Philip Xiao's Profile

Dear Mr. OSB, I find your article and analysis very interesting. Brexit is definitely a big issue for banks as well as other industries who are heavy in London. To me, a ‘hard Brexit’ is unlikely as the whole country becomes more rational now after the controversial referendum. In the near term, it is still hard to imagine large banks moving out from London to elsewhere. It is also something Britain doesn’t want to see that GS can leverage as its lobbying chips, maybe together with other banks. Somehow I think it is difficult to see GS try to game the system or make policy arbitrage, due to how much they care about reputation risk.

Thanks Dylan for your post. It is very interesting and I actually don’t know Samsung made this ‘strategic’ move in Xi’an causing a huge amount of money. To some extent, the political legacy of this action will last longer in China vs US due to political differences in the two countries. Thus, entering US will be quite difficult given President Trump’s policies and potential policy changes by another president or party in the future. From Samsung’s perspective, its decision making needs to make economic sense, in terms of economic benefits in the future. It could be related to market entry, cost saving or technology upgrade when it eyed on global investment. Chinese companies are investing aggressively overseas as well and investments in developed countries are more prevalent right now. As Samsung has its business legacy and technology advantage, it should have enough leverage when entering into strategic talks with other nations.

I agree with you Tiffany set its sustainability target but has done little so far in terms of real actions. Companies in such business with leading market share and high bargain power along the value chain should assume more responsibilities in environmental issues. Tiffany can implement sustainability standard easily on its suppliers and make positive influence on the whole industry. I am skeptical that LEED programs may have side effects or other implications which have slowed down the construction process.

Very interesting findings and great analysis. It is hard to imagine HP being one of the pioneer in sustainability issue. The goals they set seem to be aggressive but it looks like they are on their way. However, given the intense competition in IT space, I would doubt if they can exert high requirement along the value chain like what IKEA did. It should probably involve policy makers or industry associations to have more significant influence. After all, sustainability is an issue that cannot be dealt with by any single enterprise without the intervention from a higher perspective.

I agree that UA should definitely digitize its supply chain in order to catch up with Nike, long seen as the most innovative player in the industry. It has profound impact on inventory management, merchandising and continuous process improvement.
As for the reason why athletic wear outpaced other segments in terms of digitization, I think one potential reason is that sportswear is more standardized and functional. Technology has always played a pivotal role in product upgrade and utility enhancement, whereas fashion and lifestyle products put more weight on design and tailor.

Very interesting topic! I agree content acquisition can be helpful as Netflix moves upstream to expand content library, especially with quality contents that can generate higher margin and commercial values. As the largest online distribution platform, Netflix has established formidable competitive strength which gives them very high bargain power with upstream and downstream players.
However, I do think quality of their internally generated contents or Netflix labeled contents is something Netflix needs to be aware of. UGC is an interesting idea to establish social network and enhance stickiness, but content quality is definitely not guaranteed and direct competition with Youtube may not be a good idea.
In terms of variety of contents, Netflix can also work on it as for their in-house content creation. Taking the leading online media distribution platform in China as examples, they have produced movie, reality show and even sports contents, which may be some interesting areas Netflix can start or continue to develop.