Scrutinize the general and task environment for the chosen company's strategy (already launched) to

address the reasons why that strategy was conducted?

Apple Inc. is a technological business that has achieved excellent success in developing, designing,
producing and selling the unique products including Mac, iPad, iPhone, Airpod,… which brings the best
innovations for the customers. To receive the reputation and maintain its brand values in the intense
competition, business strategies and marketing strategies have played a significant role for the
corporation. These strategies will be conducted based on the general environment and task environment to
help the company understand the market situations, the directions of the operations and find out the
factors, which affect organizational performance.

The organizational environment is subdivided into two aspects, that is the general environment and the
task environment. The general environment can be defined as the external environment, which refers to a
combination of factors outside the company that can influence the operation and performance of the
business. On the other hand, the task environment is things that are closed to the organization and affect
its ability to reach the goals.

The first environment that I will discuss is the task environment. There are four factors in the task
environment. These are suppliers, distributors, customers and competitors. At Apple, everyone knows that
this organization has top-notch products, but few of them know who help to build it. To make products
like iPhone, iPad, iPod,… Apple does not depend on manufacturing alone. There are over 200 top
suppliers, which account for 98 per cent of procurement expenditures for materials, manufacturing, and
assembly of its products worldwide. Taiwan is Apple's number one supplier region, including many big
companies. The company that I must mention is Hon Hai Precision- better known as Foxconn
Technology. Foxconn is one of Apple's oldest and largest suppliers. The company has its headquarters in
Tucheng, New Taipei City. That is why Taiwan is on the map of Apple. This is a place where a huge
volume of iPhones and iPads for Apple are made. Foxconn has helped Apple to branch out with many
locations in the world like Taiwan, China, India, Brazil, Vietnam, United States,… Similar to Foxconn,
Pegatron provides iPhone assembly. This is another company rounding out the Taiwan lineup with
headquarters in Taiwan. Apple orders chips from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (TSMC). TSMC
builds 5nm chips for iPhone 12, iPad Air, 5G iPad Pro, and any future MacBook or iMac systems. In
2019, Apple was thought to have accounted for about 20 per cent of TSMC's monthly revenue, making it
one of TSMC's largest customers.
Moreover, Apple has several suppliers for manufacturing screens. Samsung Display is the main display
supplier for Apple, shipping 90 per cent of the OLED panels for the iPhone, including iPhone 11 Pro and
iPhone 11 Pro Max. Japan Display, LG Display, and Sharp manufactured LCD-based iPhones, like
iPhone 11. Apple is known to maintain one of the best managed and supply chains in the world. I think
that being associated with a big brand like Apple can be a remarkable boon for supplier firms. In general,
Apple needs suppliers to make perfect products and suppliers need Apple to earn revenue. This
relationship is from two sides. The strong relationship depends on both sides appreciating these needs and
working together to ensure both sides get what they need.

Because of its reputation all over the world, there are a lot of organizations in the world that sell their
products—for instance, FPT to be Apple's official distributor in Vietnam. According to the CEO of FPT,
this will make a significant contribution to improving the source of supply and service quality for
domestic consumers. Another distributor of Apple is Digiworld Corporation. This organization directly
distributes all Apple product lines comprising iPhone, iPad, Macbook, Watch, Apple TV and accessories
like Airpod, keyboard, mouse, and case. Distributors play a vital role in connecting manufacturers and
customers. The more distributors of Apple appearing in the world, the more efficiency and effectiveness
Apple will get.
 Due to simple features and various devices such as iPhone, iPod, Apple Watch, Mac, Apple is not only a
brand that is familiar to a huge number of customers of all ages but also loved by them, especially the
group of young people who are more likely to catch the trend in the society. According to a Marketing
Agency, Slice, a higher percentage of customers who buy the iPhone, Macbook Air, Macbook Pro, and
Apple TV are between the ages of 25 and 34. Seniors 65 and older, and people between 35 and 44, are the
biggest of iPad customers. And those who are 35 to 44 made up the highest percentage of Apple Watch
sales. The largest percentage of Apple Music customers are 25 to 34 years old. However, Apple currently
faces the bargaining power of buyers. There are a variety of choices for buyers. Customers can switch
easily between the brands and look for the devices that have high quality but low price. This causes some
difficulties for Apple when their price is quite high, so Apple is mainly targeting the customers that have
academic institutes, colleges, and retail buyers to develop. Schools and other organizations are the main
customers of Apple. Besides, Apple has always followed a magic formula that is implementing a
customer-centric strategy and building good relationships with customers to sell more products through
the customer centre by surveying 'customer experience' to gain customer loyalty. For example, Apple
makes opportunities for customers to use its products, then gather opinions about the product. Based
there, Apple will create products that meet the needs and tastes of consumers as well as resolve
customer's problems and concerns like customer privacy. During Consumer Technology Association
2020, Apple's senior director for global privacy mentioned Apple's take on privacy as minimizing the
amount of personal data collected from its users, providing highly secured cloud storage (iCloud) and
providing tools for users to be able to maintain their privacy. These are the reasons to explain why Apple
attracts more and more customers using their products.

Furthermore, Apple is operating in a competitive market with a variety of competitors such as Google
Phone, Microsoft, Nokia, Lenovo. One of Apple's top competitors is Samsung which is a Korean
multinational corporation headquartered in Samsung Town, Seoul, in 1938. It includes many affiliated
businesses, most of them united under the Samsung brand and the largest corporation in Korea. It focuses
on developing and expanding strategic products in the Consumer Electronics division. The Samsung
Galaxy phones, for instance, have great features with the Android operating system which is widely
accepted and available at different costs. According to IHS, in 2019, Samsung sold more smartphones
than Apple - 295 million compared to 193 million. This leads to the remarkable risks and challenges for
Apple. Next, Huawei is a multinational corporation in network equipment and telecommunications,
headquartered in Shenzhen, Guangdong, China. The company is a leading provider of information and
communication technology and smart devices. Huawei's main strength is being ranked third in the global
mobile internet market. It has great technical strength and has invested heavily in research and
development. It has steady business growth and excellent global sales. Since Huawei is an excellent
manufacturer of smartphones, it is a top iPhone competitor. Another competitor is Nokia which is
remembered as the first user mobile device for many users, founded in 1865 and is headquartered in
Finland. With a strong foundation and being one of the top-selling brands in the smartphone market,
Nokia has pressure on Apple in the competitive market. In sum, Apple needs to work strategically to
regain its top position, especially when the product life cycle is too short, and the dynamics of the market
are continuously changing.

The second environment that involves business is the general environment. Economic, technological,
sociocultural, demographic, political, and legal forces in the general environment often have important
effects on forces in the task environment that determine an organization's ability to obtain resources
effects that managers may not be aware of. In Apple, we can easily see many factors which this company
is facing in recent days and especially in politics. As we know that Apple is on of American technology
companies had a large asset, it reached to 34.7$ billion on June 30, 2015, or taking the place of giant
company Saudi Aramco to become the most valuable company in the word in 2020. This creates a
political issue in taxation which demand Apple pays more money for taxation in the US where taxation is
set by income. Moreover, Apple heavily depends on lower-cost manufacturing and market in China. The
unrest problems in China, such as COVID-19 pandemic and conflict between America and China rising
because of restricting import and export in two countries can influence the manufacturing and sales of
Apple. It can increase the price of Apple product because Apple has to deal with increasing
manufacturing-cost in China, and taxation in the product is produced in China when being sold in the
USA. The close association of Apple with China could lead to a political issue in the USA and Japan if
China perceived as a threat. That means Apple will have to close all the stores in China and choose new
alternatives such as India, Vietnam … Although it will create a new chance for Apple to enter the India
market, Apple affords for manufacturing cost more than producing in China. Finally, monopolizing Apple
in many fields such as music - Spotify and Apple music or paying through Apple pay such as Apple with
Epic Games. It can create potential problems and political pressure to break Apple and reduce the market
share of this company when Apple has to face antitrust law in many Europe countries.

Apple is one of many companies which consider the environment because there were more than 1.2
billion iPhone are released to the market in the third quarter of 2017. That leads to the biggest
environmental issue facing Apple is the disposal of used or non-working electronic devices. The expense
of disposing of devices, particularly those containing lithium batteries, could be high. Apple could be
forced to assume that expense because of concerns about such devices in landfills. However, Apple has
invented a robot which can recover valuables from used iPhone, and it can reduce a large amount of
electronic waste to the environment. Growing concern about pollution and side effects from
manufacturing in China and motivation reducing greenhouse gases, reduction of fossil fuel in China can
impact directly on the price of producing new Apple devices in this country, which will increase the price
of Apple devices if Apple does not have a suitable strategy to deal with this situation. Moreover, the
strength of Apple devices is that the connection each other devices by data centre- iCloud, that catch
Apple must spend a large amount of money on electricity and bandwidth if the price of two kinds of
things increases that also impact on user's experience. That means Apple will increase price or regulation.
Even though many challenges in saving the environment, Apple is still successful in solving problems
about the environment and in 2020 with cutting Earpods and adapters in the new iPhone promise to
reduce electronic waste to the environment. This reduction and design capabilities of Apple create an
advantage that should propel its revenue growth for decades to come.

About the economic environment, the recent years, the price of the iPhone has increased higher, as the
development of the economic, the people have higher income, so more people can buy the higher price of
products. Furthermore, in China, the price of the iPhone 8 is RMB4000, the iPhone X and the iPhone Xs
all about RMB5000, the iPhone 11 is RMB6000, but there are more people buy the iPhone 11 , so the
economic environment is better than province. About the trade environment, for instance, as the Samsung
Note 20 is produced, the iPhone 11is also showed, there are the most people buy the product in China, but
Chinese buy the Samsung more than iPhone, because, in the Samsung mobile phone map, Diaoyu Island
belong to China, but iPhone is not if the iPhone want to sell more products, they need to think about the
Chinese because the China market is the biggest in the world.
Apple has recently entered the highly regulated financial services sector via Apple Pay. This could
increase the level of regulation and government oversight it faces by offering financial services, Apple
could face increased levels of litigation. News reports indicate that Apple is planning to enter another
highly-regulated sector: automobile manufacturing. Entering the auto business could increase regulatory,
insurance and litigation costs at Apple.Apple depends on a variety of products covered by intellectual
property laws, such as software and music, for much of its income. This leaves the company highly
vulnerable to both piracy and litigation.

Socially, due to globalization, various factors have contributed and marked a massive impact on Apple,
like the rapid increase in the popularity and usage of the virtual world, present lifestyle. Everyone knows
that Apple is the leading and premium brand in the world. It defines its brand, and this is that one name
with which people across the world wish to move with. This is not about possession of an iPhone and
iMac. It is desirable and wished by the customers because of its unique selling proposition, innovative
design, simple and straight marketing strategies, and high pricing of its products. Eventually, it has
become a status symbol in society across the world due to its exceptionally high prices, making it
affordable to society's high class. Moreover, in the coming decades, Apple has a huge scope of finding its
potential market share in third-world countries like Africa. The people of these countries are unaware of
the products of Apple. The company must formulate strategies to explore and penetrate its products in
these new, unapproached markets to understand new possibilities for generating revenues. In China, some
people may find that the company lacks social- consciousness and responsibility, as it carries out its
manufacturing process, while it can be a job-creator for the home country. Still, it is attracted to China to
get low-cost labor for its manufacturing. This factor may limit its appeal to some people.

When it is about earning revenues, Information technology's stakes are higher than any other industry.
Apple is one of those rising industries that has grown with time. It is proven that any company that wishes
to earn well must innovate from time to time. In the year 2013, Apple revealed that it had made a deal
with China Mobile to attract customers towards its iPhone, which was previously under the influence of
other low-budget android smartphones. Through this deal, Apple could get a massive entry to the Chinese
market and China Mobile's 760 subscribers at a very large level. As per the contract, Apple products
iPhone 5, iPhone 5S are accessible in China at Apple retail stores and China Mobile. According to a
report of 2015, Apple spent $8.7 billion in its Research & Development that cost it for around 3% of the
total company's net sales. The purpose of these researchers is to understand customers' approach by
having the short product life cycle of the industry. Its spectacular design is Apple's unique selling point.
Apple is committed to better designs and concepts. The edgy and attractive designs of Apple products are
unbeatable to match for its competitors. However, with time, people prefer the bigger screen sizes.

Based on preceding research on task environment and general environment, in the next five years despite
the challenges, Apple can prosper in the electronic device industry. The reason behind its assured success
is that it has a unique ability of always adapting to the challenging environment. Its distinct features like
exclusive and unique design become the competitive advantage, which can be seen in its sales growth and
rising revenues. Hence, it is appropriate to state that Apple is and will be in the years to come, be a leader
in the electronics industry.