in an economy. Entrepreneurial development for societal progress is supported by a number of theories such as, David McClelland’s theory of needs and Maslow’s hierarchy of needs (Bula, 2012). In addition, Schumpeter and Drucker argued that entrepreneurial innovation is necessary for exploiting unseen opportunities and encouraging changes in the economy (Śledzik, 2013). There are a number of entrepreneurs presently operating in surrounding business environment. Under broad categories, they can be classified as: social entrepreneurs, women entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs. Social entrepreneurs are by nature innovators, but they are different from business entrepreneurs in terms of purpose. They play distinct role in developing and initiating changes in the society. Social entrepreneur is an individual who recognises problems prevailing in the society and employ principles of entrepreneurship for creating and supporting scope of social ventures. Social entrepreneurs

Why are there many homeless people in big cities like LA Essay

Why are there many homeless people in big cities like LA - Essay Example 47). This essay will cover the reasons why there are many homeless people living in big cities for example Los Angeles and suggest solutions to the problems. There are various causes of homeless people moving into big cities for example LA. The homeless move into the large cities due to existence of programs and shelters. The large population of the large cities attracts more programs and more shelters to help the needy. The homeless need as much aid as they can get to get back on their feet hence the preference to live in large cities. Also there are state and federal programs which help the needy but are only accessible in large cities only and also privately run programs that are not available in small cities or rural areas. Other programs include discounted medical programs, large churches which have programs to help the needy and soup kitchens. A big city makes it easy for one to move around from one place to another looking for basic necessities (Haymes, pp. 58). A person can go to one church and get breakfast and then go to a different shelter and eat again. Another reason for homeless people living in large cities is because of t he existence of mass transit. This includes buses, subways, trains or even ferries. These things are necessary and vital to homeless people in order for them to move from one place to another and be able to get out of homelessness. Large cities usually offer free bus passes to the homeless through registration with them. The homeless persons after registration must show up twice a week for job workshop classes and to register for employment (Dubuis, pp. 82). Many homeless people also live in big cities like LA due to the availability of nearby social amenities. In big cities there are many restaurants with bathrooms where people can wash their faces when it is hot or clean up. During hot days, one can also walk into shopping malls to use the air conditioning to cool off. When it is raining there are a variety of

Robert Nozicks work entitled How Liberty Upsets Patterns Essay

Robert Nozicks work entitled How Liberty Upsets Patterns - Essay Example Nozick begins his argument by poising that people who have contrary beliefs regarding distributive justice, particularly those who abide by notions of patterned distributive justice such as utilitarianism and egalitarianism, should not refute his distribution theory of justice, especially with regard to holdings. Nozick’s theory takes a non-patterned consideration into the element of justice in holdings. According to Nozick, the repeated application of justice in holdings typically results in entitlement of holdings. Nozick bases his argument squarely on the concept of non-patterned principle of distributive justice, which attempts to elucidate the fact that patterned conceptions regarding justice in distribution are typically unable to work well with notions of liberty. Nozick uses the now famous argument of Wilt Chamberlain to demonstrate the manner in which patterned principles that deal with just distribution are essentially irreconcilable with all notions of liberty. Nozi ck poises that Rawl’s difference principle fails to provide a real description of the society today. (Sandel 2007, 359). The society runs on distribution patterns, which are defined by the desires of people who in it. Various distribution patterns are entirely just because they are based on the desires of the society. However, Nozick argues that, while an alternative distribution pattern in society does not typically conform to the favored patterns of people within the society, the alternative distribution pattern is still just. According to Nozick, the Wilt Chamberlain example essentially demonstrates that no standard patterned tenet of distributive justice can be well-suited with liberty. This is primarily because, in order to conserve the patterns provided for by patterned distribution where the society’s desires dictate distribution patterns, the state will need to interfere with the capacity of people to exchange freely their instinctual distributive justice on a constant basis. This is primarily because, as Nozick argues, all exchanges of distributive justice in patterned principles essentially require the constant violation of the patterns for which they were originally formulated. Nozick concludes that end-state, as well as a vast majority of patterned distributive justice principles provide for unfair ownership of people, their labor and actions. As a consequence, such principles provide for the shift from the notions of self ownership to those of limited property rights in the actions and beings of other people (Sandel 2007, 358). In essence, this means that, under patterned distributive justice systems, the example of Wilt Chamberlain shows that third parties will have a just claim on other people (Chamberlain) provided that the third parties transfer something valuable to the individual in question. Under patterned distributive patterns, third parties have legitimate shares in the individual since their shares cannot be changed. From the reading, several misunderstandings become clear; the greatest source of concern is the Wilt Chamberl

The Great Depression Essay Example for Free

The Great Depression Essay A time of great hardship came to the people of Australia from 1929 to 1932. This time was known as the Great Depression were the economy of the state drops. Australia is not the only nation affected and many other nations as well. However, Australia is said to have been one of the most affect and hardest-hit country due to its high dependence on exports. â€Å"Australia’s dependence o n the world market left her extraordinarily vulnerable to world market fluctuations† (Spenceley, p. 14). Since the Great Depression was a time of crisis not only for Australia but for the whole world, Australia was affected greater than other nations. As a result, more and more people loss their jobs. By that time, even the women and youth tried to find ways to earn money. It was a time of hardship, hunger and conflict. Even before the time of the Great depression unemployment rate in Australia is high reaching around 10%. At the time the stock market crash at Wall Street in October 1929, the unemployment rate rocketed reaching 20%. The unemployment rate reaches its peak in the year 1932 were 32% Australians were jobless (culture.gov.au, n.d.). It is said that the fall on export prices, sales, overseas loans and residential construction lead to the Great Depression. Still, economist is debating on the ultimate cause that triggered the event. The Great Depression created a devastating effect on the Australian economy. This also led to many illegal or rather unusual ways of making money including gambling and prostitution. Even the minors, man or woman take part in making money. Mostly young men were involved in small gambling and young women in amateur prostitution. Education was also greatly affected since most children were forced to leave school at the age of thirteen or fourteen. The time of the Great Depression was hard particularly for working women since they are required to do the house chores with their exhausted body. Job was easier that time for young workers but it was short lived, until they reach the age of sixteen to twenty one. During those times, the abilities of the government were questioned by many Australian citizens and many organizations gained popularity through their acts showing their dissatisfaction to the government. In order to bring new investment, the country relied heavily on borrowing money from different countries and the monetary policy of the country was controlled by privately owned banks. The government also had to sell off gold reserves whenever the banks refuse to extend the overdrafts of the country. Still, unemployment continued to increase as the government instituted employment projects. Until now, many factors that triggered the Great Depression that is present. Thus, those hard times are not just in vain since we, the new generation, were able to learn from the past and incorporate the steps that our forefathers used during those hard times. Today, in cases of crisis and unemployment due to the fall of company’s we go back to the basic goal for working, just as in the time of the Great Depression, to provide food and necessities for our family. Reference   Spenceley, G.   (1981). The Depression Decade. Thomas Nelson, Australia. The Great Depression (n.d). Available online from culture.gov.au

History of African American Music Essay Example for Free

History of African American Music Essay The history of African American music has been characterized by a mixture among various forms of music. Country blues, urban blues, New Orleans Jazz, Bebop, big-band jazz, and rhythm and blues, have all influenced each other profoundly. These influences flowed back and forth among the various forms. But, black gospel music had only a very limited effect on popular styles, until a few church-trained artists, such as Sam Cooke and Ray Charles, began to incorporate gospel styling into their popular work. The result is usually described as soul music, a mix of blues, rhythm and blues, and gospel voices. But, if Ray Charles was one of the originators of soul music, Aretha Franklin reshaped it, by bringing even more of her gospel background to bear on secular love songs (Wade and Picardie 27). By combining popular elements with her stunning voice, her great musicianship, and the feeling for a song that she learned in church, Aretha became one of the greatest soul singers to ever live. Aretha Franklin is a well-known pop, RB, and gospel singer. She has been nicknamed â€Å"The Queen of Soul† and is an internationally known artist and a symbol of pride in the African American community. Her popularity soared in 1967 when she released an album containing songs â€Å"I Never Loved a Man†, â€Å"Respect†, and â€Å"Baby I Love You. † Throughout her career she has achieved fifteen Grammy Awards, Lifetime Achievement Award, National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences Legend Awards, and many Grammy Hall of Fame Awards. In 1987 she became the first woman inducted into the Rock Roll Hall of Fame. Time magazine chose her as one of the most influential artists and entertainers of the 20th century. She sang at Dr. Martin Luther King’s funeral and at former President Bill Clinton’s inaugural party. Although she has all these accomplishments and awards there are other reasons that have driven Franklin to fame and landed her on the front cover of Time magazine on June 28, 1968. The reasons I believe allowed Aretha Franklin to become so successful are the following: Her family’s involvement with religion, the inspiring people that surrounded her, and the pain she suffered. It is clear that because her family’s involvement with religion would be one reason why Aretha Franklin became as famous as a Gospel singer. Some people would say that her love for religion is unbelievable, but after researching her childhood it is very believable. Her father, Reverend Clarence LaVaugh Franklin lived in Shelby Mississippi and preached while living the life of a sharecropper. As soon as he had enough money, he would move to Memphis, Tennessee to become a pastor of two churches. After a couple of years he attended LeMoyne College, and he studied Education and English Literature. With his education he was able to bring a more liberal view to his preaching’s. Then he moved the family to Buffalo, New York. When he had the resources, he moved the family again to Detroit, Michigan were he settled and became a pastor of a churched called New Bethel Baptist Church. He quickly became one of the most famous pastors in the city of Detroit. Aretha was two years old when they made their final move, she would grow up here and grab the emotion of Church and incorporate it into her music. Aretha Franklin’s mom, Barbara V. Skaggers, served as choir director and pianist. Aretha describes her mom as â€Å"a Superb singer, her voice was clear and distinctive†. (Franklin and Ritz, 6) Her parents taught her how to sing with great pride. This was a big issue because the late ‘50s, early ‘60s was a time of turmoil for African Americans. Her father especially tried to instill pride into her. He was a Civil Rights activist and he was a close colleague with Dr. Martin Luther King. With her parents keeping her involved in Church she was bound to become one of the world’s greatest singers. At around age 12, the father recognized Aretha’s talent as a singer. So he took her on the road with his traveling gospel show. This was important because it shows the kind of support Aretha received from her family. It was said, â€Å"She was a spellbinding performer at the age of fourteen. † (Franklin, 3) So her family really supported and inspired her to become a gospel singer. What also made her a great artist was that she had inspiring people all around her. Aretha grew up in Detroit which at the time was a rousing city or a city of hope for the African Americans running away from the brutality of the South. Though Detroit still had its problems such as race riots, many famous musicians grew up there. Also since New Bethel Baptist Church was so prominent, many musicians and political leaders used Reverend Franklin’s pulpit as a platform to sing or speak to the Black’s of Detroit. Aretha was introduced to classical music by Smokey Robinson’s sister Sylvia Burston. She listened to well known local DJ’s like Ruth Brown and Senator Brystal Brown. When Aretha was younger, she would ride her bike to the local park, and on her way home she would stop by a night club where you could here B. B. King perform. She says, â€Å"You could hear the soft sound of his guitar all the way to the sidewalk (Franklin and Ritz, 22). National and local political leaders would give there speeches. Speakers such as Dr. Adam Clayton Powell, Sr. , Dr. Martin Luther King, and Reverend Jesse Jackson would speak powerfully to the church. Aretha was directly influenced by Miriam Anderson, Sammy Davis, and Roy Wilkins. Detroit was overflowing with talent and speakers which I believe also contributed to Aretha’s success. Pain was probably what really drove Aretha Franklin’s success. As stated before, Franklin’s family was highly religious and was continually involved in the Church. But that doesn’t mean that she hadn’t been through a tremendous amount of pain. Early in life her mother and father got a divorce. The father was better suitable to raise Aretha and her four Siblings. The mother moved to Buffalo, New York and tried to make regular visits to see her children. She was supported her children in the best way she could, but when Aretha needed her, she still was not reachable. Matters became worst a few years later when Aretha’s mom dies of a stroke. Aretha described her mom by saying â€Å"she was the absolute lady† (Smith, 3). At age 15 she had her first child and two years later another would come. But Aretha still wanted to go out and be with friends, so her grandmother usually babysat for her periodically. In a time when Black Activism, Feminism, and Sexual Liberation were high, she needed to provide for herself. So when Aretha was old enough and was ready to start performing, she hired a man named Ted White to be her manager. He later became her husband. In the future she would divorce him for a famous actor which would end in divorce, too. Even though in 1968 to 1969, Franklin’s career was rising rapidly. She was still described by her Producer Jerry Wexler as â€Å"a person whose depressions runs deeper than the sea† (Ritchie Unterberger, 3). Then one of Franklin’s highest admirers, gospel giant Mahalia Jackson died. Right after her death a extremely emotional gospel album was released my Aretha â€Å"Amazing Grace† This record was considered to be one of the most emotional records of its time. Much of the pain that Aretha suffered was not really publicized, but still it had to be one of the reasons for her to have such a powerful voice. Aretha Franklin was a successful artist and still inspires musicians today. Her voice is still described as incredible. She has all the awards that she needs to show her talent. Works cited Franklin, Aretha, and David Ritz. Aretha: From These Roots. New York: Villard, 1999. Print. Carroll, Jillian. Aretha Franklin. Chicago: Raintree, 2004. Print.

Albanian Mobile Communications (AMC) Analysis

Albanian Mobile Communications (AMC) Analysis Albanian Mobile Communications Market segments characteristics. (Demands type) Business and Residential are the main customer segments for Data and Internet services. According to ERG Report on regulation of access products necessary to deliver the business connectivity, business customers distributed with remote branches/offices nationally, tend to order wholesale services ordered by the headquarter rather than ordered as separate packages by the remote branches and while this is typical for big and organized business, smaller one sometimes find themselves convenient to buy and use the retail offered services (ERG, 2009). Regarding the demand from business customers different needs are found and a clear line between the high-end and low-end business customers can not be set but what separates them is often the quality of services demanded and the way of ordering the services as a complete network solution from one provider only or having different providers and the company itself does the role of the integrator (ERG, 2009). Another common behavior of businesses is the demand for a full solution for communication services covering the range of fixed and mobile services while it is noted that big business and in addition while the standard users are more sensitive for the price, the business big ones stick to well known brands, quality and reliability of services and after sales support provided (ERG, 2009). Big Business Multi-site customers seem to have different needs when compared to residential users or to small business users: Different services such as mobile, fix, data networking, convergent products and value added services; high quality communication services; quick response and good support; dedicated personnel as account manager (ERG, 2009) 5. AMC Company Profile Albanian Mobile Communications (AMC) is the biggest Mobile Network operator in Albania and is part of the Cosmote Mobile Telecommunications, the mobile part of OTE SA Greece. Part of Cosmote Group which is operating in 4 countries Greece, Albania, Bulgaria and Romania, AMC is operating in Albanian market since 1996 and has constantly dominated the market by means of customer base and revenue. AMC is founded as a state owned company by early 1996 and launched the standard GSM services on May 1996. It was privatized in 2000 when Cosmote Telenor Consortium became the controlling shareholder privatizing 85% of the shares while around 2% were provided to the employees and the rest of 13% remained to the state. Now 97% of the shares it is owned by Cosmote and 3% by the employees. At the time of privatization AMC was offering the services only to about 30,000 postpaid customers and only at xxx% of the territory and xx% of the population. (ASK ILIR) After the privatization, due to the low level of development of fixed telephony, lack of real completion and the investments made by the Greek company Cosmote, the company developed very fast by expanding the network to all the territory of Albania, offering the services to prepaid customers segment and adding a broad range of mobile services such as SMS, MMS, VMS and Internet access. After Vodafone entrance in the Albanian market in 2001, the competition in the market forced the constant decrease of prices, increase of number of services and their quality. The third operator, Eagle Mobile, entered in the market in 2008 and further busted the competition among the three operators. Positioning itself as a low cost services operator, Eagle mobile initiated a price war in the market forcing further decreases of services prices. Today AMC is the biggest Mobile operator in Albania, dominating the market by having around 1.9 million of customers with 43.3% market penetration. AMC is covering 99.8% of the population and 90% of the territory in Albania. Roaming agreements are established with more than 300 GSM operators worldwide. Major mobile product and services offered to individuals are: voice, SMS, MMS, voice mail, internet access, WAP portals and push email for residential. Corporate push email, data internetworking, ISP and VPN services are provided to corporate customers. EDGE technology is implemented covering 86% of the population and 63% of territory offering the possibility to the customers to access the internet through the mobile at acceptable rates. 3G technology is not yet licensed in Albania but the licensing process is expected to start during this year. AMC has around 530 employees highly qualified and trained. Around xx% of employees have a university degree and xx% of them are under the age of xxx. Personnel is organized in three main division, Commercial, Technical, Finance and Operations Administrative. The revenues for 2008 were at 191,272 millions, the OIBDA margin was at 64.7% and the net profit margin was at xxx%. During 2009, due to several factors present in the market such as the third entrant competition, world financial crises and intervention of regulatory body in decreasing the retail and interconnection termination tariffs AMC has faced some challenges on realizing the revenue objectives although the figures were still very good: revenue at 145,744mil, OIBDA at 57% and net profit at xxx%. For the future, considering the expected fierce competition due to also to the entrance of the fourth operator in the market and present financial crisis as well, AMC is looking to realize the targets through orienting the business towards the customer, finding other revenue streams, offering a wide range of products and services, the best technology in the market and best network quality. Offering of 3G services within 2010 and enrichment of products portfolio with services that this technology makes possible are considered as good opportunity for AMC in the near future for increasing the revenue. 6. Current Situation Analysis 6.1 General environment factors Political Albania is a small country located in southeastern Europe bordered by Adriatic Sea, Greece, Montenegro and Kosovo. Territory is 28,748 sq km and population at 3,639,453. After the Second World War, Albania established a communist regime which has ruled the country for 46 years until 1991 when it collapsed and a new democratic system was established. Albania has gone through a difficult process of transforming society to a democratic one and of developing the market economy. The process has proven to be very challenging and although a lot of progress has been done, the country is facing a lot of problems and deficiencies related to corruption, week infrastructure, unemployment, organized crime and sometimes lack of political stability. Since starting the transition process in 1991, the progress of Albania has been impressive although the transition period has taken longer than enough. Albania has established the institutions of democracy, has developed the capacities of public institutions, and has established the foundations of market economy (World Bank, 2010). Albania has joined NATO in 2009, has signed in 2006 the agreement for Stabilization and Association with EU and is one of the potential candidates for joining the EU. As part of EU association agreement, Albania since ten years has transformed and adopted the legislation based on EU recommendations and framework. The legislation improvement has been a continuing process and is performed under the tough monitoring and supervision of EU. In this regard, currently we may say that Albania has a very good legislation frame although there are evident gaps between the legislation and practical implementation of the laws in the country. The country has joined the WTO in 2000 and since then has adopted its international trading policies in accordance with the agreement with this organization. Government policies and strategies on Electronic communications are focused on liberalization, development of market and competition, attraction of foreign direct investments, protection of consumer and are developed in compliance with the National Strategy for Development (covering years 2007-2013) and the EU integration directives. Economy Albania is a country with low to middle income with a gross domestic income per capita of $3740 in 2008. The Economy of the country has been totally transformed during the transition period from a communist economy towards a market-based economy. Albania has achieved a sustainable economic growth, while containing inflation almost constant every year. During the transition period, the structure of economy has been transformed from an agriculture and industry to services and construction. Large scale migration has fueled high workers remittances, which make up around 8-13 percent of GDP (World Bank Web Page, 2010, Albania in Brief). During that period the GDP growth rates of around 5-6 percent per year have been achieved while the poverty level has been reduced constantly. The absolute poverty rate was 25.4 % in 2002 but dropped to 18.5 percent in 2005 and to 12.4 percent in 2008. The extreme poverty rate decreased from about 5 to 3.5 percent but inequality has increased significantly (World Bank Web Page, 2010, Albania in Brief). According to World Bank data, the Albania GNIP (Gross National Income per Capita) in 2008 was at 3840$ ranking at 113th position while PPP (Purchasing power Parity) was at 7950$ during 2008 ranking at 108th position worldwide (World Bank, 2008). The GDP composition by sectors the year 2009 was as following: agriculture 20.06%, industry 18.8% and services 60.6% (CIA Fact book, 2010). In 2009 unemployment rate was at 12%, population under the poverty line 25%, Inflation rate 2.1% and has been kept within the range of 2-4% since 2002 (CIA Fact book, 2010). Major agriculture products are wheat, corn, vegetables, potatoes, fruits, sugar, grapes and meat while the industrial ones are food processing, textiles and clothing, oil, hydropower, cement, chemicals, mining and basic metals. In 2009 the exports were at 1994 billion while the imports were at 3602 billion (CIA Fact book, 2010). Strong growth has been seen during the years 2002 -2008 at the rate of 14-15% in the construction industry which has been considered as very successful one in the country. Evidences of global crises effects have been shown during 2009 when the GDP growth was 4% less than 2008. The remittances and bank deposits have declined much during 2008 and 2009 causing the slowdown of consumption while imports went down from 4,898 in 2008 to 3.602 Billion in 2009 (INSTAT, 2010). The deposit rates during 2007 were at the average of 6.3% while the bank interest rates were at 13.6% (INSTAT, 2010). Following are shown the main competitiveness indexes for Albania provided by the Harvard University, M. Porter in The Global Competitiveness Report. Source: M. Porter, The Global Competitiveness Report, 2008-2009 Based on this report, Albania is categorized in the group of countries being at the stage of efficiency driven economy, has many deficiencies in infrastructure, technology and innovation and market efficiency while fits with the standards of this category for macroeconomic stability, health and primary education, labor market efficiency and institutions, Source: M. Porter, The Global Competitiveness Report, 2008-2009 From the above report we can see that corruption, inadequate infrastructure, governing efficiency and bureaucracy and Tax regulations are the main problematic factors for doing business in Albania. Source: World Bank, Doing Business 2010 Albania According to World Bank, Albania is currently well positioned to continue with its strong economic growth and is able to make significant movements towards the integration with the European Union but the government must strongly address the governance problems, maintain a stable macroeconomics framework, improve the business environment and attract investments, upgrade public infrastructure, develop its human capital and make sure that the development benefits are fairly distributed to different categories of society with a special attention to supporting the poor ones (World Bank 2010). Although it has sustained high growth rate by keeping the microeconomic stability during the last decade, Albania remains still one of the poorest countries in Europe showing a large scale of informality in economy, a week and inadequate energetic and transportation infrastructure. Shortages in Energy caused from the dependency from hydropower plants and inadequate distribution infrastructure contribute much in a poor business environment and is a factor for not being successful in the process of attracting the foreign investors. According the European Commission 2009 report , Albania has kept and maintained the macro-economic while the worldwide crises had only a limited impact on the country, inflation was low, exchange rate has been stable, liquidity of banks have been ensured (EU Commission, 2009) Social According to INSTAT, 46 % of the population is between the age of 15-44 years and average age is 32.1 years therefore we may say that Albania has a young population however the population has started aging for the reason of decreased rate of births and longer life rate (INSTAT,2010). The number of people living in urban areas has increased from 35.8% in 1989 to 45% in 2004. Consumer telecom utilization and spending is high and at around 6 % of the total household expenditures. New generation like the new technology of mobiles and are followers of offers. Some future social trends are mentioned below: Urbanization will continue therefore increasing the chances for the fast rollout of broadband technologies Economic inequality will increase, therefore the customer segmentations should be considered and product and services should be customized to each segment needs Family size will decrease People joining the social networks will increase Regulatory The country has adopted the national legislation in accordance with the EU 2003 regulatory recommendations and framework. The Law No. 9918 (May 19, 2008) is the main legal instrument for the electronic communications industry regulation. It defines the responsibilities of government and regulatory institutions for this regulation. Based on this law, the Minister of State for Reforms and Parliamentary relations is the administration body for the electronic communications services and it is responsible for drafting the related legislation and for preparing the plan for radio frequencies. Based on the proposals submitted by the regulatory, the Ministry has the authority to approve the tenders for limited spectrum assignment and universal service providers. In 2009, the Council of Ministers has approved the National Frequency Plan while there is under the approval process the policy for the sector development for the period 2009-2014 which is oriented on liberalization, European integration and convergence. The regulatory authority (AKEP) is an independent, self-financed entity which covers the regulatory tasks for the electronic communications. Under its authority belong also some tasks related to adoption, administration and implementation of legislation. For the industry of Electronic Communications, the regulatory body should safeguard the competition, guaranty the quality of services offered and delivery of them, protect the consumer, license and develop the market through promoting the investment and latest technology implementation. AKEP can impose prices control, set administration fees and define methodologies for regulation of tariffs and defines its own structure and salaries without any intervention from the Ministry. The financing is taken from fees applied to operators and service providers. It reports to the parliamentary assembly. The privatization of Albtelecom and Eagle Mobile, in 2007, increased the level autonomy and independence for the AKEP and the Ministry although the state still owns 25% of the shares. Lately the government has announced these shares will be sold. Another institution was established by the government in April 2007, National Agency on Information Society (NAIS) which role is to coordinate the government activities for the information society and communications. It prepares and proposes the national strategies, draft ICT legislations and coordinate the projects of government in ICT. With regards to market access and authorizations, Albania has moved forward with the gradual process of liberalization. In 1998 the liberalization started with the rural local networks, then in 2003 was liberalized the operations for the domestic long-distances networks and in 2005 for international ones. In 2006 the market was liberalized for urban operation of local alternative providers. The law of 2008, established the concept of â€Å"General authorization† based on which the networks and services which do not require the usage of limited resources could start operating without getting a license but just by sending a notification for their start to the regulatory authority within 15 days of operations. Based on this, the need for getting the license remained only for the frequencies and numbers. Based on the law, AKEP can use the SMP (Significant Market Power) designation mechanism in order to regulate the competition in the market. The decision for designation should be based on a Market Analysis procedure results. In 2007 AKEP has designated AMC and Vodafone as SMP in the market of retail mobile services and for the wholesale voice termination. Based on that, AKEP imposed to these two operators obligations related to non-discrimination, transparency in RIO (Reference Interconnection Offer), imposed the prices of interconnect termination by cutting them by 31.2%% and applied a reduction in retailed prices of 30% for on-net and 40%for the off-net calls for a period of two years. In 2007, AKEP has designated Albtelecom as SMP in six markets related to fixed voice services offered to customers and for voice transit services. Obligations were set to Albtelecom including the imposed reduction of retail and transit tariffs. Following a review of the markets in wholesale and retail tariffs done in 2009, the competitive safeguards LLU and CS/CPS were imposed to Albtelecom which are not yet implemented. AKEP has already launched several markets analysis procedures on most of the wholesale and retail markets such as: Mobile wholesale market for call termination, access and call origination; fixed retail access and call services for wholesale interconnection. In December 2009, AKEP introduced to operators a reference document with the model of BULRAIC cost calculations for mobile services MTR based on which the data have been provided to AKEP by the operators. As the result of these analyses, it is expected that AKEP imposes the Mobile Terminated Rates for national calls while the rates for the international calls will be reviewed. During 2009 AKEP has launched the market analysis and public consultation process for wholesale and retail leased lines markets and finalization of it is expected by mid 2010. As result of public consultation process, is expected to be defined the services, demands, providers, supply structure and markets and then based on these is expected that regulatory designates the SMP operators for which the tariffs for their services will be regulated. During Q1 2010, AKEP has launched a public consultation process on â€Å"The rule for the indexes of service quality† which is expected to be finalized during Q1 2010. The above mentioned actions which regard regulation of competitions can be considered as steps to develop the competitive safeguards environment, however we can mention other steps not yet realized by the regulatory although the process has already started. Such missing measurements are: number portability, carrier selection and pre-selection (CS, CSP) not in practice yet, local loop un-bundling (LLU) not in practice yet, national roaming, MVNO and whole sale line rental. Number portability public consultation is in progress and based on AKEP plans, the service will be available in the market by end 2010 while the process for licensing for wireless broadband spectrum (WiMAX and mobile 3G) are expected to start with public consultations opening by March 2010 and be finalized by mid 2010. According to latest European Commission assessment, there were noted some progress including the alignment of primary legislation, while still some secondary lines laws have to be adopted yet, market liberalization and competition still are at early stage and administrative capacities of the ministry and regulator was not sufficient (Cullen, 2008). Technological In the area of mobile communication technology, GSM 2.75 technology (EDGE) is implemented since 2006 and now three operators offer it to the customers, AMC, Vodafone and Eagle. Regulatory has not yet provided the licensing for the Mobile 3G CDMA and broadband technologies HSPA and HSPA+. There is a delay in this aspect and the licensing for 3G technologies may be provided only now, at the end of lifecycle for 3G technology and at the time that other markets have started trialing and adopting the 4G network technologies (LTE). Video Digital Broadcasting (DVB-H) services are offered by three operators (DIGITALB, TRING and TV SHIJAKU) already to the market through terrestrial or satellite broadcasting. Number of PCs and PC utilization at home is low and estimated to xxx% of the houses while the utilization in companies and government is high. Internet services are provided in the country by more than 36 ISPs and technology for access is mainly fixed broadband xDSL, hybrid fiber coax and dial-up. Wireless broadband spectrum available for WiMAX is not licensed yet by the regulatory while the WiFi networks are frequently used for the Internet access in cafes. Points to multipoint systems such as LMDS are not present in the country. Fiber networks are present only in the main cities such as Tirana and Durres and implemented by some ISP-s for the purposes of internet access or triple play services provided to the end user. Fiber backbone is missing and the mobile operators backbone is mainly build of microwave transmission links based on SDH or PDH technology. Two of mobile operators have taken already some steps on offering the mobile fix substitution services to the customers but not providing the convergence of the mobile and fix telephone number. Content development is weak and mainly is based on external international resources. The main technology factors that will shape the next decade of electronic communications development are the following: Convergence of networks Fixed and mobile network differences will vanish and a common network providing integrated services will serve the customers. Mobile to fix substitution and integration has already started Convergence of network technologies to an all IP networks Traditional telecom networks and internet (ISP) will merge together to a next generation carrier network which is based on all IP technology. Services will clearly separate from transport networks and competition will be focused and oriented on services Convergence of services Convergence of networks and network technology will make possible to design, combine and deliver to the customer services which traditionally have been provided before by different technology, networks and vendors such as triple play services, (video, voice and internet) provided all at one network access point, accessed through same application environment which run in many different types of devices. Unified services access and unified messaging Customers can access through same software environment and through same or different devices and from everywhere (office, home, when traveling) same set of applications and services. Reduction of cost for hardware and increase of software role and power Software will run on standard hardware. Big software players will play a big role while the network HW vendors will become more software oriented. Growth of video content and internet utilization while the voice remains strong Demands for capacities will be huge while the needs for integrating all sets of services at one management and control will increase. Increase of connected number and types of devices Web connected devices will increase. PCs, mobiles, TVs, game devices, etc. There will be a need to standardize the applications to all these set of devices. 6.2 Electronic communications industry analysis We will use the M. Porters â€Å"Five forces model† for analyzing the industry. We selected this model as being already one of the most worldwide known, widely recognized and used model for industry analysis. The analysis done based on that model will be used for business strategy development recommendations. Market overview General data The following graphs show the sector revenue growth and market in 2008 compared to the other countries in the region. Source: (Cullen Report, 2010) Source: (Cullen Report, 2010) Mobile telephony In May 1996, AMC a state owned company by this time launched for the first time in Albania the GSM services becoming one of the first countries in the region to offer such services. Currently there are three companies operating in the mobile services market AMC, Vodafone and Eagle Mobile. The fourth operator is licensed and is expected to launch the services on July 2010. On July 2009, the mobile customers were at 3.52 millions, mobile service penetration was at 110% of the population, and more than 99% of population and 90% of territory is covered by GSM signal. Around 93.8% of customers are prepaid and 6.2% are postpaid. AMC has 43.30% of customer base, Vodafone AL 43.00% and Eagle 13.7 % (Cullen, 2010). Technology used is 2G EDGE while 3G spectrum is expected to be licensed by mid 2010. Main services offered in the market are voice, SMS, MMS, WAP, internet access and GPRS intranets. 43.3% of market share is owed by AMC, 43% by Vodafone and 13.4% by Eagle Mobile. Fixed telephony Albtelecom is the incumbent fixed operator in the market while more than 70 alternative operators operate mainly in the rural zones. Number of fixed telephony users by July 2009 end was 360,000 which represents 11.3% penetration while alternative operators customers are at 49, 690 representing 14% of this number(Cullen, 2010). 99.92 % of the fixed telephony is digitized. In July 2009 the numbers of PSTN lines were at 359,100, ISDN lines at 929, lines given to residential customers were at 338,300 and to business customers at 21,700 (Cullen, 2010). Leased lines and Data services Albtelecom and the three mobile operators are the providers of leased lines services at national and international access. Albtelecom has had the monopoly of such services until few years ago and kept it for international access until 2006. Albtelecom has implemented a few fiber lines connecting some main cities while internationally have access of fiber backbones to Italy and to Greece and other Adriatic see countries through the Adria fiber backbone. The mobile operators have not build yet a backbone to be used for leasing yet but are offering for the moment free capacities of their backbone build for their core business, mobile services. Besides AMC, there are not any clear evidences and data on the leased lines or data services provided by the other two mobile operators (Vodafone and Eagle Mobile). Albtelecom and mobile operators are moving forward their plans for implementation of a national Fiber backbone which will serve future needs for capacities nationally or for international access. AMC has provided data internetworking services to banks and other business or government institutions. More than 200 local networks of xxx customers are internetworked nationally and xxxx connections to international networks are established. COMPLETE STATISTICS Use Cullen report data on lease lines (pages 53-67, here are prices only) Broadband and Internet Services These services are offered for the moment by fixed operators while the mobile broadband services are not yet licensed by regulatory authority. Broadband penetration rate was at 2.51 % on January 2010 and was the lowest one in the region while EU penetration was at 23.9% (Cullen, 2010). About 36 ISPs are operating in Albania mainly providing the services in Tirana area and few in the other western cities. According to Cullen report, by January 2010, the number of broadband connections was 80,000, narrowband connections were at 28,512 and 30% of people are regularly using the Internet (Cullen, 2010). Number of internet users in 2008, including the mobile internet access users, was at 580,000. Main operators are Albtelecom, Abisnet, ABCOM, Alfa cable and ASC (AKEP, 2010). 65% of broadband market is owned by Albtelecom and 35% by the alternative operators. Broadband technology used is ADSL and HFC. The following table shows the internet penetration progress over the years. Source: (Internet world statistics, 2010) Albtelecom offers upstream capacities of internet access to retail customers from 512Kbps to 4Mbps while Abisnet from 1 to 3 Mbps. Albtelecom is the main operator offering to other ISP-s high capacity access to internet international gateway through fiber. Other alternative operators access the international gateways through Albtelecom use other alternative microwave links. The internet backbone access capacity in October 2009 was 5.5GB and was one of the lowest in the region. The threat for substitute product and services AMC offers Data Internetworking and Internet services through ISP in addition to its core business mobile services. International IP transit services are provided through the partnership established with OTEGlobe which is an international data services provider. The type of service is IP transit, (Layer3 Networking) where turnkey IP network is provided through delivering the end routers, installation and configurations of them and IP packet encryption as well. IP capacities provided are dedicated. Availability of services is above 99.9% and quality of network is very good. For such type of data services, substitute services in the market are considered the MPLS VPN-s, satellite data links, internet VPN services, GPRS Intranets and data dial-up. MPLS VPNs are becoming standard services worldwide but not yet present in the local market. This comes mainly due to the reasons of lack of a dedicated data backbone in the country, the lack of development of IP backbones technologies by the operators for the moment and the lack of fiber backbones. Since the data IP backbone is missing for the moment and establishing it will need time and big investments, MPLS VPNs may present a substitution threat after some years. There are not operators offering such products for the moment. Satellite data links are established through satellite terminals installed at the local remote offices locations. Links are aggregated to the satellite nub and then connected to the headquarter network. These links have the advantage of installing anywhere in the country and this represent an advantage considering the terrain but are more convenient to be used as point to point links rather than in a distributed multipoint top Albanian Mobile Communications (AMC) Analysis Albanian Mobile Communications (AMC) Analysis Albanian Mobile Communications Market segments characteristics. (Demands type) Business and Residential are the main customer segments for Data and Internet services. According to ERG Report on regulation of access products necessary to deliver the business connectivity, business customers distributed with remote branches/offices nationally, tend to order wholesale services ordered by the headquarter rather than ordered as separate packages by the remote branches and while this is typical for big and organized business, smaller one sometimes find themselves convenient to buy and use the retail offered services (ERG, 2009). Regarding the demand from business customers different needs are found and a clear line between the high-end and low-end business customers can not be set but what separates them is often the quality of services demanded and the way of ordering the services as a complete network solution from one provider only or having different providers and the company itself does the role of the integrator (ERG, 2009). Another common behavior of businesses is the demand for a full solution for communication services covering the range of fixed and mobile services while it is noted that big business and in addition while the standard users are more sensitive for the price, the business big ones stick to well known brands, quality and reliability of services and after sales support provided (ERG, 2009). Big Business Multi-site customers seem to have different needs when compared to residential users or to small business users: Different services such as mobile, fix, data networking, convergent products and value added services; high quality communication services; quick response and good support; dedicated personnel as account manager (ERG, 2009) 5. AMC Company Profile Albanian Mobile Communications (AMC) is the biggest Mobile Network operator in Albania and is part of the Cosmote Mobile Telecommunications, the mobile part of OTE SA Greece. Part of Cosmote Group which is operating in 4 countries Greece, Albania, Bulgaria and Romania, AMC is operating in Albanian market since 1996 and has constantly dominated the market by means of customer base and revenue. AMC is founded as a state owned company by early 1996 and launched the standard GSM services on May 1996. It was privatized in 2000 when Cosmote Telenor Consortium became the controlling shareholder privatizing 85% of the shares while around 2% were provided to the employees and the rest of 13% remained to the state. Now 97% of the shares it is owned by Cosmote and 3% by the employees. At the time of privatization AMC was offering the services only to about 30,000 postpaid customers and only at xxx% of the territory and xx% of the population. (ASK ILIR) After the privatization, due to the low level of development of fixed telephony, lack of real completion and the investments made by the Greek company Cosmote, the company developed very fast by expanding the network to all the territory of Albania, offering the services to prepaid customers segment and adding a broad range of mobile services such as SMS, MMS, VMS and Internet access. After Vodafone entrance in the Albanian market in 2001, the competition in the market forced the constant decrease of prices, increase of number of services and their quality. The third operator, Eagle Mobile, entered in the market in 2008 and further busted the competition among the three operators. Positioning itself as a low cost services operator, Eagle mobile initiated a price war in the market forcing further decreases of services prices. Today AMC is the biggest Mobile operator in Albania, dominating the market by having around 1.9 million of customers with 43.3% market penetration. AMC is covering 99.8% of the population and 90% of the territory in Albania. Roaming agreements are established with more than 300 GSM operators worldwide. Major mobile product and services offered to individuals are: voice, SMS, MMS, voice mail, internet access, WAP portals and push email for residential. Corporate push email, data internetworking, ISP and VPN services are provided to corporate customers. EDGE technology is implemented covering 86% of the population and 63% of territory offering the possibility to the customers to access the internet through the mobile at acceptable rates. 3G technology is not yet licensed in Albania but the licensing process is expected to start during this year. AMC has around 530 employees highly qualified and trained. Around xx% of employees have a university degree and xx% of them are under the age of xxx. Personnel is organized in three main division, Commercial, Technical, Finance and Operations Administrative. The revenues for 2008 were at 191,272 millions, the OIBDA margin was at 64.7% and the net profit margin was at xxx%. During 2009, due to several factors present in the market such as the third entrant competition, world financial crises and intervention of regulatory body in decreasing the retail and interconnection termination tariffs AMC has faced some challenges on realizing the revenue objectives although the figures were still very good: revenue at 145,744mil, OIBDA at 57% and net profit at xxx%. For the future, considering the expected fierce competition due to also to the entrance of the fourth operator in the market and present financial crisis as well, AMC is looking to realize the targets through orienting the business towards the customer, finding other revenue streams, offering a wide range of products and services, the best technology in the market and best network quality. Offering of 3G services within 2010 and enrichment of products portfolio with services that this technology makes possible are considered as good opportunity for AMC in the near future for increasing the revenue. 6. Current Situation Analysis 6.1 General environment factors Political Albania is a small country located in southeastern Europe bordered by Adriatic Sea, Greece, Montenegro and Kosovo. Territory is 28,748 sq km and population at 3,639,453. After the Second World War, Albania established a communist regime which has ruled the country for 46 years until 1991 when it collapsed and a new democratic system was established. Albania has gone through a difficult process of transforming society to a democratic one and of developing the market economy. The process has proven to be very challenging and although a lot of progress has been done, the country is facing a lot of problems and deficiencies related to corruption, week infrastructure, unemployment, organized crime and sometimes lack of political stability. Since starting the transition process in 1991, the progress of Albania has been impressive although the transition period has taken longer than enough. Albania has established the institutions of democracy, has developed the capacities of public institutions, and has established the foundations of market economy (World Bank, 2010). Albania has joined NATO in 2009, has signed in 2006 the agreement for Stabilization and Association with EU and is one of the potential candidates for joining the EU. As part of EU association agreement, Albania since ten years has transformed and adopted the legislation based on EU recommendations and framework. The legislation improvement has been a continuing process and is performed under the tough monitoring and supervision of EU. In this regard, currently we may say that Albania has a very good legislation frame although there are evident gaps between the legislation and practical implementation of the laws in the country. The country has joined the WTO in 2000 and since then has adopted its international trading policies in accordance with the agreement with this organization. Government policies and strategies on Electronic communications are focused on liberalization, development of market and competition, attraction of foreign direct investments, protection of consumer and are developed in compliance with the National Strategy for Development (covering years 2007-2013) and the EU integration directives. Economy Albania is a country with low to middle income with a gross domestic income per capita of $3740 in 2008. The Economy of the country has been totally transformed during the transition period from a communist economy towards a market-based economy. Albania has achieved a sustainable economic growth, while containing inflation almost constant every year. During the transition period, the structure of economy has been transformed from an agriculture and industry to services and construction. Large scale migration has fueled high workers remittances, which make up around 8-13 percent of GDP (World Bank Web Page, 2010, Albania in Brief). During that period the GDP growth rates of around 5-6 percent per year have been achieved while the poverty level has been reduced constantly. The absolute poverty rate was 25.4 % in 2002 but dropped to 18.5 percent in 2005 and to 12.4 percent in 2008. The extreme poverty rate decreased from about 5 to 3.5 percent but inequality has increased significantly (World Bank Web Page, 2010, Albania in Brief). According to World Bank data, the Albania GNIP (Gross National Income per Capita) in 2008 was at 3840$ ranking at 113th position while PPP (Purchasing power Parity) was at 7950$ during 2008 ranking at 108th position worldwide (World Bank, 2008). The GDP composition by sectors the year 2009 was as following: agriculture 20.06%, industry 18.8% and services 60.6% (CIA Fact book, 2010). In 2009 unemployment rate was at 12%, population under the poverty line 25%, Inflation rate 2.1% and has been kept within the range of 2-4% since 2002 (CIA Fact book, 2010). Major agriculture products are wheat, corn, vegetables, potatoes, fruits, sugar, grapes and meat while the industrial ones are food processing, textiles and clothing, oil, hydropower, cement, chemicals, mining and basic metals. In 2009 the exports were at 1994 billion while the imports were at 3602 billion (CIA Fact book, 2010). Strong growth has been seen during the years 2002 -2008 at the rate of 14-15% in the construction industry which has been considered as very successful one in the country. Evidences of global crises effects have been shown during 2009 when the GDP growth was 4% less than 2008. The remittances and bank deposits have declined much during 2008 and 2009 causing the slowdown of consumption while imports went down from 4,898 in 2008 to 3.602 Billion in 2009 (INSTAT, 2010). The deposit rates during 2007 were at the average of 6.3% while the bank interest rates were at 13.6% (INSTAT, 2010). Following are shown the main competitiveness indexes for Albania provided by the Harvard University, M. Porter in The Global Competitiveness Report. Source: M. Porter, The Global Competitiveness Report, 2008-2009 Based on this report, Albania is categorized in the group of countries being at the stage of efficiency driven economy, has many deficiencies in infrastructure, technology and innovation and market efficiency while fits with the standards of this category for macroeconomic stability, health and primary education, labor market efficiency and institutions, Source: M. Porter, The Global Competitiveness Report, 2008-2009 From the above report we can see that corruption, inadequate infrastructure, governing efficiency and bureaucracy and Tax regulations are the main problematic factors for doing business in Albania. Source: World Bank, Doing Business 2010 Albania According to World Bank, Albania is currently well positioned to continue with its strong economic growth and is able to make significant movements towards the integration with the European Union but the government must strongly address the governance problems, maintain a stable macroeconomics framework, improve the business environment and attract investments, upgrade public infrastructure, develop its human capital and make sure that the development benefits are fairly distributed to different categories of society with a special attention to supporting the poor ones (World Bank 2010). Although it has sustained high growth rate by keeping the microeconomic stability during the last decade, Albania remains still one of the poorest countries in Europe showing a large scale of informality in economy, a week and inadequate energetic and transportation infrastructure. Shortages in Energy caused from the dependency from hydropower plants and inadequate distribution infrastructure contribute much in a poor business environment and is a factor for not being successful in the process of attracting the foreign investors. According the European Commission 2009 report , Albania has kept and maintained the macro-economic while the worldwide crises had only a limited impact on the country, inflation was low, exchange rate has been stable, liquidity of banks have been ensured (EU Commission, 2009) Social According to INSTAT, 46 % of the population is between the age of 15-44 years and average age is 32.1 years therefore we may say that Albania has a young population however the population has started aging for the reason of decreased rate of births and longer life rate (INSTAT,2010). The number of people living in urban areas has increased from 35.8% in 1989 to 45% in 2004. Consumer telecom utilization and spending is high and at around 6 % of the total household expenditures. New generation like the new technology of mobiles and are followers of offers. Some future social trends are mentioned below: Urbanization will continue therefore increasing the chances for the fast rollout of broadband technologies Economic inequality will increase, therefore the customer segmentations should be considered and product and services should be customized to each segment needs Family size will decrease People joining the social networks will increase Regulatory The country has adopted the national legislation in accordance with the EU 2003 regulatory recommendations and framework. The Law No. 9918 (May 19, 2008) is the main legal instrument for the electronic communications industry regulation. It defines the responsibilities of government and regulatory institutions for this regulation. Based on this law, the Minister of State for Reforms and Parliamentary relations is the administration body for the electronic communications services and it is responsible for drafting the related legislation and for preparing the plan for radio frequencies. Based on the proposals submitted by the regulatory, the Ministry has the authority to approve the tenders for limited spectrum assignment and universal service providers. In 2009, the Council of Ministers has approved the National Frequency Plan while there is under the approval process the policy for the sector development for the period 2009-2014 which is oriented on liberalization, European integration and convergence. The regulatory authority (AKEP) is an independent, self-financed entity which covers the regulatory tasks for the electronic communications. Under its authority belong also some tasks related to adoption, administration and implementation of legislation. For the industry of Electronic Communications, the regulatory body should safeguard the competition, guaranty the quality of services offered and delivery of them, protect the consumer, license and develop the market through promoting the investment and latest technology implementation. AKEP can impose prices control, set administration fees and define methodologies for regulation of tariffs and defines its own structure and salaries without any intervention from the Ministry. The financing is taken from fees applied to operators and service providers. It reports to the parliamentary assembly. The privatization of Albtelecom and Eagle Mobile, in 2007, increased the level autonomy and independence for the AKEP and the Ministry although the state still owns 25% of the shares. Lately the government has announced these shares will be sold. Another institution was established by the government in April 2007, National Agency on Information Society (NAIS) which role is to coordinate the government activities for the information society and communications. It prepares and proposes the national strategies, draft ICT legislations and coordinate the projects of government in ICT. With regards to market access and authorizations, Albania has moved forward with the gradual process of liberalization. In 1998 the liberalization started with the rural local networks, then in 2003 was liberalized the operations for the domestic long-distances networks and in 2005 for international ones. In 2006 the market was liberalized for urban operation of local alternative providers. The law of 2008, established the concept of â€Å"General authorization† based on which the networks and services which do not require the usage of limited resources could start operating without getting a license but just by sending a notification for their start to the regulatory authority within 15 days of operations. Based on this, the need for getting the license remained only for the frequencies and numbers. Based on the law, AKEP can use the SMP (Significant Market Power) designation mechanism in order to regulate the competition in the market. The decision for designation should be based on a Market Analysis procedure results. In 2007 AKEP has designated AMC and Vodafone as SMP in the market of retail mobile services and for the wholesale voice termination. Based on that, AKEP imposed to these two operators obligations related to non-discrimination, transparency in RIO (Reference Interconnection Offer), imposed the prices of interconnect termination by cutting them by 31.2%% and applied a reduction in retailed prices of 30% for on-net and 40%for the off-net calls for a period of two years. In 2007, AKEP has designated Albtelecom as SMP in six markets related to fixed voice services offered to customers and for voice transit services. Obligations were set to Albtelecom including the imposed reduction of retail and transit tariffs. Following a review of the markets in wholesale and retail tariffs done in 2009, the competitive safeguards LLU and CS/CPS were imposed to Albtelecom which are not yet implemented. AKEP has already launched several markets analysis procedures on most of the wholesale and retail markets such as: Mobile wholesale market for call termination, access and call origination; fixed retail access and call services for wholesale interconnection. In December 2009, AKEP introduced to operators a reference document with the model of BULRAIC cost calculations for mobile services MTR based on which the data have been provided to AKEP by the operators. As the result of these analyses, it is expected that AKEP imposes the Mobile Terminated Rates for national calls while the rates for the international calls will be reviewed. During 2009 AKEP has launched the market analysis and public consultation process for wholesale and retail leased lines markets and finalization of it is expected by mid 2010. As result of public consultation process, is expected to be defined the services, demands, providers, supply structure and markets and then based on these is expected that regulatory designates the SMP operators for which the tariffs for their services will be regulated. During Q1 2010, AKEP has launched a public consultation process on â€Å"The rule for the indexes of service quality† which is expected to be finalized during Q1 2010. The above mentioned actions which regard regulation of competitions can be considered as steps to develop the competitive safeguards environment, however we can mention other steps not yet realized by the regulatory although the process has already started. Such missing measurements are: number portability, carrier selection and pre-selection (CS, CSP) not in practice yet, local loop un-bundling (LLU) not in practice yet, national roaming, MVNO and whole sale line rental. Number portability public consultation is in progress and based on AKEP plans, the service will be available in the market by end 2010 while the process for licensing for wireless broadband spectrum (WiMAX and mobile 3G) are expected to start with public consultations opening by March 2010 and be finalized by mid 2010. According to latest European Commission assessment, there were noted some progress including the alignment of primary legislation, while still some secondary lines laws have to be adopted yet, market liberalization and competition still are at early stage and administrative capacities of the ministry and regulator was not sufficient (Cullen, 2008). Technological In the area of mobile communication technology, GSM 2.75 technology (EDGE) is implemented since 2006 and now three operators offer it to the customers, AMC, Vodafone and Eagle. Regulatory has not yet provided the licensing for the Mobile 3G CDMA and broadband technologies HSPA and HSPA+. There is a delay in this aspect and the licensing for 3G technologies may be provided only now, at the end of lifecycle for 3G technology and at the time that other markets have started trialing and adopting the 4G network technologies (LTE). Video Digital Broadcasting (DVB-H) services are offered by three operators (DIGITALB, TRING and TV SHIJAKU) already to the market through terrestrial or satellite broadcasting. Number of PCs and PC utilization at home is low and estimated to xxx% of the houses while the utilization in companies and government is high. Internet services are provided in the country by more than 36 ISPs and technology for access is mainly fixed broadband xDSL, hybrid fiber coax and dial-up. Wireless broadband spectrum available for WiMAX is not licensed yet by the regulatory while the WiFi networks are frequently used for the Internet access in cafes. Points to multipoint systems such as LMDS are not present in the country. Fiber networks are present only in the main cities such as Tirana and Durres and implemented by some ISP-s for the purposes of internet access or triple play services provided to the end user. Fiber backbone is missing and the mobile operators backbone is mainly build of microwave transmission links based on SDH or PDH technology. Two of mobile operators have taken already some steps on offering the mobile fix substitution services to the customers but not providing the convergence of the mobile and fix telephone number. Content development is weak and mainly is based on external international resources. The main technology factors that will shape the next decade of electronic communications development are the following: Convergence of networks Fixed and mobile network differences will vanish and a common network providing integrated services will serve the customers. Mobile to fix substitution and integration has already started Convergence of network technologies to an all IP networks Traditional telecom networks and internet (ISP) will merge together to a next generation carrier network which is based on all IP technology. Services will clearly separate from transport networks and competition will be focused and oriented on services Convergence of services Convergence of networks and network technology will make possible to design, combine and deliver to the customer services which traditionally have been provided before by different technology, networks and vendors such as triple play services, (video, voice and internet) provided all at one network access point, accessed through same application environment which run in many different types of devices. Unified services access and unified messaging Customers can access through same software environment and through same or different devices and from everywhere (office, home, when traveling) same set of applications and services. Reduction of cost for hardware and increase of software role and power Software will run on standard hardware. Big software players will play a big role while the network HW vendors will become more software oriented. Growth of video content and internet utilization while the voice remains strong Demands for capacities will be huge while the needs for integrating all sets of services at one management and control will increase. Increase of connected number and types of devices Web connected devices will increase. PCs, mobiles, TVs, game devices, etc. There will be a need to standardize the applications to all these set of devices. 6.2 Electronic communications industry analysis We will use the M. Porters â€Å"Five forces model† for analyzing the industry. We selected this model as being already one of the most worldwide known, widely recognized and used model for industry analysis. The analysis done based on that model will be used for business strategy development recommendations. Market overview General data The following graphs show the sector revenue growth and market in 2008 compared to the other countries in the region. Source: (Cullen Report, 2010) Source: (Cullen Report, 2010) Mobile telephony In May 1996, AMC a state owned company by this time launched for the first time in Albania the GSM services becoming one of the first countries in the region to offer such services. Currently there are three companies operating in the mobile services market AMC, Vodafone and Eagle Mobile. The fourth operator is licensed and is expected to launch the services on July 2010. On July 2009, the mobile customers were at 3.52 millions, mobile service penetration was at 110% of the population, and more than 99% of population and 90% of territory is covered by GSM signal. Around 93.8% of customers are prepaid and 6.2% are postpaid. AMC has 43.30% of customer base, Vodafone AL 43.00% and Eagle 13.7 % (Cullen, 2010). Technology used is 2G EDGE while 3G spectrum is expected to be licensed by mid 2010. Main services offered in the market are voice, SMS, MMS, WAP, internet access and GPRS intranets. 43.3% of market share is owed by AMC, 43% by Vodafone and 13.4% by Eagle Mobile. Fixed telephony Albtelecom is the incumbent fixed operator in the market while more than 70 alternative operators operate mainly in the rural zones. Number of fixed telephony users by July 2009 end was 360,000 which represents 11.3% penetration while alternative operators customers are at 49, 690 representing 14% of this number(Cullen, 2010). 99.92 % of the fixed telephony is digitized. In July 2009 the numbers of PSTN lines were at 359,100, ISDN lines at 929, lines given to residential customers were at 338,300 and to business customers at 21,700 (Cullen, 2010). Leased lines and Data services Albtelecom and the three mobile operators are the providers of leased lines services at national and international access. Albtelecom has had the monopoly of such services until few years ago and kept it for international access until 2006. Albtelecom has implemented a few fiber lines connecting some main cities while internationally have access of fiber backbones to Italy and to Greece and other Adriatic see countries through the Adria fiber backbone. The mobile operators have not build yet a backbone to be used for leasing yet but are offering for the moment free capacities of their backbone build for their core business, mobile services. Besides AMC, there are not any clear evidences and data on the leased lines or data services provided by the other two mobile operators (Vodafone and Eagle Mobile). Albtelecom and mobile operators are moving forward their plans for implementation of a national Fiber backbone which will serve future needs for capacities nationally or for international access. AMC has provided data internetworking services to banks and other business or government institutions. More than 200 local networks of xxx customers are internetworked nationally and xxxx connections to international networks are established. COMPLETE STATISTICS Use Cullen report data on lease lines (pages 53-67, here are prices only) Broadband and Internet Services These services are offered for the moment by fixed operators while the mobile broadband services are not yet licensed by regulatory authority. Broadband penetration rate was at 2.51 % on January 2010 and was the lowest one in the region while EU penetration was at 23.9% (Cullen, 2010). About 36 ISPs are operating in Albania mainly providing the services in Tirana area and few in the other western cities. According to Cullen report, by January 2010, the number of broadband connections was 80,000, narrowband connections were at 28,512 and 30% of people are regularly using the Internet (Cullen, 2010). Number of internet users in 2008, including the mobile internet access users, was at 580,000. Main operators are Albtelecom, Abisnet, ABCOM, Alfa cable and ASC (AKEP, 2010). 65% of broadband market is owned by Albtelecom and 35% by the alternative operators. Broadband technology used is ADSL and HFC. The following table shows the internet penetration progress over the years. Source: (Internet world statistics, 2010) Albtelecom offers upstream capacities of internet access to retail customers from 512Kbps to 4Mbps while Abisnet from 1 to 3 Mbps. Albtelecom is the main operator offering to other ISP-s high capacity access to internet international gateway through fiber. Other alternative operators access the international gateways through Albtelecom use other alternative microwave links. The internet backbone access capacity in October 2009 was 5.5GB and was one of the lowest in the region. The threat for substitute product and services AMC offers Data Internetworking and Internet services through ISP in addition to its core business mobile services. International IP transit services are provided through the partnership established with OTEGlobe which is an international data services provider. The type of service is IP transit, (Layer3 Networking) where turnkey IP network is provided through delivering the end routers, installation and configurations of them and IP packet encryption as well. IP capacities provided are dedicated. Availability of services is above 99.9% and quality of network is very good. For such type of data services, substitute services in the market are considered the MPLS VPN-s, satellite data links, internet VPN services, GPRS Intranets and data dial-up. MPLS VPNs are becoming standard services worldwide but not yet present in the local market. This comes mainly due to the reasons of lack of a dedicated data backbone in the country, the lack of development of IP backbones technologies by the operators for the moment and the lack of fiber backbones. Since the data IP backbone is missing for the moment and establishing it will need time and big investments, MPLS VPNs may present a substitution threat after some years. There are not operators offering such products for the moment. Satellite data links are established through satellite terminals installed at the local remote offices locations. Links are aggregated to the satellite nub and then connected to the headquarter network. These links have the advantage of installing anywhere in the country and this represent an advantage considering the terrain but are more convenient to be used as point to point links rather than in a distributed multipoint top