41–50 of 76 posts
Umm, Bhopal? Seriously I can't believe it's not even mentioned.
> Seriously I can't believe it's not even mentioned. Wasn't that an accident rather than a deliberate mistake? I know their behavior in aftermath was bad, but the actual incident was an accident, so I don't think it's part of this list.
My vote goes to Bayer for knowingly and willingly selling H.I.V tainted medicine in the 1980s just to get rid of their inventory, not caring about the hundreds or thousands of people they infected. Possibly sadder is that the FDA actively helped Bayer to try and cover the whole thing up. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/22/business/2-paths-of-bayer-...
As recently as 2009, Nokia was estimated by Interbrand to be one of the top 5 global brands [1]. Interbrand's guesstimate at the monetary value rated "Nokia" as being worth over two times as much as "Apple". Just four years later, in 2013, Nokia had lost 80% of its value and Apple's brand was estimated to be worth about 13 times more. Such a tremendous collapse for a global brand seems unprecedented. (And no, it wasn…
Wait till you hear about the East India companies
As recently as 2009, Nokia was estimated by Interbrand to be one of the top 5 global brands [1]. Interbrand's guesstimate at the monetary value rated "Nokia" as being worth over two times as much as "Apple". Just four years later, in 2013, Nokia had lost 80% of its value and Apple's brand was estimated to be worth about 13 times more. Such a tremendous collapse for a global brand seems unprecedented. (And no, it wasn…
I'd been a very happy and loyal Nokia cellphone user for about 10 years up to 2008. When the beautiful-looking N96[1] was announced early that year, I excitedly signed up to be notified of availability, and waited expectantly for a call or email. I never heard anything. A few months later, the iPhone hit the market in Australia. I bought one shortly after, and have used only iPhones ever since. Could they have done a…
I am not by any means a product development expert but I consider Nokia to have made three mistakes (atop everything else the pundits divine):
1. Not creating a quality smartphone for the mass market
2. Selling the brand to Microsoft (which proceeded to decimate its value with its hideous windows OS)
3. Not trying again.
The battle for market share by smartphone makers in my opinion represents skirmishes in the larger war for lebensraum in a connected future; and that is not over by any means.
[1] - http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1573380/Doing-a-Ratne...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Seriously I can't believe it's not even mentioned. Wasn't that an accident rather than a deliberate mistake? I know their behavior in aftermath was bad, but the actual incident was an accident, so I don't think it's part of this list.
Accidents can be caused by mistakes, no?
As in they said "This is the best way", later it turns out to have been a mistake.
Negligence or neglect are not the same thing (they are bad, but they are not educational, so they are not part of this list).
> We also do cut-glass sherry decanters complete with six glasses on a silver-plated tray that your butler can serve you drinks on, all for £4.95. People say, "How can you sell this for such a low price?", I say, "because it's total crap."
Cue half a billion pounds in losses... 1992 pounds.
The Scottish Darien Company attempted to establish a colony in Panama in the late 1600s, to compete with England. Backed by almost half the money in Scotland, they completely failed at establishing a colony, lied about it, got more money and settlers who then also utterly failed at establishing a colony, almost started a war with Spain, bankrupted Scotland, and set the stage for Scotland to be absorbed into the Unite…
https://www.amazon.com/How-Scots-Invented-Modern-World/dp/06...
Commodore, well Irving Gould, making Medhi Ali CEO. Or even employing the guy at all. IBM selling Thinkpads to Lenovo. Gerald Ratner, CEO of the Ratner Group, becoming famous for the "Ratner Effect" which destroyed the group and his career. They had 1,000+ stores and multiple brands in UK and US. He gave a speech to the IoD London in 91 that included "How can you sell this for such a low price?", I say, "because it's…
As much as I dislike the direction Lenovo took with the brand… IBM shed a branch that was turning a massive loss because of IBM's management, and now Lenovo is the second-largest laptop manufacturer in the world and turning massive profits with the brand and the massive amount of spin-off consumer products. I can't imagine IBM being able to do either themselves.
I doubt any company comes close to Sears. They had the Sears catalog, and even more important an entire distribution network all over the US. They shut it down just before the internet became big. They also had the ISP Prodigy and a credit card company. With just a slight change they could have been larger than Google and Amazon combined. Instead.......
Companies have lifespans like humans and cannot continue forever. I would argue that Sears had gotten big and mature enough that its failure was a matter of time. At that level of growth and capitalization it would probably be impossible for any CEO to convince a board and shareholders to change a proven strategy for a new fad, especially when there is no financial pressure to do so.