Marketing research on example of Sony in USA

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National university of life and environmental science of Ukraine

Department of world agriculture and foreign economic activity

Marketing research on example of SONY in USA

Fulfilled by:

Sachok Oleksandr

Scientific advisor:

Mischenko I. A.

Kyiv 2011Content

Introduction

1. Marketing environment SONY

1.1 Macroenvironment of the company (PEST)

1.2 Microeconomic environment

2. Technics of international marketing

3. Marketing analysis of the company

3.1 SWOT analysis of the SONY

3.2 BCG Matrix

Conclusions

List of used literature

Introduction

Start of Sony "(Sony) put a small workshop to produce short-wave radios to the console, which was opened by Mr. Masaru Ibuka. May 7, 1946, he and his companion, Mr. Akio Morita founded a company in Tokyo, "Tokyo Tsushin Kogyo (Tokyo Telecommunications Company). It employs 20 people, and the initial capital amounted to only about $ 500.

Hardly anyone would have predicted a great future if this facility which has been starved of financial resources, did not have attractive products in its production program and is constantly struggling with the threat of displacement from the market by more powerful competitors.

However, a brilliant partnership Masaru Ibuka, the technical genius of the firm, and Akio Morita, is responsible for marketing and commercial embodiment of bold projects that have transformed a small and an unknown company into one of the largest transnational corporations in the world. Their effort was to create not just a large company, and company-innovator. That's Sony Corp. launched the first mass-produced transistor radio and created the world's first home video recorder. Portable VCR with headphones, Walkman - an indispensable attribute of contemporary youth culture - also the brainchild of "Sony" (Sony), and the first person A. Morita. Together with the Dutch concern, "Philips" (Philips) the firm has developed and introduced a fundamentally new laser technology to record on CD-ROM. Do not have an equal contribution to the company in the development and promotion of equipment for television broadcasting - from analog "betakamov" camcorders and VCRs to digital formats of the last generation. Finally, the recent "Sony" (Sony) actively creates equipment for the production of digital high-definition programming, which is already replacing traditional film technology in the cinema.

That's global aspirations of the leaders of the company, their ambitious plans to promote the advanced Japanese technologies to the world markets have prompted a decision to rename the company. In 1955 she received the name of SONY, which, in essence, was expected to reflect the energetic, innovative and creative nature of the corporation.

Word of Sony, comes from combining two words: "sonus" - in translation from Latin meaning "sound" (it is a part of such well-known words such as "sound" and "sonic"), and "sonny", meaning "little son ").

The key to the corporation "Sony" (Sony) are the choice of the major goals and staging major scientific and technical problems. For those with the earliest days of the company was brilliant intuition guide, thorough market analysis and scientific forecasting of trends in its development.

The most important asset of our company was and remains the ability to mobilize the leadership team at a common understanding and coherent implementation of the task. The cycle of action before the serial production of new models of acquired finished look and used the company whenever required to make a sharp turn in its strategy to expand markets and spheres of influence in global business. A typical situation is not repeated once.

Years of establishment and successful development of the corporation only confirmed the essential values of the company Sony, always distinguish it from many other Japanese companies: openness to new ideas, ability to adapt to change plans, taking into account the real needs of the market, constant encouragement and enthusiastic young talent.

Currently, the corporation carried on the following key areas: consumer and professional electronics, production of information and telecommunications, entertainment, including film production, music programs and computer games; financial and investment activities, implementation of online projects.

Total number of employees worldwide - about 150 000 people. The headquarters of the corporation Sony in Tokyo, Japan.

1. Marketing environment SONY

1.1 Macroenvironment of the company

Macroenvironment of particular country can be described in PEST analysis. It includes political, economic, social and technical analysis of a country.

Political environment

The United States is the world's oldest surviving federation. It is a constitutional republic, "in which majority rule is tempered by minority rights protected by law." It is fundamentally structured as a representative democracy, though U.S. citizens residing in the territories are excluded from voting for federal officials. The government is regulated by a system of checks and balances defined by the U.S. Constitution, which serves as the country's supreme legal document. In the American federalist system, citizens are usually subject to three levels of government, federal, state, and local; the local government's duties are commonly split between county and municipal governments. In almost all cases, executive and legislative officials are elected by a plurality vote of citizens by district. There is no proportional representation at the federal level, and it is very rare at lower levels. Federal and state judicial and cabinet officials are typically nominated by the executive branch and approved by the legislature, although some state judges and officials are elected by popular vote.

The federal government is composed of three branches:

Legislative: The bicameral Congress, made up of the Senate and the House of Representatives, makes federal law, declares war, approves treaties, has the power of the purse, and has the power of impeachment, by which it can remove sitting members of the government.

Executive: The president is the commander-in-chief of the military, can veto legislative bills before they become law, and appoints the Cabinet and other officers, who administer and enforce federal laws and policies.

Judicial: The Supreme Court and lower federal courts, whose judges are appointed by the president with Senate approval, interpret laws and can overturn laws they find unconstitutional.

The House of Representatives has 435 members, each representing a congressional district for a two-year term. House seats are apportioned among the states by population every tenth year. As of the 2000 census, seven states have the minimum of one representative, while California, the most populous state, has fifty-three. The Senate has 100 members with each state having two senators, elected at-large to six-year terms; one third of Senate seats are up for election every other year. The president serves a four-year term and may be elected to the office no more than twice. The president is not elected by direct vote, but by an indirect electoral college system in which the determining votes are apportioned by state. The Supreme Court, led by the Chief Justice of the United States, has nine members, who serve for life. The state governments are structured in roughly similar fashion; Nebraska uniquely has a unicameral legislature. The governor (chief executive) of each state is directly elected.

All laws and procedures of both state and federal governments are subject to review, and any law ruled in violation of the Constitution by the judiciary is voided. The original text of the Constitution establishes the structure and responsibilities of the federal government and its relationship with the individual states. Article One protects the right to the "great writ" of habeas corpus, and Article Three guarantees the right to a jury trial in all criminal cases. Amendments to the Constitution require the approval of three-fourths of the states. The Constitution has been amended twenty-seven times; the first ten amendments, which make up the Bill of Rights, and the Fourteenth Amendment form the central basis of Americans' individual rights.

Barack Obama taking the presidential oath of office from U.S. Chief Justice John G. Roberts, January 20, 2009.

The United States has operated under a two-party system for most of its history. For elective offices at all levels, state-administered primary elections choose the major party nominees for subsequent general elections. Since the general election of 1856, the major parties have been the Democratic Party, founded in 1824, and the Republican Party, founded in 1854. Since the Civil War, only one third-party presidential candidate--former president Theodore Roosevelt, running as a Progressive in 1912--has won as much as 20% of the popular vote.

Within American political culture, the Republican Party is considered center-right or "conservative" and the Democratic Party is considered center-left or "liberal". The states of the Northeast and West Coast and some of the Great Lakes states, known as "blue states", are relatively liberal. The "red states" of the South and much of the Great Plains and Rocky Mountains are relatively conservative.

The winner of the 2008 presidential election, Democrat Barack Obama, is the 44th U.S. president and the first African American to hold the office. All previous presidents were men of solely European descent. The 2008 elections also saw the Democratic Party strengthen its control of both the House and the Senate. In the 111th United States Congress, the Senate comprises 57 Democrats, two independents who caucus with the Democrats, and 40 Republicans (one seat remains in dispute); the House comprises 256 Democrats and 178 Republicans (one seat is vacant).

Political divisions

Main articles: U.S. state, Territorial evolution of the United States, and Territorial acquisitions of the United States

The United States is a federal union of fifty states. The original thirteen states were the successors of the thirteen colonies that rebelled against British rule. Most of the rest have been carved from territory obtained through war or purchase by the U.S. government. One set of exceptions comprises Vermont, Texas, and Hawaii: each was an independent republic before joining the union. Another set of exceptions comprises those states created out of the territory of the original thirteen. Early in the country's history, three states were created in this manner: Kentucky from Virginia; Tennessee from North Carolina; and Maine from Massachusetts. During the American Civil War, West Virginia broke away from Virginia. The most recent state--Hawaii--achieved statehood on August 21, 1959. The states do not have the right to secede from the union.

The states compose the vast bulk of the U.S. land mass; the two other areas considered integral parts of the country are the District of Columbia, the federal district where the capital, Washington, is located; and Palmyra Atoll, an uninhabited but incorporated territory in the Pacific Ocean. The United States also possesses five major overseas territories: Puerto Rico and the United States Virgin Islands in the Caribbean; and American Samoa, Guam, and the Northern Mariana Islands in the Pacific. Those born in the territories (except for American Samoa) possess U.S. citizenship.

Foreign relations and military

The United States exercises global economic, political, and military influence. It is a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council and New York City hosts the United Nations Headquarters. Almost all countries have embassies in Washington, D.C., and many host consulates around the country. Likewise, nearly all nations host American diplomatic missions. However, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Bhutan, Sudan, and the Republic of China (Taiwan) do not have formal diplomatic relations with the United States.

The United States enjoys a special relationship with the United Kingdom and strong ties with Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Israel, and fellow NATO members. It also works closely with its neighbors through the Organization of American States and free trade agreements such as the trilateral North American Free Trade Agreement with Canada and Mexico. In 2005, the United States spent $27 billion on official development assistance, the most in the world. However, as a share of gross national income (GNI), the U.S. contribution of 0.22% ranked twentieth of twenty-two donor states. Nongovernmental sources such as private foundations, corporations, and educational and religious institutions donated $96 billion. The combined total of $123 billion is also the most in the world and seventh as a percentage of GNI.

The president holds the title of commander-in-chief of the nation's armed forces and appoints its leaders, the secretary of defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The United States Department of Defense administers the armed forces, including the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force. The Coast Guard is run by the Department of Homeland Security in peacetime and the Department of the Navy in time of war. In 2005, the military had 1.38 million personnel on active duty, along with several hundred thousand each in the Reserves and the National Guard for a total of 2.3 million troops. The Department of Defense also employs about 700,000 civilians, not including contractors. Military service is voluntary, though conscription may occur in wartime through the Selective Service System. American forces can be rapidly deployed by the Air Force's large fleet of transport aircraft and aerial refueling tankers, the Navy's fleet of eleven active aircraft carriers, and Marine Expeditionary Units at sea in the Navy's Atlantic and Pacific fleets. Outside of the United States, the military is deployed to 770 bases and facilities, on every continent except Antarctica. The extent of this global military presence has prompted some scholars to describe the United States as maintaining an "empire of bases."

Total U.S. military spending in 2009, over $528 billion, was 46% of global military spending and greater than the next fourteen largest national military expenditures combined. (In purchasing power parity terms, it was larger than the next six such expenditures combined.) The per capita spending of $1,756 was about ten times the world average. At 4.06% of GDP, U.S. military spending is ranked 27th out of 172 nations. The proposed base Department of Defense budget for 2009, $515.4 billion, is a 7% increase over 2008 and a nearly 74% increase over 2001. The cost of the Iraq War to the United States has been estimated to reach $2.7 trillion. As of March 10, 2009, the United States had suffered 4,257 military fatalities during the war and over 31,000 wounded.

Economic analysis. Economic parameters

The United States has a capitalist mixed economy, which is fueled by abundant natural resources, a well-developed infrastructure, and high productivity. According to the International Monetary Fund, the U.S. GDP of $14.3 trillion constitutes 23% of the gross world product at market exchange rates and almost 21% of the gross world product at purchasing power parity (PPP). The largest national GDP in the world, it was about 4% less than the combined GDP of the European Union at PPP in 2007. The country ranks seventeenth in the world in nominal GDP per capita and sixth in GDP per capita at PPP. The United States is the largest importer of goods and third largest exporter, though exports per capita are relatively low. Canada, China, Mexico, Japan, and Germany are its top trading partners. The leading export commodity is electrical machinery, while vehicles constitute the leading import. The United States tops the overall ranking in the Global Competitiveness Report. After an expansion that lasted just over six years, the U.S. economy has been in recession since December 2007.

The private sector constitutes the bulk of the economy, with government activity accounting for 12.4% of GDP. The economy is postindustrial, with the service sector contributing 67.8% of GDP. The leading business field by gross business receipts is wholesale and retail trade; by net income it is finance and insurance. The United States remains an industrial power, with chemical products the leading manufacturing field. The United States is the third largest producer of oil in the world, as well as its largest importer. It is the world's number one producer of electrical and nuclear energy, as well as liquid natural gas, sulfur, phosphates, and salt. While agriculture accounts for just under 1% of GDP, the United States is the world's top producer of corn and soybeans. The New York Stock Exchange is the world's largest by dollar volume. Coca-Cola and McDonald's are the two most recognized brands in the world.

In 2005, 155 million persons were employed with earnings, of whom 80% had full-time jobs. The majority, 79%, were employed in the service sector.With about 15.5 million people, health care and social assistance is the leading field of employment. About 12% of workers are unionized, compared to 30% in Western Europe. The World Bank ranks the United States first in the ease of hiring and firing workers. Between 1973 and 2003, a year's work for the average American grew by 199 hours. Partly as a result, the United States maintains the highest labor productivity in the world. However, it no longer leads in productivity per hour as it did from the 1950s through the early 1990s; workers in Norway, France, Belgium, and Luxembourg are now more productive per hour. Compared to Europe, U.S. property and corporate income tax rates are generally higher, while labor and, particularly, consumption tax rates are lower.

Income and human development

Main articles: Income in the United States, Income inequality in the United States, Poverty in the United States, and Affluence in the United States

Inflation adjusted percentage increase in after-tax household income for the top 1% and four quintiles, between 1979 and 2005 (gains by top 1% are reflected by bottom bar; bottom quintile by top bar)

According to the United States Census Bureau, the pretax median household income in 2007 was $50,233. The median ranged from $68,080 in Maryland to $36,338 in Mississippi. Using purchasing power parity exchange rates, the overall median is similar to the most affluent cluster of developed nations. After declining sharply during the middle of the 20th century, poverty rates have plateaued since the early 1970s, with 11-15% of Americans below the poverty line every year, and 58.5% spending at least one year in poverty between the ages of 25 and 75. In 2007, 37.3 million Americans lived in poverty.

The U.S. welfare state is now among the most austere in the developed world, reducing both relative poverty and absolute poverty by considerably less than the mean for rich nations.While the American welfare state does well in reducing poverty among the elderly, the young receive relatively little assistance. A 2007 UNICEF study of children's well-being in twenty-one industrialized nations ranked the United States next to last.

Despite strong increases in productivity, low unemployment, and low inflation, income gains since 1980 have been slower than in previous decades, less widely shared, and accompanied by increased economic insecurity. Between 1947 and 1979, real median income rose by over 80% for all classes, with the incomes of poor Americans rising faster than those of the rich. Median household income has increased for all classes since 1980, largely owing to more dual-earner households, the closing of the gender gap, and longer work hours, but growth has been slower and strongly tilted toward the very top (see graph). Consequently, the share of income of the top 1%--21.8% of total reported income in 2005--has more than doubled since 1980, leaving the United States with the greatest income inequality among developed nations. The top 1% pays 27.6% of all federal taxes; the top 10% pays 54.7%.

Wealth, like income, is highly concentrated: The richest 10% of the adult population possesses 69.8% of the country's household wealth, the second-highest share among developed nations. The top 1% possesses 33.4% of net wealth.

Social analysis

People have absolutely no idea what Democracy means, therefore they do not know how to "work with it". Democracy allows the USA citizens to change any low, and to change even the structure of the USA Government itself if it is better that way. Democratic Laws are made only for people; if the laws are simple, clear, and good for people, that is fine; if the Laws are not good for people, then change them because you can do that.

Science and technology

The United States has been a leader in scientific research and technological innovation since the late 19th century. In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell was awarded the first U.S. patent for the telephone. Thomas Edison's laboratory developed the phonograph, the first long-lasting light bulb, and the first viable movie camera. Nikola Tesla pioneered alternating current, the AC motor, and radio. In the early 20th century, the automobile companies of Ransom E. Olds and Henry Ford promoted the assembly line. The Wright brothers, in 1903, made the first sustained and controlled heavier-than-air powered flight.

The rise of Nazism in the 1930s led many European scientists, including Albert Einstein and Enrico Fermi, to immigrate to the United States. During World War II, the Manhattan Project developed nuclear weapons, ushering in the Atomic Age. The Space Race produced rapid advances in rocketry, materials science, and computers. The United States largely developed the ARPANET and its successor, the Internet. Today, the bulk of research and development funding, 64%, comes from the private sector. The United States leads the world in scientific research papers and impact factor. Americans possess high levels of technological consumer goods, and almost half of U.S. households have broadband Internet access. The country is the primary developer and grower of genetically modified food; more than half of the world's land planted with biotech crops is in the United States.

The United States population is projected by the U.S. Census Bureau to be 306,321,000, including an estimated 11.2 million illegal immigrants. The United States is the third most populous nation in the world, after China and India. Its population growth rate is 0.89%,compared to the European Union's 0.16%.

The birth rate of 14.16 per 1,000, 30% below the world average, is higher than any European country's except Albania and Ireland. In fiscal year 2007, 1.05 million immigrants were granted legal residence. Mexico has been the leading source of new residents for over two decades; since 1998, China, India, and the Philippines have been in the top four sending countries every year. The United States is the only industrialized nation in which large population increases are projected.

The United States has a very diverse population--thirty-one ancestry groups have more than a million members. White Americans are the largest racial group, with German Americans, Irish Americans, and English Americans constituting three of the country's four largest ancestry groups. African Americans are the nation's largest racial minority and third largest ancestry group.

Asian Americans are the country's second largest racial minority; the two largest Asian American ancestry groups are Chinese and Filipino. In 2007, the U.S. population included an estimated 4.5 million people with some American Indian or Alaskan native ancestry (2.9 million exclusively of such ancestry) and over 1 million with some native Hawaiian or Pacific island ancestry (0.5 million exclusively).Race/Ethnicity (2008)

The population growth of Hispanic and Latino Americans (the terms are officially interchangeable) is a major demographic trend. The 45.4 million Americans of Hispanic descent are identified as sharing a distinct "ethnicity" by the Census Bureau; 64% of Hispanic Americans are of Mexican descent.[123] Between 2000 and 2007, the country's Hispanic population increased 27% while the non-Hispanic population rose just 3.6%. Much of this growth is from immigration; as of 2007, 12.4% of the U.S. population was foreign-born, with 54% of that figure born in Latin America. Fertility is also a factor; the average Hispanic woman gives birth to three children in her lifetime. The comparable fertility rate is 2.2 for non-Hispanic black women and 1.8 for non-Hispanic white women (below the replacement rate of 2.1). Minorities (as defined by the Census Bureau, all those beside non-Hispanic, non-multiracial whites) constitute 34% of the population; they are projected to be the majority by 2042.

About 79% of Americans live in urban areas (as defined by the Census Bureau, such areas include the suburbs); about half of those reside in cities with populations over 50,000. In 2006, 254 incorporated places had populations over 100,000, nine cities had more than 1 million residents, and four global cities had over 2 million (New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Houston). There are fifty metropolitan areas with populations greater than 1 million. Of the fifty fastest-growing metro areas, twenty-three are in the West and twenty-five in the South. The metro areas of Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, Phoenix, and California's Inland Empire all grew by more than three-quarters of a million people between 2000 and 2006.

Language

English is the de facto national language. Although there is no official language at the federal level, some laws--such as U.S. naturalization requirements--standardize English. In 2005, about 216 million, or 81% of the population aged five years and older, spoke only English at home. Spanish, spoken by 12% of the population at home, is the second most common language and the most widely taught foreign language. Some Americans advocate making English the country's official language, as it is in at least twenty-eight states. Both Hawaiian and English are official languages in Hawaii by state law. While neither has an official language, New Mexico has laws providing for the use of both English and Spanish, as Louisiana does for English and French. Other states, such as California, mandate the publication of Spanish versions of certain government documents including court forms. Several insular territories grant official recognition to their native languages, along with English: Samoan and Chamorro are recognized by American Samoa and Guam, respectively; Carolinian and Chamorro are recognized by the Northern Mariana Islands; Spanish is an official language of Puerto Rico.

Religion

The United States is officially a secular nation; the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution guarantees the free exercise of religion and forbids the establishment of any religious governance. In a 2002 study, 59% of Americans said that religion played a "very important role in their lives," a far higher figure than that of any other wealthy nation. According to a 2007 survey, 78.4% of adults identified themselves as Christian, down from 86.4% in 1990. Protestant denominations accounted for 51.3%, while Roman Catholicism, at 23.9%, was the largest individual denomination. The study categorizes white evangelicals, 26.3% of the population, as the country's largest religious cohort; another study estimates evangelicals of all races at 30-35%. The total reporting non-Christian religions in 2007 was 4.7%, up from 3.3% in 1990. The leading non-Christian faiths were Judaism (1.7%), Buddhism (0.7%), Islam (0.6%), Hinduism (0.4%), and Unitarian Universalism (0.3%). From 8.2% in 1990, 16.1% in 2007 described themselves as agnostic, atheist, or simply having no religion, significantly less than in other postindustrial countries such as Britain (2005: 44%) and Sweden (2005: 85%).

Education

American public education is operated by state and local governments, regulated by the United States Department of Education through restrictions on federal grants. Children are required in most states to attend school from the age of six or seven (generally, kindergarten or first grade) until they turn eighteen (generally bringing them through twelfth grade, the end of high school); some states allow students to leave school at sixteen or seventeen. About 12% of children are enrolled in parochial or nonsectarian private schools. Just over 2% of children are homeschooled. The United States has many competitive private and public institutions of higher education, as well as local community colleges with open admission policies. Of Americans twenty-five and older, 84.6% graduated from high school, 52.6% attended some college, 27.2% earned a bachelor's degree, and 9.6% earned graduate degrees. The basic literacy rate is approximately 99%. The United Nations assigns the United States an Education Index of 0.97, tying it for 12th in the world.

Health

The United States life expectancy of 77.8 years at birth is a year shorter than the overall figure in Western Europe, and three to four years lower than that of Norway, Switzerland, and Canada. Over the past two decades, the country's rank in life expectancy has dropped from 11th to 42nd in the world. The infant mortality rate of 6.37 per thousand likewise places the United States 42nd out of 221 countries, behind all of Western Europe. U.S. cancer survival rates are the highest in the world. Approximately one-third of the adult population is obese and an additional third is overweight; the obesity rate, the highest in the industrialized world, has more than doubled in the last quarter-century. Obesity-related type 2 diabetes is considered epidemic by health care professionals. The U.S. adolescent pregnancy rate, 79.8 per 1,000 women, is nearly four times that of France and five times that of Germany. Abortion, legal on demand, is highly controversial. Many states ban public funding of the procedure and restrict late-term abortions, require parental notification for minors, and mandate a waiting period. While the abortion rate is falling, the abortion ratio of 241 per 1,000 live births and abortion rate of 15 per 1,000 women aged 15-44 remain higher than those of most Western nations.

The U.S. health care system far outspends any other nation's, measured in both per capita spending and percentage of GDP. The World Health Organization ranked the U.S. health care system in 2000 as first in responsiveness, but 37th in overall performance. The United States is a leader in medical innovation. In 2004, the nonindustrial sector spent three times as much as Europe per capita on biomedical research.

Unlike in all other developed countries, health care coverage in the United States is not universal. In 2004, private insurance paid for 36% of personal health expenditures, private out-of-pocket payments covered 15%, and federal, state, and local governments paid for 44%. In 2005, 46.6 million Americans, 15.9% of the population, were uninsured, 5.4 million more than in 2001. The main cause of this rise is the drop in the number of Americans with employer-sponsored health insurance. The subject of uninsured and underinsured Americans--estimates of which vary widely--is a major political issue. In 2006, Massachusetts became the first state to mandate universal health insurance.

Culture

The United States is a multicultural nation, home to a wide variety of ethnic groups, traditions, and values. There is no "American" ethnicity; aside from the now small Native American and Native Hawaiian populations, nearly all Americans or their ancestors immigrated within the past five centuries. The culture held in common by most Americans--mainstream American culture--is a Western culture largely derived from the traditions of European immigrants with influences from many other sources, such as traditions brought by slaves from Africa.More recent immigration from Asia and especially Latin America has added to a cultural mix that has been described as both a homogenizing melting pot and a heterogeneous salad bowl in which immigrants and their descendants retain distinctive cultural characteristics.

According to Geert Hofstede's cultural dimensions analysis, the United States has the highest individualism score of any country studied. While the mainstream culture holds that the United States is a classless society, scholars identify significant differences between the country's social classes, affecting socialization, language, and values. The American middle and professional class has initiated many contemporary social trends such as modern feminism, environmentalism, and multiculturalism. Americans' self-images, social viewpoints, and cultural expectations are associated with their occupations to an unusually close degree. While Americans tend greatly to value socioeconomic achievement, being ordinary or average is generally seen as a positive attribute. Though the American Dream, or the perception that Americans enjoy high social mobility, plays a key role in attracting immigrants, some analysts find that the United States has less social mobility than Western Europe and Canada.

Women now mostly work outside the home and receive a majority of bachelor's degrees. In 2005, 28% of households were married childless couples, the most common arrangement. Same-sex marriage is contentious--several states permit civil unions in lieu of marriage. Between 2003 and 2009, the supreme courts of Massachusetts, California, Connecticut, and Iowa ruled those states' bans on same-sex marriage unconstitutional. The California ruling was superseded by a state constitutional amendment, approved by voters in November 2008, that defines marriage as between a man and woman; the legality of the amendment is currently being contested in court. Between 2004 and 2008, voters in 13 other states approved similar constitutional bans on same-sex marriage. In 2009, Vermont became the same state to permit same-sex marriage through legislative action.

Literature, philosophy, and the arts

In the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, American art and literature took most of its cues from Europe. Writers such as Nathaniel Hawthorne, Edgar Allan Poe, and Henry David Thoreau established a distinctive American literary voice by the middle of the 19th century. Mark Twain and poet Walt Whitman were major figures in the century's second half; Emily Dickinson, virtually unknown during her lifetime, is now recognized as an essential American poet. A work seen as capturing fundamental aspects of the national experience and character--such as Herman Melville's Moby-Dick (1851), Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885), and F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby (1925)--may be dubbed the "Great American Novel."

Eleven U.S. citizens have won the Nobel Prize in Literature, most recently Toni Morrison in 1993. Ernest Hemingway, the 1954 Nobel laureate, is often named as one of the most influential writers of the 20th century. Popular literary genres such as the Western and hardboiled crime fiction developed in the United States. The Beat Generation writers opened up new literary approaches, as have postmodernist authors such as John Barth, Thomas Pynchon, and Don DeLillo.

The transcendentalists, led by Ralph Waldo Emerson and Thoreau, established the first major American philosophical movement. After the Civil War, Charles Peirce and then William James and John Dewey were leaders in the development of pragmatism. In the 20th century, the work of W. V. Quine and Richard Rorty brought analytic philosophy to the fore of U.S. academics. Ayn Rand's objectivism won mainstream popularity.

In the visual arts, the Hudson River School was a mid-19th-century movement in the tradition of European naturalism. The 1913 Armory Show in New York City, an exhibition of European modernist art, shocked the public and transformed the U.S. art scene. Georgia O'Keeffe, Marsden Hartley, and others experimented with new styles, displaying a highly individualistic sensibility. Major artistic movements such as the abstract expressionism of Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning and the pop art of Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein developed largely in the United States. The tide of modernism and then postmodernism has brought fame to American architects such as Frank Lloyd Wright, Philip Johnson, and Frank Gehry.

One of the first major promoters of American theater was impresario P. T. Barnum, who began operating a lower Manhattan entertainment complex in 1841. The team of Harrigan and Hart produced a series of popular musical comedies in New York starting in the late 1870s. In the 20th century, the modern musical form emerged on Broadway; the songs of musical theater composers such as Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, and Stephen Sondheim have become pop standards. Playwright Eugene O'Neill won the Nobel literature prize in 1936; other acclaimed U.S. dramatists include multiple Pulitzer Prize winners Tennessee Williams, Edward Albee, and August Wilson.

Though largely overlooked at the time, Charles Ives's work of the 1910s established him as the first major U.S. composer in the classical tradition; other experimentalists such as Henry Cowell and John Cage created an American approach to classical composition. Aaron Copland and George Gershwin developed a unique synthesis of popular and classical music. Choreographers Isadora Duncan and Martha Graham helped create modern dance, while George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins were leaders in 20th century ballet. Americans have long been important in the modern artistic medium of photography, with major photographers including Alfred Stieglitz, Edward Steichen and Ansel Adams. The newspaper comic strip and the comic book are both U.S. innovations. Superman, the quintessential comic book superhero, has become an American icon.

Law environment.

Environmental Law is a body of law, which is a system of complex and interlocking statutes, common law, treaties, conventions, regulations and policies which seek to protect the natural environment which may be affected, impacted or endangered by human activities.

Law enforcement in the United States is primarily the responsibility of local police and sheriff's departments, with state police providing broader services. Federal agencies such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the U.S. Marshals Service have specialized duties. At the federal level and in almost every state, jurisprudence operates on a common law system. State courts conduct most criminal trials; federal courts handle certain designated crimes as well as appeals from state systems.

Among developed nations, the United States has above-average levels of violent crime and particularly high levels of gun violence and homicide. In 2007, there were 5.6 murders per 100,000 persons, three times the rate in neighboring Canada. The U.S. homicide rate, which decreased by 42% between 1991 and 1999, has been roughly steady since.[166] Gun ownership rights are the subject of contentious political debate.

The United States has the highest documented incarceration rate and total prison population in the world. At the start of 2008, more than 2.3 million people were incarcerated, more than one in every 100 adults. The current rate is about seven times the 1980 figure. African American males are jailed at about six times the rate of white males and three times the rate of Hispanic males. In 2006, the U.S. incarceration rate was over three times the figure in Poland, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) country with the next highest rate. The country's high rate of incarceration is largely due to sentencing and drug policies. Though it has been abolished in most Western nations, capital punishment is sanctioned in the United States for certain federal and military crimes, and in thirty-seven states. Since 1976, when the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty after a four-year moratorium, there have been over 1,000 executions.[174] In 2006, the country had the sixth highest number of executions in the world, following China, Iran, Pakistan, Iraq, and Sudan. In December 2007, New Jersey became the first state to abolish the death penalty since the 1976 Supreme Court decision, followed by New Mexico in March 2009. In 2004, New York's death penalty statute was declared unconstitutional, and it has not performed an execution since 1963.

Technological environment

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was established in 1970 by President Nixon. It was created to permit coordinated and effective governmental action on behalf of the environment. Its mission is to protect human health and to safeguard the natural environment - air, water, and land - under the laws enacted by Congress. EPA's purpose is to ensure that: all Americans are protected from significant risks to human health and the environment where they live, learn and work.

National efforts to reduce environmental risk are based on the best available scientific information. Environmental protection is an integral consideration in U.S. policies on natural resources, human health, economic growth, energy, transportation, agriculture, industry, and international trade, and these factors are similarly considered in establishing environmental policy. All parts of society have access to accurate information in order to effectively participate in managing human health and environmental risks. Environmental protection contributes to making American communities and ecosystems diverse, sustainable and economically productive.

Environmental technology, one of the fastest growing industry sectors worldwide, has evolved in response to growing concerns about the risks and costs of pollution and the enactment of pollution control legislation in the United States and around the world. It advances sustainable development by reducing risk, enhancing cost-effectiveness, and creating products and processes that are not environmentally harmful.

Environmental technology is comprised of four major categories: 1) monitoring and assessment, or technologies used to establish and monitor the condition of the environment; 2) pollution avoidance, or equipment and processes used to prevent or minimize the generation of pollutants; 3) pollution control, or technologies that render hazardous substances harmless before they enter the environment; and, 4) remediation and restoration, or technologies used to render hazardous substances harmless.

1.2 Microeconomic environment

In the United States, Sony Electronics Inc. (SEL) is working actively to create a work environment conducive to the employment of individuals from varying backgrounds. One such initiative was the inauguration in October 2005 of two affinity groups focusing on the engagement of women and minorities. Through workshops and forums, members of these groups have established personal networks and promoted to share information and have communications. An additional group was established in 2007 to hold forums and other activities that enhance employee motivation, productivity and satisfaction.

Ratios of Female Employees and Female Employees in Management Positions

Hoover's business intelligence allows subscribers to assess how Sony USA's competitors, prospects, and partners stack up financially. With access to Hoover's business intelligence, subscribers are able to view a competitive analysis of all Sony USA competitors on several key numbers including: sales, profitability, valuation, and financial ratios.

Demand is driven by consumer income and the rate of product innovation. The profitability of individual companies depends on manufacturing efficiency and effective marketing and distribution. Large companies have advantages in economies of scale in manufacturing, marketing, and distribution. Small companies can compete effectively by offering specialty products or components in system solutions, such as speakers in a home theatre system. Average annual revenue per worker is about $500,000 per year.

The output of US audio and video equipment manufacturing is forecast to increase at an annual compounded rate of 2 percent between 2008 and 2013. Data

Audio Video Equipment

First Research forecasts are based on INFORUM forecasts that are licensed from the Interindustry Economic Research Fund, Inc. (IERF) in College Park, MD. INFORUM's "interindustry-macro" approach to modeling the economy captures the links between industries and the aggregate economy.

The First Research Industry Growth Rating reflects the expected industry growth relative to other industries, based on INFORUM's forecasted average annual growth for the combined years of 2009 and 2010.

Demand: Demographics favorable

Efficient use of labor required

Risk: Slow economy limits spending on non-essentials

Industries Where Sony USA Competes

-Consumer Products Manufacturers

-Consumer Electronics (primary)

-Computer Hardware

-Computer Software

-Leisure

Sony USA competitors are primarily in the Consumer Electronics industry. Sony USA also competes in the Photographic & Optical Equipment/Supplies Manufacturers, Computer Peripherals, and Handheld Computers & Accessories sectors.

Top Sony USA Competitors :

-Panasonic Corporation of North America(Secaucus, NJ)

-Philips North America (Andover, MA)

-SANYO North America(San Diego, CA)

With access to Hoover's business intelligence, subscribers are able to view a competitive analysis of Sony USA's main competitors with details in several key categories, including: sales, profitability, valuation, and financial ratios. Learn how Hoover's business intelligence provides you with an accurate, 360° view of Sony USA's competitive landscape.

2. Technics of international marketing

The Sony Group is primarily focused on the Electronics (such as AV/IT products & components), Game (such as PlayStation), Entertainment (such as motion pictures and music), and Financial Services (such as insurance and banking) sectors. Not only do represent a wide range of businesses, but they remain globally unique. The main aim is to fully leverage this uniqueness in aggressively carrying out their convergence strategy so that they can continue to emotionally touch and excite their customers.

Sales & Margin summary analysis for Sony Corporation Tabular results include up to a ten-year history on Sales, Ebidta(Earnings before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortization), Income before Extraordinary Items and number of Employees. Additional ratios are included for sales growth, earnings and income as a percent of sales and Sales per Employee.

Sony Corporation. The Group's principal activity is to develop, design, manufacture and sale of various kinds of electronic equipment, instruments, and devices for consumer and industrial markets. It also develops, produces, manufactures, and markets home-use game consoles and software. It is engaged in the development, production, manufacture, marketing, distribution and broadcasting of image-based software, including film, video and television products. It is also engaged in various financial service businesses, including insurance operations through a Japanese life insurance subsidiary and a non-life insurance subsidiary, banking operations through a Japanese internet-based banking subsidiary and leasing and credit financing operations in Japan. The other activities include development, production, manufacture and distribution of recorded music, a network service business, an animation production and marketing business and an advertising agency business.

Sony Corporation of America, based in New York, NY, is a U.S. subsidiary of Sony Corporation, headquartered in Tokyo. Sony is a leading manufacturer of audio, video, communications, and information technology products for the consumer and professional markets. Its motion picture, television, computer entertainment, music and online businesses make Sony one of the most comprehensive entertainment companies in the world. Sony's principal U.S. businesses include Sony Electronics Inc., Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc., Sony Computer Entertainment America Inc., and Sony Music Entertainment, one of the largest recorded music companies in the world. Sony recorded consolidated annual sales of approximately $88.7 billion for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2008, and it employs 180,500 people worldwide. Sony's consolidated sales in the U.S. for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2008 were $29 billion.

Sony companies are known for creating products that enrich people's lives. Through Sony Corporation of America and its operating companies - Sony Electronics Inc., Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc. and Sony Music Entertainment - they are also dedicated to improving people's lives. Their commitment extends to helping local communities, fostering better educational systems, funding research to cure devastating diseases, supporting the arts and culture, helping disadvantaged youth, protecting and improving the environment and actively encouraging employee volunteerism.

Sony philanthropic efforts reflect the diverse interests of their key businesses and focus on several distinct areas: arts education; arts and culture; health and human services; civic and community outreach; education; the environment; and volunteerism. Each operating company has its own philanthropic priorities and unique resources, from product donations to recordings and screenings that benefit a multitude of causes. Sony Corporation of America is a strong supporter of arts and culture. Education and volunteerism are key components of Sony Electronics Inc.'s philanthropic efforts. Sony Pictures Entertainment is a major supporter of arts education and community involvement, with emphasis in Culver City, California, its world headquarters. Collectively, they have also been quick to provide assistance when large-scale disasters have struck. We've helped victims of major hurricanes, earthquakes, wildfires and the attack on the World Trade Center.