Thursday, January 30, 2020

Crocs Essay Example for Free

Crocs Essay The companys primary products include footwear and accessories which utilize its proprietary closed cell-resin, Croslite. It operates through three segments: Americas, Europe and Asia. *source from WSJ. The stock price (from 1/1/2007 to now) shows the overall up and down trends to Crocs. The point indicates on Nov. 2007, Crocs’s price meltdown. Clearly, Nov 2007 is just a start for Crocs to keep going down. 2. Management problems-Inventory Crocs is a huge shoe-manufactory and international company. As mentioned in the case, there is some management problems exist in the company. As seen the chart of price above, such big volatile may reflect something wrong in the company. As we analyze the balance sheet and income statement of Crocs. We find that the inventory turnover is a little low. That is a huge problem for Crocs. Because the low rate means there are too much surplus inventory in the company. While shoes are fashionable items and Crocs is now offering large amount of new styles to customers. Thus the surplus inventories do damage to the company. The chart below compares Crocs with related-field companies to see if the inventory turnover is really low. *source from www. sec. gov/ However, I think Crocs’s inventory crisis may not be that serious. Because Crocs is an international company which focuses on seasonal products, the excess inventory can be digested selling abroad. Besides, there is another way to handle this problem. According to Ron Snyder, President and CEO of Crocs, theres really no risk in having excess inventory of our high-volume products, where the new products we want to have excess capacity in place where, when a given style takes off in a season, we can quickly ramp up and take advantage of that new style.

Wednesday, January 22, 2020

What Is Enterprise Acrhitecture Essay -- Information Technology Essays

What is Enterprise architecture? Enterprise Architecture is the link between strategy and implementation. It is a top down view of the structure of systems; it includes the fundamental organization of a system, embodied by its components, their relationships to each other and the environment, and the principles guiding its design. It can be defined as: A means for describing business structures and processes that connect business structures. www.sei.cmu.edu/architecture/glossary.html There are four areas that are commonly accepted as the components of the overall frame work. These are: †¢ Business Process. This includes strategy, governance, organisation, and key business processes. †¢ The Data. This describes the structure of an organisation's data assets. †¢ Applications. This provides an overview for the individual application systems to be deployed, their interactions, and their relationships to the business processes of the organization. †¢ Technology. This describes the logical software and hardware that are required to support the deployment of business, data, and application services. This includes IT infrastructure, networks, communications, processing, etc. It is can be used to get the current view of the business process and also where the business wants to go and how to get there. It can be viewed as city planning for IT covering the overall business processes and IT assets, how they're used, and how they should be built. What Impact could it have on the business? A strong Enterprise Architecture process helps to answer basic questions like: What are the organization's business processes, and how is IT supporting those processes? In general, the essential reasons for developing an Enterprise... ...requirements of an organization. †¢ The required IS and business capabilities to achieve these requirements. It is important to include all relationships with external entities to help ensure proper integration with their systems. †¢ Required changes within the organization this. This includes identifying the gaps between where you are and where you want to be. Once agreement has been reached that this is right for the company and backing received for the key stakeholders the company then needs to: †¢ Agree priorities for delivery. This needs to be planned in manageable stages to accommodate the company’s capacity to handle change. The company should also keep in mind the dependencies between one system and another or the possibility to run systems in parallel during the change over. †¢ Develop the required solutions. †¢ Agree standards. †¢ Evolve solutions.

Tuesday, January 14, 2020

Video Conferencing

CompareBusinessProducts. com What to Look for in a Video Conferencing System What to Look for in a Video Conferencing System Video conferencing has become â€Å"the next best thing to being there† for many businesses. Facilitating face-to-face collaboration for people who are in different locations, it can help businesses increase productivity while saving money on business travel expenses. With video conferencing, you can still have dynamic â€Å"in-person meetings† and â€Å"live† presentations and events – even if you’re on opposite ends of the country, or even in different countries.Video conferencing is also considered a â€Å"green† technology as it eliminates the carbon dioxide emissions that result from driving and air travel. But how do you know what to buy for your organization? The first step in determining this is to understand your main objectives for the system, including your usage requirements today and what they might be over the next 3-5 years. You don’t want to buy more than you need, but you do want a system that is going to scale with your business.Video conferencing has become â€Å"the next best thing to being there† for many businesses. Facilitating face-to-face collaboration for people who are in different locations, it can help businesses increase productivity while saving money on business travel expenses. With video conferencing, you can still have dynamic â€Å"in-person meetings† and â€Å"live† presentations and events – even if you’re on opposite ends of the country, or even in different countries.Video conferencing is also considered a â€Å"green† technology as it eliminates the carbon dioxide emissions that result from driving and air travel. But how do you know what to buy for your organization? The first step in determining this is to understand your main objectives for the system, including your usage requirements today and what they might be over the next 3-5 years. You don’t want to buy more than you need, but you do want a system that is going to scale with your business. ContentsKey Questions o How Big Is My Audience? o Personal, Group Conferencing, or Both? Key Features to Look For o Easy Integration with Your Computer, Network, and Unified Communications Systems o Full Video and Audio Capabilities o Recording of Audio, Video, and Data o Flexible and Comprehensive Moderator and Presenter Controls o Customizable, Brand-able o Easy to Install, Easy to Use, and Easy to Maintain o Attentive, Accessible Customer Support o Competitively Priced and Great Value –  © CompareBusinessProducts. com (877) 852-5226 What to Look for in a Video Conferencing System Key Questions How Big Is My Audience? Consider the size of your audience – or the maximum number of attendees you will ever have for your video conferences, and who they are. If you plan on having international conferences, you’ll wa nt to discuss this with your vendor to ensure all networking and equipment standards are compatible. Consider the size of the rooms where attendees will take part in the video conference. Will you have 0-10 participants, up to 100, up to 500 or more?Will attendees mostly watch from their desktops, on a lap top while traveling, on a mobile device, in the board room, in a conference hall, or all of the above? Having a very clear picture of how the system will be used will enable you to make the right decision. Personal, Group Conferencing, or Both? When it comes to group or personal videoconferencing, there is a difference in what you’ll need. Essentially, all conferencing requires a camera, microphone, speaker, monitor, and a codec, which is a small â€Å"compression-decompression† program that helps large files travel across the Internet quickly.Personal videoconferencing systems are meant to work within an office or home environment and are designed for the personal c omputer, or now, increasingly, mobile devices. Speakers, microphones, and cameras are designed for close ups use and privacy. These systems now enable rich media collaboration, data sharing, and instant messaging. Group conferencing equipment is obviously more complicated, requiring cameras that â€Å"pan,† â€Å"tilt,† and â€Å"zoom,† as well as projectors, large flat panel monitors and other displays, microphone pods, and a variety of speakers.Key Features to Look for in a Video Conferencing System Easy Integration with Your Computer, Network, and Unified Communications Systems You’ll want to make sure that the system you buy easily integrates with your existing technologies, including your phone systems, the type of computers employees use, existing flat screen monitors, speakers, etc. You’ll want to check to see if the system complies with current standards or if they are proprietary technologies. You want a system that will communicate freely with all other standards-based systems vs. nly with products from the same manufacturer. You don’t want to invest in a system that will become obsolete within a short period of time  © CompareBusinessProducts. com (877) 852-5226 3 What to Look for in a Video Conferencing System Full Video and Audio Capabilities It may seem obvious, but make sure your system can play actual videos during the video conference, not just a PowerPoint presentation or other document. You’ll want high definition for best viewing quality.In addition, many systems provide a variety of screen layouts, so that attendees can simultaneously watch a video in one section of the screen, the presenter in another, and attendees in another. The system should have a video gateway that performs the translation between various technology protocols, including audio and video encoding formats used by the other components. When it comes to audio capabilities, make sure the system is going to be versatile an d loud enough for your audience to hear it, and that is complies with broad standards.Recording of Audio, Video, and Data Your system should enable you to record the audio, video, and even data portions of your conference. It can be very useful to record important, interactive presentations to share with others, such as hosting on your company’s website Intranet, or even YouTube for later viewing. Flexible and Comprehensive Moderator and Presenter Controls Easy to use and comprehensive controls are essential, especially when it comes to live presentations and meetings.Your conference moderator should be able to control who’s presenting, what attendees can view and hear, screen resolution, bandwidth, phone call admission, call routing, and more. You’ll also want a system that can pass control of the conference to other presenters to create a dynamic and interactive meeting. Controls should also include presentation mode, when the focus needs to be solely on the p resentation and not interactive dialogue and desktop sharing for flexibility, for example going back and forth between presentation decks to a website to a video.Customizable, Brand-able While you’re buying this system from a vendor whose brand will undoubtedly be showing up on the equipment, you’ll also want to make sure your organization’s branding appears for your conference – so you want a system that is customizable and flexible enough to display your company’s look and feel in the presentation and visuals.  © CompareBusinessProducts. com (877) 852-5226 4 What to Look for in a Video Conferencing System Easy to Install, Easy to Use, and Easy to Mainta in Check to make sure the system is not so complicated that it’s unusable, or even that some of the key features are not usable.It should have a clear, concise, and easy to use menu and an intuitive user interface. Many IT people have a knack for learning how to use new technologies. For this reason, have a few others in your organization try it out and use it before buying. Attentive, Accessible Customer Support When it comes to video conferencing, you cannot underestimate how important customer support is – including technical support – for your system. A video conference is a live event with a live, interactive audience.When something goes wrong, and all too often with new technologies it will – it’s like a dropped phone call during a critical business negotiation – but to the 1,000th degree. You want to make sure that you can access support and get solutions ASAP if you have any issues with your equipment or connection. Competitively Priced and Great Value Today, the popularity of video conferencing among businesses has skyrocketed, and hence there are many players who have entered the market.This is good news for buyers because these companies are competing for your business. You want a company that has a good track record of success and one that can prove it with existing customers testimonials, case studies, and references. And as with other parts of your business, be clear about your objectives first and what you aim to achieve with your video conferencing system, including your return on investment, before you open up your wallet.  © CompareBusinessProducts. com (877) 852-5226 5