Hardware and Software

Market Expansion Strategy

Networking Products

A major networking company decided to systematically address the government market for products and services after having made a tentative entry from its base in the private sector. Its problem was that this market's customers had needs that differed significantly from those of its traditional private-sector clients. In addition, this market was controlled by a different set of VARs and system integrators from those that had led our client to success in the private sector. We helped the client determine what value propositions would appeal best to these new customers and channel partners and then formulate a set of strategies to maximize market penetration.

Improving Product Portfolio and Value Communications

Communications Products

One of the largest telecommunications technology vendors asked us to review the appropriateness of its portfolio of support services surrounding its core products for its largest customers. After detailed analyses of the drivers of customer value, purchase behavior, account profitability, and discounting policies, we recommended a series of changes to (1) product positioning, (2) sales approaches and customer value communications (3) relative pricing of different services, (4) realignment of products to match them with how customers want to buy them, and (5) reformulation of several offerings to better meet customer needs. Through these changes our client expects to increase revenues and profits by several hundred million dollars per annum.

Capturing Missed Profits

Information Technology Vendor

A multi-billion information technology vendor was concerned about how to achieve its full profit potential for services. The Sales organization said that services were priced too high, while the service delivery organization said that sales was 'giving away the store'. Meanwhile the overall organization had only the roughest ideas about which accounts were profitable, and what values customers ascribed to various services. After a detailed analysis of account profitability, discounting patterns, service costs at the account level, and customer perceptions of value we learned that (1) discounting was indeed out of control, (2) the core services were of high value and somewhat under-priced relative to customers' perception of value, leaving some $70-100 M in profits on the table, and (3) a second set of services needed to be significantly restructured to better meet customers requirements. As a result, the client improved the processes by which it managed discounting, established sales training programs to help the sales reps sell more on value and less on price, and redesigned the problematic offers in order to capture a several hundred million dollar revenue opportunity.

Communications Market Strategy

Electronics and System Integration Company

This $6 B division of a Fortune 50 company had developed numerous telecommunications products and service concepts in its R&D laboratory and sought help in commercializing them. We reviewed the project portfolio and identified several multi-billion dollar product ideas. We then helped the company determine which to pursue on its own, which to develop in conjunction with partners, and which to partially spin out to take advantage of the investment community's large current appetite for communications technology companies.

Channel Strategy

Computer Products

An office equipment and computer products company recognized that the growth in their markets was shifting from the high-priced office and IT-shop equipment, which it had traditionally sold with its direct sales force, towards network printers sold through PC channels. The problem was that while the company had some competitive printers, its previous attempts to sell through PC channels had failed. We helped our client determine which products to sell through which channels, develop value propositions that would lead to channel share worth $1 B+ in new revenues among tier one and tier two PC distributors, and develop processes to manage channel conflict between the indirect channels organization and the direct sales force. The key market analysis concerned the channel partners' needs when viewed as customers of our client.

Understand Merger Economics

Hedge fund

Our client, a mid-sized hedge fund focused on the technology industries, has had us do several analyses of the economics of various mergers in the telecom equipment and services sectors. In two cases, we identified significant potential synergies that the merging companies had not announced, so as to have hidden reserves to offset potential future market weakness. In two other cases, our analyses showed that the merging companies had over-hyped the benefits of their mergers. The former companies produced several years of better-than-expected earnings and shareholder value growth, while the shares of the latter two companies have fallen sharply in value as a result of repeatedly missed earnings projections.

Post-Merger Integration

Internet and Software Services Company

Our clients, the CEO's of two Internet and software services companies had just signed a letter of intent to merge their companies. We were retained to work with a cross-company team to address all issues of post merger integration in parallel with the legal and financial due diligence phases of the discussions, so that they day that the merger received formal approval, the companies could begin joint operations. Our work addressed all elements of the two businesses including marketing and sales, operations, R&D, and administration. Within four weeks we developed a comprehensive plan to combine the companies, achieve a minimum 10% unit cost decrease, retain all major accounts and key staff, and complete the integration with ninety days of deal closure.

Improve Field Support Process

Business Software Company

One of the largest software companies had developed a global network of several thousand very powerful market influencers who led important virtual communities. Our client's expectation was that these communities would help customers improve their experience with the client's products, thereby cutting down on calls to the help desk and inclining them to be more loyal and buy additional products. While the influencers loved the program, its processes were non-scalable and the experience of the individual influencer varied widely, based on the experience and creativity of his rep at the company. Our task was to regularize service delivery to achieve a scalable model without compromising service quality..

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