Case: ADM@RT--Poor plan and its consequences

ADM@RT 's start up problems and chaos were mainly caused by poor plan.
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For a department that required a structured and logical procedure to build up a system,
adM@rt’s IT had no set long-term plan. Terence said,
“Basically we change with Jimmy’s directions. And he changes every day.”
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Although ADM@RT entered into a new area of business, which does not necessarily mean that it is no need to or not able to have sufficient preparations. Some necessary plans could have help Mr. Lai out if they were implemented.

1) If Mr. Lai and his team could have launched surveys for:Categories of its potential customer and their buying habits--frequency to buy/targetted goods/their buying channel @ ADM@RT
2) and if Mr. Lai could analyze prior for:Capacity of his system and its allocation--How much orders for each system(telephone/internet/fax/call center/shops) could accept as maximum and how to allocate capacity of these systems to make best use of both system and human resources.

Adm@rt was a pioneer in the online shopping. They put a lot of money and energy into the company but the result was not good. Reasons including:
1)The founder of the company was always changing, no definite strategy and invest a unfamiliar area
2)The operating cost of the company was too high to break even.
3)Their rivals had larger market shares than Adm@rt did, and the rivals knew the industry better than Adm@rt. It was hard for Adm@rt to compete against them

The issue is how ADM@RT can compete with the traditional retailers in a long term, and with the increasing orders how to handle technical problems, the pressure of logistics and stock. Meanwhile provides the best service for its customers with efficient Information and Logistics Systems.

In my opinion, the main issues ADM@RT met are: How to operate efficiently and economically? How to lure more customers? And how to make profits? The reasons to the issues may as follows:
The model of ADM@RT was really a new one which was quite different from the customers’ conventional way of buying.
ADM@RT failed to build a good image and make a good impression on customers;and
the competitors were very strong for ADM@RT in the struggle of market share.

There are lots of problems that you can found in this case. 1st Mr. Lai=Adm@rt, he is too powerful in the company, it is not a good sign. 2nd almost all the senior managers are from Giordano. 3rd, lack of feasibility study, just an idea of Mr. Lai. 4th, Since Mr. Lai is considered as an anti-communist figure, his company become unwelcomed by mainland China, that caused him lost a huge market or potential market in the future.
------------Mandia Ni / Ni Yueying 2011969158-----------------------

mandiani wrote:There are lots of problems that you can found in this case. 1st Mr. Lai=Adm@rt, he is too powerful in the company, it is not a good sign. 2nd almost all the senior managers are from Giordano. 3rd, lack of feasibility study, just an idea of Mr. Lai. 4th, Since Mr. Lai is considered as an anti-communist figure, his company become unwelcomed by mainland China, that caused him lost a huge market or potential market in the future.
------------Mandia Ni / Ni Yueying 2011969158-----------------------

Senior managers come from Giordano is not a weak point, on the contrary the team are full of experience and very loyal to Lai. Regarding Lai's attitude to mainland China, it just has potential risk for him to extend adM@rt biz to China, but seldom influence to his biz in HK. MLChina is out of reach at this moment, he has to focus on local biz first of all.

Joel-11GB wrote:In my opinion, the main issues ADM@RT met are: How to operate efficiently and economically? How to lure more customers? And how to make profits? The reasons to the issues may as follows:
The model of ADM@RT was really a new one which was quite different from the customers’ conventional way of buying.
ADM@RT failed to build a good image and make a good impression on customers;and
the competitors were very strong for ADM@RT in the struggle of market share.

In my understanding, it is better to have one main issue in the assignment. Others are side issues or just symptons of the issues. And I don't agree your first reason to the issues. The biz model is indeed a new one, but if managed properly, it can entail a great success.

For the first field of retail electrical commerical business, the important factor need to focus on delivery way and consummer converience, just sharply reduce price and cost will potential increase fade product increase.

luoli wrote:

Joel-11GB wrote:In my opinion, the main issues ADM@RT met are: How to operate efficiently and economically? How to lure more customers? And how to make profits? The reasons to the issues may as follows:
The model of ADM@RT was really a new one which was quite different from the customers’ conventional way of buying.
ADM@RT failed to build a good image and make a good impression on customers;and
the competitors were very strong for ADM@RT in the struggle of market share.

In my understanding, it is better to have one main issue in the assignment. Others are side issues or just symptons of the issues. And I don't agree your first reason to the issues. The biz model is indeed a new one, but if managed properly, it can entail a great success.

Really impressive about the viewpoint of Ali. He said the idea was totally wrong. Lai should not do EC at HK at all!

11250690156 wrote:ADM@RT 's start up problems and chaos were mainly caused by poor plan.
--------------------------------------------------------------
For a department that required a structured and logical procedure to build up a system,
adM@rt’s IT had no set long-term plan. Terence said,
“Basically we change with Jimmy’s directions. And he changes every day.”
--------------------------------------------------------------
Although ADM@RT entered into a new area of business, which does not necessarily mean that it is no need to or not able to have sufficient preparations. Some necessary plans could have help Mr. Lai out if they were implemented.

1) If Mr. Lai and his team could have launched surveys for:Categories of its potential customer and their buying habits--frequency to buy/targetted goods/their buying channel @ ADM@RT
2) and if Mr. Lai could analyze prior for:Capacity of his system and its allocation--How much orders for each system(telephone/internet/fax/call center/shops) could accept as maximum and how to allocate capacity of these systems to make best use of both system and human resources.

The personality of Jimmy or we say GM or CEO can heavily influence the direction, decision and strategy of the company which to some extent might decide the fate of the company. Like Steve Jobs....

Song Lihui wrote:

11250690156 wrote:ADM@RT 's start up problems and chaos were mainly caused by poor plan.
--------------------------------------------------------------
For a department that required a structured and logical procedure to build up a system,
adM@rt’s IT had no set long-term plan. Terence said,
“Basically we change with Jimmy’s directions. And he changes every day.”
--------------------------------------------------------------
Although ADM@RT entered into a new area of business, which does not necessarily mean that it is no need to or not able to have sufficient preparations. Some necessary plans could have help Mr. Lai out if they were implemented.

1) If Mr. Lai and his team could have launched surveys for:Categories of its potential customer and their buying habits--frequency to buy/targetted goods/their buying channel @ ADM@RT
2) and if Mr. Lai could analyze prior for:Capacity of his system and its allocation--How much orders for each system(telephone/internet/fax/call center/shops) could accept as maximum and how to allocate capacity of these systems to make best use of both system and human resources.

The personality of Jimmy or we say GM or CEO can heavily influence the direction, decision and strategy of the company which to some extent might decide the fate of the company. Like Steve Jobs....

So be a great leader, or find a greater leader.

The explaination of "poor plan" is kind of afterwards explaination. I personally feel that Jimmy Lai failed because his concept goes far ahead of the reality. He didn't have much resource to use, like successful story , cost effective logistic and mature Emart software. He could not plan everything, otherwise he would even never do it . He just wanted to walked out a new way, and actually he did. Many late comers can learn a lot from his experience, and contribute a lot to nowadays industry. Actually even now, many E-players are still trying to walk out a "new" way, coz it is still a debate whether Emart could be an sustainable business model. You see, a lot of E-players are pretty struggling to make money.

Giant company never try to become the "first" . They would wait for more and more Jimmy Lai bring out new ideas and to explore it. They would leverage its capital to make things better and scrub entreprenures like Jimmy. From this sense, the possibility of failure to those "first" is very high. However, we still need to say "First Failures" are as imporant as "First wins".

Luo Jian wrote:Adm@rt was a pioneer in the online shopping. They put a lot of money and energy into the company but the result was not good. Reasons including:
1)The founder of the company was always changing, no definite strategy and invest a unfamiliar area
2)The operating cost of the company was too high to break even.
3)Their rivals had larger market shares than Adm@rt did, and the rivals knew the industry better than Adm@rt. It was hard for Adm@rt to compete against them

If ADm@RT esdtablished now, it will be very success, because E-commerce is familiar to every body now.
ADM's idea is too early in 1999. So ADM@rt could not aquire the sufficient technical support at that time. The biggest enemy of E-commerce is the system's capability can not keep up with the customers' demand. The firts problem ADM meet was just this one.

luoli wrote:

mandiani wrote:There are lots of problems that you can found in this case. 1st Mr. Lai=Adm@rt, he is too powerful in the company, it is not a good sign. 2nd almost all the senior managers are from Giordano. 3rd, lack of feasibility study, just an idea of Mr. Lai. 4th, Since Mr. Lai is considered as an anti-communist figure, his company become unwelcomed by mainland China, that caused him lost a huge market or potential market in the future.
------------Mandia Ni / Ni Yueying 2011969158-----------------------

Senior managers come from Giordano is not a weak point, on the contrary the team are full of experience and very loyal to Lai. Regarding Lai's attitude to mainland China, it just has potential risk for him to extend adM@rt biz to China, but seldom influence to his biz in HK. MLChina is out of reach at this moment, he has to focus on local biz first of all.

Mr.Lai's role in Adm@rt is just like Pretorius in Danimal;Both are essentially supported by the passion of only one individual; But one succeed and one fail;And both tell a truth that this kind module of business is very risky; For a long run business, find the right value propositon, establish the suitable business module are more essential;

I just feel that the company rely too much on Mr. Lai. The operation head said that they just followed Lai. But I think this kind of mechanism did not benifit for the innovation. I think that innovation is a kind of team work not leaded by one person.

高峰 wrote:I just feel that the company rely too much on Mr. Lai. The operation head said that they just followed Lai. But I think this kind of mechanism did not benifit for the innovation. I think that innovation is a kind of team work not leaded by one person.

Absolutely,It feels like not a team,just Lai

qiuhao2222 wrote:

Luo Jian wrote:Adm@rt was a pioneer in the online shopping. They put a lot of money and energy into the company but the result was not good. Reasons including:
1)The founder of the company was always changing, no definite strategy and invest a unfamiliar area
2)The operating cost of the company was too high to break even.
3)Their rivals had larger market shares than Adm@rt did, and the rivals knew the industry better than Adm@rt. It was hard for Adm@rt to compete against them

If ADm@RT esdtablished now, it will be very success, because E-commerce is familiar to every body now.
ADM's idea is too early in 1999. So ADM@rt could not aquire the sufficient technical support at that time. The biggest enemy of E-commerce is the system's capability can not keep up with the customers' demand. The firts problem ADM meet was just this one.

That's one point, another critical point is that Adm@rt focus too much , while loss on its critical value chains. It pay too many attentions for its logistics, vehicles and shops.but its still short of good credit monitor, good customer internet order system, and finance balance model.. and so on.

As the major role at ADM@RT is to support the frontline team to provide the best service for the customers, the people did not prefer the ADM@RT. So when we focus the structure of ADM@RT, we could found Lai was the main leader in ADM@RT’s organizational structure. And he control three main divisions: Human Resources, Information Technology and Logistics directly. Blind obedience made the company can’t truly develop at all. If Lai delegate powers to lower levels the situation should more successfully.
To regard as EC is a very unconventional business. EC is a kind of business that needs somebody who is as daring, open-minded and unconventional. It could believe that ADM@RT will overcome the challenge and develop the EC in the future.