I estimated the budget for this hypothetical motion picture project (code name: Pequod ) using existing data. The average annual marketing and negative cost data listed in Entertainment Industry Economics allowed me to extrapolate average costs in today’s numbers. The estimated average negative cost will be $93.4 million in 2016. The estimated average prints and advertising cost will be $52.1 million in 2016. The total budget for Pequod is approximately $148.5 million. The target demographic for P equod is Generation Z — anyone born after 1994. This whale represents 25.9 percent of the population and controls $44 billion in spending.2 Influence over parent’s spending has been estimated at $200 billion.3 Due to the unique needs of this demographic, the development of Pequod will require three distinct phases. To understand how this vessel should be configured, Pequod will go through an extensive research and strategy phase budgeted at $1.5 million. During this phase, the aim will be to find direction on the film itself, alternative narrative structures as well as marketing strategies specific to Generation Z. Generation Z is generally described as extremely creative, more comfortable with one-to-one media interactions (e.g. Snapchat or WhatsApp), and keenly averse to advertising and commercial content.
On May 26, cable providers Charter Communications, Inc. and Time Warner Cable Inc. announced a $56.7 billion merger. Charter has also announced that it acquired Bright House Networks (owned by the Advance/Newhouse Partnership) for $10.4 billion.1 If approved, the company — dubbed New Charter — will become the second largest broadband and third largest cable provider in the U.S. with 19.4 million and 17.3 million subscribers for services respectively. 1 Charter, TWC, and the Advance/Newhouse Partnership filed applications with the FCC on June 25 seeking approval to transfer control of all associated FCC-issued licenses and authorizations in connection with the merger.2 The proposed merger is drawing a lot of attention and a bit of criticism — most notably — because of the recent scrapped merger between Comcast Corporation and TWC. The merger would have propelled Comcast into an unreachable 30 million managed subscribers while netting an estimated $1.5 billion in operating efficiencies.3 Recent news coverage in Multichannel, Forbes, MediaPost, AdAge and Variety has highlighted public comment on the merger.
I worked at Hewlett-Packard from 2009 - 2014 as an editor for HP Printables. This was a product that allowed consumers to print on demand or scheduled newspapers and other content (crossword puzzles, coloring pages) from their web-connected printer.
My team was organized into an R&D unit within the HP printer division (home to everything from HP DeskJet / OfficeJet printers to printer cartridge (pen) design and two-story “web” presses for industrial application). That team is based at the HP site in Corvallis, Ore. At one time, that site housed 10,000 employees (surprise, there are more than 10,000 people in Oregon!) in a town of 60,000. Today, there are fewer than 2,000 employees at that site. Strengths
So, even though I worked there for almost 5 years I had to do a little research to try and understand how HP is currently organized. I put together the graphic below. Until 2014, I worked in IPG (Imaging and Printing Group) that is now a part of the Printing and Personal Systems Group. HP is currently organized into 4 (formerly 7) business units that each operate internationally.
Each top-level business unit has an executive vice president that sits on the company's board of directors. Each business unit also has a VP for each geographic region. Those business units are additionally broken into down into product groups or lab groups (read: R&D) with their own VPs that manage the development and manufacturing of products. Teams within product groups for specific products dissolve quickly after the product has been put into production, but those team members usually stay within their product group. This organizational structure lends itself to deep expertise in product development (see: printers) that is efficient and leverages the existing supply and manufacturing chains very efficiently (strength). However, in an environment where synergy creates innovation, it's a disadvantage that business units are often separated onto different HP sites and are organizationally discouraged from interacting (weakness). |