Английский язык. Практический курс для решения бизнес-задач

Важнейшим достижением Ли Якокки можно считать его обращение к правительству США с просьбой выступить гарантом займов компании у банков – это был единственный способ спасти компанию от банкротства. В тот период правительство, деловые круги и население все более отчетливо понимали неэффективность государственного вмешательства в экономику, и большой популярностью пользовался лозунг «Никаких федеральных подачек! (handouts)». Ли Якокке удалось доказать Конгрессу, что банкротство «Крайслера» привело бы к потере десятков тысяч рабочих мест и обошлось бы налогоплательщикам в 16 млрд долл. в виде пособий по безработице, социальных выплат и других расходов и что Америка не стала бы лучше без компании «Крайслер».

В 1982 году «Крайслер» впервые за многие годы заработал прибыль, а в 1983 году досрочно погасил весь банковский заем. Это произошло ровно через пять лет после того, как Ли Якокка был уволен из «Форда».

Источник: по материалам книги Ли Якокки «Карьера менеджера»

Lesson 6 Corporate Strategy

Read and translate the text and learn terms from the Essential Vocabulary.

Carly’s Challenge

The relief at Hewlett-Packard Co.’s headquarters was palpable. On Nov. 16, 2004, just 96 days after its biggest quarterly earnings miss in more than a decade, HP celebrated the company’s 2004 Q4 results. The 66-year-old technology giant had rebounded nicely, reporting a 27% hike in profits, to $1.1 billion, while sales jumped 8%, to $21.4 billion. The market was happy, and HP’s stock rose a solid 8%.

But the next day, cheers gave way to sighs. Certainly the company improved its performance from the disastrous third quarter. But investors were quick to discover the vulnerabilities behind the cheery numbers. HP continued to rely heavily on its superstar printing business while its mammoth PC and server businesses struggled to generate profits. Much of the profit growth stemmed from cuts in R&D, and from a lower tax rate. Without these savings, HP’s profits would have grown only 10% – not 27%.

It has been more than five years since Carleton S. Fiorina hit town with bold plans to reinvent the Silicon Valley icon, and she’s still struggling. The charismatic CEO has zealously pursued a bigger-is-better strategy, with hopes of creating a technology world-beater. Thanks largely to its $19 billion acquisition of Compaq Computer in 2002, HP has doubled its sales in the past five years and become a competitor in an unprecedented number of markets.

Yet in too many of the businesses, HP is losing steam. Sure, its $24 billion printing division generates impressive profits. But the rest of HP is an underachiever. In personal computers, it’s no match for Dell. And HP is too often outgunned by IBM in the global markets for corporate computing. Fiorina’s team faces steep operational challenges as it tries to cope with HP’s huge portfolio of businesses. «It requires entirely different strategies to compete with Dell and IBM,» says analyst Bill Shope of J.P. Morgan. «Judging by HP’s performance, they haven’t been able to do either.»

Analysts estimate the stand-alone value of its printing business as slightly less than the entire company’s $61 billion capitalization. That means that the rest of HP’s businesses, which generate $56 billion in revenues, are being valued at next to nothing.

Still, HP is hardly insolvent. Its 2005 profits are expected to reach $4.5 billion, with sales climbing 6%, to $85 billion. Trouble is, HP has earned a reputation of not meeting expectations. Over the past 20 quarters, HP has missed analysts’ profit estimates seven times. «(HP is) trying to do 100 things. It’s hard to do everything well,» says Joseph Tucci, CEO of EMC Corp., a rival in the storage business.

Louder Drumbeat. Investors aren’t impressed, and Wall Street is insisting on a simple solution: break the company up. The CEO strongly resists the idea. The BoD continues to discuss such a move, but directors support Fiorina’s commitment to hold the company together. Still, the calls to split apart the consumer and corporate businesses, or to sell off the printer division, are bound to grow if she fails to light a fire under HP’s underperformers. The breakup options could certainly appeal to investors. Analyst Steven Milunovich of Merrill Lynch estimates that the total value of HP’s businesses could increase by 25% to 45% if it were split into printing and nonprinting operations. The printing business could expand its market and partner with HP’s computing rivals, including IBM and Dell.