Blabla

Background Sony Corporation is one of the best-known names in consumer electronics andranks second worldwide in electronics behind Matsushita Electric Corporation. Since itwas  established  shortly  after  World  War  II,  Sony  has  introduced  a  stream  of  revolutionary  products,  including  the  transistor  radio,  the  Trinitron  television,  theBetamax  VCR,  the  CD  player,  the  Walkman  portable  cassette  player,  and  thePlayStation game console. The company's electronics segment–which includes audioand video products, televisions, personal computers, monitors, computer peripherals,telecommunications devices, and electronic components (such as semiconductors).When Dr. Toshi T. Doi took charge of the project to develop a new computer in 1984, herecruited  11  top-flight  engineers  to  form  the  team. Doi  established  three  basicguidelines for the development: †¢ (1) the computer should be 32 bit; †¢ (2) it should be multipurpose; and †¢ (3) the project should be completed as soon as possible. The engineers, however, decided that they wanted to design a machine (an engineeringworkstation)  that  would  help  them  in  their  own  engineering  work  rather  than  amultipurpose machine. Doi approved their plan, but  he required that it be  finished in sixmonths.SAPADAPA ANALYSIS:I. Situational  Analysis Dr. Toshi T. Doi was the general manager of Sony's workstation division(WD) and was not keen on changing Sony's product development process,which was efficient and successful. The WD's workstation â€Å"NEWS† launchedin October 1986 at the Tokyo Data Show had generated over 1000 inquiries;they  recovered  investments  in  few  months  and  saw  a  double  in  salesannually. Its new product development (NPD) process for the 1550 series workstationhad three stages: basic architecture sp ecification †¢ product design †¢ first lot productionOne side effect of Sony’s preoccupation with the video business was that itscomputer business. Although Sony had  some success in the  computer gamemarket, its first entrants in the computer market were 8-bit machines. TheSMC-70 and SMC-777 are 8-bit machines were introduced in 1982 and 1984,respectively, which failed quickly in competition with 16-bit MS-DOS systems(e. g. , the IBM  PC). Sony considered developing a  16-bit microcomputer but itsoon abandoned the idea. II. Problem Analysis The development required too much effort from hardware design engineers.Engineers in small teams were required to handle all issues from logic design tomanufacturability, requiring a breadth of knowledge, which many did not have. These engineers had to put-in 60 to 70 hours a week and much more during acrisis, rendering them overworked. With  all these extra  efforts put in,  the designswere still not optimized to be manufactured Man/Engineers ? Too  much  was  required  from  thehardware design engineers. Small teams were more efficient but they requiredthat each engineer be able to handle the completerange of  design  tasks, from  high-level architecturedown to minor details.Thus the engineer's skills andknowledge had to be both broad and  deep. Method ? With the current procedure, the designswere not  optimized for  manufacturability. Because hardware design engineers were unfamiliarwith  all  of  the  manufacturing  concerns,  they  oftenmissed  simple  redesigns  that  could  makemanufacturing far more efficient. Inthe current process, it is very difficult to separatetechnology  into  neat  steps  and  for  this  reason  ittakes time  to  transfer technology. The workstationmarket is so competitive that there is no time to dothis transfer. SpecializationDesign engineering does ot have  enough expertiseto support manufact uring properly, especially as theproduct line and the number of development projectscontinue to growWorking  TimeHardware  engineers  typically  work  60-70  hours  aweek And even more during a  crises. SWOT ANALYSIS A. Strengths †¢ Recovered Investments and doubled the  annual sales since the  launch of  Ã¢â‚¬Å"NEWS† †¢ Project Manager often a Senior Engineer  B. Weaknesses †¢ Small project teams †¢ Very limited design engineers †¢ Lack of traditional management tasks †¢ Marketing power is insufficientC. Opportunities †¢ Reorganization of engineers †¢ Hiring of Highly expertise/skilled design engineersD.Threats †¢ Marketing power of competitors during this time IV. Potential Problem Analysis †¢ Additional cost in hiring highly expertise or skilled design engineers. †¢ Possible loss of market if  other competitors will  win the competition duringthat time when the marketing power is still insuff icient. †¢ Small project teams that may require them to add manpower and its costs. †¢ Engineers will continue to work too much time that could result to burn-out. †¢ Possible decrease in the annual sales of the Sony Company. †¢ Loss of precisions in the product lines if the needed expertise will not