Geologic History of Red Rock Canyon and Valley of Fire

Valley of Fire and Red Rock Canyon Red Rock Canyon is by and by found 5 miles west of Las Vegas, Nevada. It is 197,000 sections of land inside the Mojave Desert. The gully is one of a few in the state with the name Red Rock, this one is situated on the east side of Spring Mountain, the level land ascends to an extraordinary brilliant ledge, framed along an issue zone (the Keystone Thrust) with a few tops more than 8,000 feet, and including tremendous bluffs and gorges made out of groups of dim Paleozoic carbonates, white and red Jurassic sandstone, all vigorously dissolved. The wide vacant fields underneath the slopes are studded with Joshua trees and different plants run of the mill of the Mojave Desert, adding to a most great scene. Red stone gulch has a genuinely intricate geologic history. The now national protection region was at the base of a profound sea bowl and the western shoreline of North America was in present day Utah. Around 542 million years prior, Paleozoic, the zone was under a profound sea. Thick stores of dregs, about 9,000ft, were lithified. This lithified silt inevitably shaped limestone and other comparative carbonate rocks. Protection of marine invertebrate fossils gives proof to a marine setting for the Paleozoic. Beginning around 250 million years prior, the Mesozoic time, the earths covering rose because of structural movements. This constrained water out of the region abandoning rock arrangements of salt and gypsum, this lead to the presentation of the previous ocean bed making the stone oxidize to the now trademark red-orange shading. The Paleozoic carbonates are overwhelmingly dark in shading and just red-orange locally. These prior carbonate stores were broken up and oxidized because of ocean level drop and sub aeronautical presentation, making an unconformable surface (unconformity). The seabed rose gradually something like 225 million years prior, making streams enter shallow waters, saving mud and sand. This later became shale and marine sandstones of the Triassic Moenkopi development. During Triassic time, the changing scene caught a few huge waterways. These wandering streams stored mud, rock and different flotsam and jetsam like logs. Now and again minerals supplanted the organics transforming them into froze wood. These are a portion of the couple of fossils found at the foot of the bluffs. These earthbound stores make up the Triassic Chinle Formation. Around 180 million years back the ocean levels had dropped leaving the territory totally parched like the Sahara desert, an enormous desert with moving red sands and gigantic rise fields. Winds moved the hills and leveled more seasoned ones leaving calculated lines in the sand alluded to as cross-beds. These thus were covered by different dregs and inevitably solidified into sandstone by iron oxide and calcium carbonate. The sandstone is privately known as Aztec sandstone; it is extremely hard and structures the noticeable bluffs of the Red Rock ledge. The Aztec proportional is known as the Navajo Sandstone, which yields out in huge numbers of the Utah National Parks, so the relocating sand ocean was horizontally broad. The most noteworthy element of Red Rock Canyon is the Keystone Thrust Fault, an opposite flaw with a shallow plunge. A push flaw is a break in the world's hull, bringing about a compacting power driving one crustal plate over the highest point of another. This outcomes in more seasoned stone lying on more youthful. The Keystone Thrust is a piece of a huge arrangement of push blames that expands north into Canada. The dull dim Cambrian Limestone of the Bonanza King Formation was moved sideways or more Aztec Sandstone from the Jurassic time. Putting generally more established stone over more youthful, inverse of what we know to for the most part occur in geologic time and from the laws of superposition. This push shortcoming was generally dynamic during the long Sevier Orogeny, a mountain building occasion, around 70 million years back. This structural action from the west pushed elite eastbound; the development on the Sevier overlay push was about 100 kilometers. Geologist accept 65 million years back, during the Larimide Orogeny, that two of the world's crustal plates crashed into such power that piece of one plate was pushed up and over more youthful sandstones. This push contact is unmistakably characterized by the sharp complexity between the dark limestones and the red sandstones. The southern Nevada area of the crease and push belt was not influenced by Larimide distortion just Sevier Orogeny. Like the Larimide, the Sevier Orogeny was likewise because of crash of earth’s crustal plates at the subduction zone at the western US edge. The anxiety related with this impact caused low-edge pushing further inland, which is epitomized by the Rocky Mountain geology that we see today. The explanation Nevada is the most sloping state is on the grounds that the mainland outside layer was extended practically 100% in Tertiary time. Southern NV was influenced by this augmentation, as appeared by Fig 1 with the pushes that are part by the strike-slip deficiencies. The push issues were emplaced in Late Jurassic to early Tertiary time. At that point, during the Miocene, right parallel development on the LVVSZ split the entirety of the prior pushes. In this way, in the event that that is the situation, at that point the stones that you see at Red Rocks are equivalent to found in the VALLEY OF FIRE. Notwithstanding, there are Cretaceous and Tertiary shakes that yield out in the Valley of Fire that don’t exist or are covered and not uncovered in Red Rock Canyon. Valley Of fire is found 55 miles Northeast of Las Vegas, Nevada east of Overton. It incorporates 46,000 sections of land and is Nevada’s most seasoned state park. The geologic history of this park follows a similar course of events are Red stone. With just a couple of contrasts, the white and red Jurassic sandstone and limestone’s from the Paleozoic period. These are indistinguishable succession of rock units from uncovered in Red Rocks The Muddy Mountain push of the Valley Of Fire is equal to the Keystone push in Red Rocks, which brings Cambrian Bonanza King over the Jurassic Aztec. The Willow Tank Thrust is the easternmost pushed, which brings Jurassic Aztec over the Cretaceous Willow Tank Formation (push is appeared in fig 2). Cretaceous shakes in the Valley of Fire (these stones were stored in a foreland bowl before the push belt and in this manner were protected because of resulting internment). The Willow Tank Formation, ~101-98 Ma, dates from a fossil greenery and radiometric ages from debris beds, aggregates, mudstones, debris beds, sandstones in this unit. Which are deciphered to have been saved in a low-lying floodplain and lake situations. White Member Sandstones and combinations are deciphered to be kept in plaited stream and alluvial fan conditions, 95-96 Ma, age dates from debris beds. The white shading is credited to the inspire and disintegration of the Jurassic Aztec sandstone on the Willow Tank push. So this unit is gotten from the disintegration of that frontal push Red Member. Likewise, sandstones and aggregates have been deciphered to be saved in twisted stream and alluvial fan conditions, ~93 Ma, age date from one debris bed the red shading is because of disintegration of more seasoned units (Triassic-Paleozoic) on the Willow Tank Thrust. Overton Conglomerate Member is overwhelmingly carbonates with subordinate sandstone deciphered to be essentially plaited stream stores which the age not known. The Tertiary units that harvest out in the Valley of Fire are bowl fill stores. While expansion was occurring (Basin and Range), numerous valleys were shaped and housed stream, lake and alluvial fan depositional conditions. So the Tertiary Horse Spring and Muddy Creek Formations are bowl fill stores. The atmosphere in the current day territory adds to the protection of the outcrops of sandstone. With mellow winters I extending from 0 to 75 degrees and summers surpassing 120 degrees, the bone-dry scene just has enduring from wind to manage. The precipitation once in a while surpasses 4inches every year. A portion of the intriguing and impossible to miss molded out yields incorporate the Atlatl (at’-lat-l) Rock which is named for an antiquated Indian lance that is portrayed in numerous petro glyphs or rock craftsmanship. There are a considerable lot of these petro glyphs all through the Valley Of Fire and Red Rock Canyon. Atlatl Rock is locatedâ near the west passageway of the recreation center. It makes them remarkable instances of petro glyphs. So as to see it you should scale a flight of stairs which is around 40 feet high. The petro glyphs at Atlatl Rock are out in the open, obvious to passers by, around 40 to 60 feet over the ground. The primary board is a moderately level surface which faces precisely east. This was checked by taking compass readings from a few vantage focuses. Atlatl Rock shows a lot of pictures which seem to reveal to a story. There are numerous translations of these pictures. A portion of the understandings are questionable. Nobody will ever truly comprehend what any petro glyph that was made in ancient occasions implies. Through the methods for ethnographic similarity, anthropologists attempt to decipher the potential implications of these pictures. Atlatl Rock is fascinating on the grounds that it contains pictures that we appear to know the importance of in light of the fact that they look natural. The pictures we think we know are blended in with pictures that we can just conjecture at. The Beehives are so named for their likeness to apiaries. This impact is brought about by disintegration, for the most part wind, or Aeolian procedures. Aeolian disintegration has two fundamental procedures, flattening and scraped area. Close by is proof of the procedure of collapse where sand is evacuated by wind and shipped over the desert framing sand hills and rubbing rock surfaces en route. Albeit Aeolian scraped spot isn't frequently as critical as the scraped spot process in streams or along shores, it is noteworthy over extensive stretches of time. The outcomes are etched rocks with irregular shapes due to the in situ disintegration. In a fluvial domain disintegration brings about adjusted shapes as rocks are tumbled end over end. The breeze based scraped area pits, shines, aspects and shapes the uncovered stone surfaces from numerous points of view a

Progressive Era during the Great Depression Essay

Dynamic Era during the Great Depression - Essay Example These four occasions stamped and set up a solid history that molded just as aiding in depicting the present arrangement of the world. Dynamic period that unfolded through 1800s to 1920s built up a crucial point in time of progress for the American culture and world all in all. The period portrayed with enormous urbanization combined with high pace of industrialization. In nutshell, the Progressive period got equivalent with significant levels of destitution that contacted lower class that comprised the greatest level of the American populace. No sooner had the effects the Progressive period blur than America and world all in all caught one more enticing snapshot of Great Depression. This period started in 1929 and finished in the mid 1940, preceding giving path for World War II. As indicated by Sage (2010, p. 1), the soul of dynamic began to signalize in the mid 1890s when little businesspersons, ranchers and other change arranged pioneers converged to frame the Populist Party. The m otivations behind the gathering were to stand up to and address the issues looked by the American social orders such joblessness, foul play, poor authority among other. It is from Populist Party that Progressives would later create after the previous increased national trust. As referenced before, Progressive period involved various occasions running from urbanization and industrialization that required the requirement for change in the American social orders. The rate at which urbanization occurred nearby industrialization could just mean the impacts of neediness. Expanded destitution among dominant part of residents meant unexpected weakness administrations, horror rates, prejudice, brutality, class fighting, and covetousness, along with debasement. In the depiction of Burt (2004, p. 3), poor working conditions and situations were additionally reasonable reasons for worry by the Progressives. By 1890, 18% of the all out work in the nation comprised of the ladies and youngsters. Be fore the Progressive time, American experienced high flood of migrants who thus undermined the pay rates for the local representatives bearing the hardened rivalry for work openings. To stifle such setbacks from the general public and guarantee development of the American social orders, a gathering of people from higher social class mutinied to frame a social development called â€Å"Progressives†. Individuals from the Progressive gathering were for the most part city tenants who had huge advanced degree (Burt 2004, p. 4). As indicated by the Progressives, legit government, safe condition, and instruction for the nation were the main alternatives that would help spare and build up the nation. Dynamic was the main sure method of reacting to, and valuing the modern upset that had hit the nation. Among the Progressives were Jane Addams, Susan Antony, Margaret Sanger, Alice Paul, Lucy Burns, and Carrie Nation among others. The main writer of the time who helped spread the message of progress was Ida Tarbell, Thomas, Nast, Upton Sinclair, and Jacob Riis. The political reformers and activists of the time included Theodore Roosevelt, William Dubois, Booker Washington, and Eugene Debs. The extraordinary missions of the Progressives included battling dread among the outsiders, showing majority rule government and uncovering shrewd and degenerate acts submitted by those holding power. Rauchway (2007, p. 8) comments that appointment of Robert La Follette as the legislative head of Wisconsin

The 50 Best Memoirs of the Past 50 Years The List List #356

The 50 Best Memoirs of the Past 50 Years The List List #356 The List List, a weekly roundup of the best bookish lists from around the web, is sponsored by  Dynamic Dames by Sloan De Forest.   Celebrate 50 of the most empowering and unforgettable female characters ever to grace the screen, as well as the artists who brought them to life! Through engaging profiles and more than 100 photographs, Dynamic Dames looks at some of the most inspiring female roles in film from the 1920s to today. The characters are discussed along with the exciting off-screen personalities and achievements of the actresses and, on occasion, female writers and directors, who brought them to life. Among the stars profiled are Audrey Hepburn, Josephine Baker, Barbra Streisand, Julia Roberts, Meryl Streep, Gal Gadot, Emma Watson, and many more. at Brightly, 12 Kids Books That Help Promote Healthy Habits at Bustle, 9 Scary New Books for Your Campfire Reading at Buzzfeed, 5 Books We Couldnt Put Down in June at ElectricLiterature, 10 Books with Nameless Narrators at Goodreads, 32 of the Buzziest New Debuts at The Guardian, Top 10 Books About the River Thames at LitHub, 5 Sci-Fi and Fantasy Beach Reads at The New York Times, The 50 Best Memoirs of the Past 50 Years at Read It Forward, 6 Thrillers That Hinge on Split-Second Decisions at Riveted Lit, 11 Books Ripped Straight from the Headlines at Tor, 11 Unique Uses of Telepathy in SFF at Washington Post, 9 Summer Thrillers for Your Beach Bag

A Loss For Words By Lou Ann Walker Analysis - 986 Words

â€Å"To the hearing world, the deaf community must seem like a secret society. Indeed, deafness is a culture every bit as distinctive as any an anthropologist might study.† (Walker 1986) Lou Ann Walker’s autobiographical book, â€Å"A Loss for Words† details the story of her childhood with two deaf parents. She is the oldest of three children, with two sisters who are named Kay Sue and Jan Lee. All of their names were chosen for ease of lipreading for her parents. As she is the eldest of the three, she begins to act as an interpreter, and does so; often dealing with store keepers, mechanics, and others who would not know American Sign Language, but who would still need to understand what her parents are saying. Lou Ann, as she grows up, realizes†¦show more content†¦And, that even her decision to become an interpreter was only due to her constatnt desire to help people, fostered by her parents. After this breakdown, she decides to stop being an interpre ter. The book is organized in a topical manner. Which means that the chapters appear in collections of stories revolving around a specific topic, rather than in a chronological order. Some of these chapters revolve around her education, her siblings, and what happened after her interpreting session in the psychologist’s office. As mentioned before, she stopped interpreting. In fact, she stops doing much of anything as she contemplates her unhappy childhood. But soon after this event, her sister’s wedding is planned, and she is forced to confront her past at the wedding. She enjoys herself, but resents that she still needs to interpret for her parents. Around the end of the book, Walker writes, â€Å"The fluidity of the sign is what the person enjoys watching, the actual telling of the anecdote, not the point it makes, not the final note. In sign you get excited about telling fairly mundane stories because the vigor of your presentation is part of the language. 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Definition and Examples of Denominal Nouns

A denominal  noun  is a noun that is formed from another noun, usually by adding a suffix--such as villager (from village), New Yorker (from New York), booklet (from book), limeade (from lime), lectureship (from lecture), and librarian (from library). Many denominal nouns are context sensitive (see Contextual Constructions, below). Examples and Observations Nouns like Nixonite, bicycler, and saxophonist are formed from concrete nouns like Nixon, bicycle, and saxophone by derivation. There is a plethora of idiomatic cases of this sort in English, but what innovative examples mean can vary enormously from one occasion to the next, depending on certain cooperative measures between the speaker and addressees. Each has an unlimited number of possible meanings, or so it appears. Denominal nouns, then, although they have stricter requirements than, say, possessives or compound nouns, are also contextual expressions. (Herbert H. Clark, Arenas of Language Use. Univ. of Chicago Press, 1992)The fact that a denominal noun is not the result of a direct derivation from the action itself may explain the difficulties in interpreting denominal formations. The meaning of denominal nouns may not be directly related to the action performed by the referent... (Alexander Haselow, Typological Changes in the Lexicon: Analytic Tendencies in English Noun Formati on. Walter de Gruyter, 2011) Contextual Constructions Contextual constructions arent merely ambiguous, having a small fixed set of conventional meanings. They have in principle an infinity of potential non-conventional interpretations, each built around a conventional meaning of the word or words it is derived from...  Contextual constructions rely on an appeal to context--to the participants common ground. They always require non-conventional coordination for their interpretation. (Herbert H. Clark, Using Language. Cambridge University Press, 1996) Deverbals and Denominals: Nouns Formed With the Suffix -ant Let us turn to the deverbal person noun forming affix -ant (defendant), which denotes a personal or material agent. . . . [P]ossible verbal bases involve those ending in -ify, -ize, -ate, and -en. A look at Lehnert (1971) and the OED shows that, almost without exception . . ., these verbs are subject to the domain of agentive noun forming -er/or. The rival suffix -ant has a somewhat peculiar distribution, since its attachment is partly lexically governed (i.e. unproductive) and partly rule-governed and productive. In the semantically distinguishable domains of medical/pharmaceutical/chemo-technical and legal/corporate jargon, -ant can be used productively to form words denoting substances and persons, respectively, as evidenced by the following examples disinfectant, repellant, consultant, accountant, defendant, to mention only a few. (Ingo Plag, Morphological Productivity: Structural Constraints in English Derivation. Mouton de Gruyter, 1999) Related Reading AffixAffixationAnthimeriaContextConversion Denominal Adjective  and  Denominal Verb DerivationNeologismNominalizationVerbingWord Formation

Teacher knowledge Free Essays

Since the beginning of our lives, we start to learn and improve our skills and knowledge day by day from everything around us. However, to reach our goal in the future, we need instructors who can guide us through our lives. And those instructors are teachers. We will write a custom essay sample on Teacher knowledge or any similar topic only for you Order Now Actually, teaching is a very good job and is very important for everybody and also for our country. Teachers are very precious. First, teachers always teach what is good for us and show us the right path to walk. They are wise and respectable. They have such a good manner. They always stay by our side. For instance, when we get good result from our studies, they will be happy and proud of us just like what they feel for their own children. When we get bad result, they feel upset, but instead of blaming us, they try to encourage and cheer us up. All they want back from us is nothing, but for us to be successful in the future. Second, teachers don’t think much about money. They don’t earn much money but they earn good relationship and respect from the others. That’s the most important part of being a human and also the most special part of this job. With us, as students, they are just like our parents because they care about us and want us to be good and useful people in the society. But sometimes they may also be our brothers, sisters or even friends. It’s just like we are members of one big family. We share our happiness and sadness with them and help each other out. Although sometimes they feel exhausted, they don’t even mention about their difficulties to us. They always work with happy hearts. Third, teachers are the source of the country’s development. In other words, we can say that without teachers, there’re no schools. Without schools, there’re no students. Without students, there’s no human resource, so development is impossible. As we all know, teachers play an important role in our education system. They are very important for us and our new generation. One thing we should know is that the world we know today may not exist without them. How to cite Teacher knowledge, Papers

Htc Assessment free essay sample

Internal Resources Looks at the internal resources of the company such as employees as well as the existence of tangible and intangible assets such as building and brand image as well as knowledge in the company in terms of tacit and explicit as well analyses the activities that adds value to HTC’s products such as HTC joining with firms such as Google to give them an better operating system through their Android system. Strategy Formation This section looks at the company’s available options to implement in the future. Strategies in business level as porter’s generic forces are used to see what are the possible options are HTC to survive in the market. It also offers strategies at corporate level such as the BCG growth share matrix which allows the firms to see where their products are in the market and also helps them decide what type of strategy to use on their products. Conclusion and Recommendation Recommendation has been made as to what strategy out of the ones offered that HTC should go for. The recommended strategy for HTC was a differentiation strategy that made their product different from its rivals through acquiring the technology and capabilities of some of the companies that HTC has acquired. HTC Corporation 1. 0 Company Overview HTC Corporation is a Taiwanese based company manufacturing smart phones. Founded in 1997 as a high tech consortium along with 37 other companies such as HP, IBM and Motorola, HTC has become one of the fastest growing companies in the mobile sector being ranked the 5rd in the world for best performing Technology Company. Best being known for its innovation, HTC offers a range of high tech products mainly in the Smartphone category and has also expanded into PC tablets. 2. 0 Mission and Vision HTC’s mission is to become the world’s leading supplier of communication devices by providing value-added design, world-class manufacturing and logistics and service capabilities with a keen focus on innovation (HTC Corp, 2011). With a powerful Ramp;D focus, HTC plan to come up with new innovative designs and products particularly focusing on the Smartphone category. 3. 0 External Environment It is important to analysis HTC’s external environment in order to analysis its strategic position in the market as well the opportunities and risks it faces. 3. 1 PESTEL Analysis The PESTEL analysis can be used to analysis the market environment in which HTC operates in, they include: Political Factors and Legal Factors * Due to the high tech nature of the industry, products from various companies are heavily patented and since similar technology is used between manufacturers, infringement of these patents can lead to very costly lawsuits against the company. In 2008 as well 2010, lawsuits were filed against HTC by companies such as Apple and IPCom claiming that HTC infringed upon their patents and demanded compensation such as to prevent the company from exporting their products into certain countries (Datamonitor, 2011). * Possible infringement of intellectual property in the future which if proven would result in large compensation in money as well as damaging the brand im age. Economic Factors * Since the company operates on the global scale and since most of their revenue comes from international markets, HTC would be positively or negative affected by fluctuation in the exchange rates. Due to high operating expenses overseas, such as high cost of labour and taxation, HTC’s operating margins have dropped from 19. 9% in 2008 to 15. 8% in 2010. However, these margins are considered low when compared to their competitors (Datamonitor, 2011). Social Factors * According to several report, the demand of smartphone have amount to 300 million units being sold by the end of 2010 and is expected to rise to 850 million units by 2013 (Datamonitor, 2011). * There is also a positive growth and demand towards the tablets market with an estimate of 7% of companies giving their employees tablets. Companies are estimated and be the main buyers of tablets and its total market is said to double by the end of 2011 (Datamonitor, 2011). * The tastes and preferences have seemed to change towards to smartphone explaining the rise in demand and the increasing global population would further promote demand. Technological Factors * There are vast technological factors with companies changing Operating systems of smartphones to more advanced ones each year. * The takeover of several firms by HTC has led to an increase in the technological knowledge of the company. Environmental Factors HTC faces heavily competition in the smartphone market facing against big companies such as Apple, Samsung, Sony Ericsson and LG. * Due to the intense competition, HTC had to reduce it prices of smartphones which decreased profitability. * Intense competition has led HTC to spend large amounts of money on Ramp;D to keep up to its competitors. 3. 2 Competitor Analysis There are several big companies in the market that are directly competing with HTC on the production and distribution on smartphones. The table below helps to identify some these competitors and their features. Competitor| Features| Apple Inc. | * One of the most popular and most widely used brands in the world. * Has a wide range of products including music players (itouch), pc tablets (ipad), smartphones (iphone) and computers (Apple Mac) * Has high brand awareness and social trend leader. * Has a robust financial performance with good margins * Has patented many of their technologies. * Keen focus on Ramp;D coming up with new products or updated versions every year. * Apple stores are located all around to world to provide services to the customer| | * One of the 2 South Korean giants in the field of lectronics and is recognised wide world. * Mainly operates in Asia, Europe and North America. * Has the most revenue from the other competitors, recording $112,803. 7 million by the end of 2008 (Datamonitor, 2011) * Has diversified business operations, producing a wide range of products from smartphones to refrigerators. * Deals in large scale operations * Recently entering markets where other competitors were un able to penetrate such as the Indian market. | | * A joint venture between Sony Corporation and LM Ericsson. Widely recognised and has a presence in 80 countries worldwide. * Has a strong financial position since it is backed up 2 companies as well as technical capabilities. * Specialises in camera phones and walkman phones. * Expanding in its service portfolio by offering users with application stores for their smartphones. * Has a wide range of smartphones such as the Xperia. | | * The other one of the 2 South Korean giants in the consumer electronics industry. * Like Samsung, LG is involved in large scale operations, a wide product portfolio and also a keen focus on Ramp;D. Widely known throughout the world as a result of many sponsorship agreements. * Have many strategic alliances with companies e. g. : Microsoft to enhance its smartphone by introducing new operating systems. * Records a revenue of $58. 9 billion by 2008 (Datamonitor, 2011)| 3. 3 5 Force Analysis Porters five fo rce analysis can be used to analysis the direct environment of the firms. * The Bargaining power of Suppliers The manufacturers of mobile phones such as HTC are heavily dependent on suppliers since they provide the software and equipment need to produce products. However, since most of the manufacturers are larger than the suppliers, they have to the ability to control negotiations. Suppliers also supply to a number of industries apart from the mobile phones industry, so manufacturers do not have much power as they think (Datamonitor, 2009). * The Bargaining power of Buyers The overall power of buyers is quite weak mainly due two reasons. There are 2 main buyers of mobile phones in the industry, network operators for example O2 and Vodafone in the UK as well as other independent buyers. The buyers do have some power in negotiations with the manufacturers due to the limited number of network operators however; this effect is off put by retailers having to stock all of the new products of manufacturers in order to stay competitive with amongst other network operators (Datamonitor, 2009) * The Threat of Substitutes The main threat of substitutes of smartphones would be the conventional 2G phone. The main reason consumers would choose a conventional mobile phone rather than smartphone would be due to financial reasons as smartphones are costly. However, some network operators are increasing diversifying into handset production which has manufacturers under some pressure. * Industry Competitors There is intense competition in the industry with a few large company dominate the market. Each one of the competitors holds their competitive advantage such as a high focus on innovative products from HTC. There are also several switching cost involved as well, for example apple’s sells complementary products with its smartphone such as their dock system which enables to insert the phone into the music system. Also due to competitive pressures there are also price wars that may erupt. * The threat of new entrants The threat of new entrants is quite moderate. It is quite difficult for a totally new firm to enter into the industry due to counter measures of existing firms as well the large capital investment needed to enter into a high technology industry. However, if the company is already producing electronic consumer goods, it would be quite easy for them to enter into the mobile phones industry (Datamonitor, 2009). Also legal issues such as patented technologies along with others make quite difficult for new firms to enter. 4. 0 Internal Resources HTC has many internal resources that adds value to its products as well as provides them with a competitive advantage. Some of these internal resources a company acquires may include: * Knowledge and Innovation Knowledge and innovation is a key internal resource to have especially in the mobile phones industry where specialist knowledge is needed to come up with innovative new products for consumers. HTC would have two type of knowledge, tacit and explicit. The tacit knowledge they would have would be the solutions to the problems they would have had in the past, since they experiences are hard to copy they provide HTC with an advantage over companies who had come across the problem yet. It also makes the employees who have experienced these events an important internal resource. However, this effect is nullified, if employees from HTC joins their rivals and prevent the problem from happening in the first place. Also explicit knowledge such as patents on products is very valuable since competitors cannot copy their products. However, most of the smartphone makers have similar technology and have their own patents, this scope is very limited. These both help in the innovation of new products but are very risky and expensive. * Value Chain The value chain is made up of primary activities which directly contribute to produce products and support activities which help with the production function and can also be classified as tangible and intangible assets. Value is added to HTC’s products through various ways. HTC had introduced its applications store after joining up with Google’s Android which has similar features to that of apple’s app store. Its introduction of the HTC Sense completely changed its smartphones into easy to use graphical interface system (HTC Corp, 2011). Apart from this, HTC’s many partnerships with companies such as Google, Intel and Qualcomm which provided them with user interfaces and equipment as well as its agreements with network operators such as O2, T-Mobile and Vodafone adds to their value chain. Other factors which add value to HTC would be its brand name and reputation. HTC is viewed as a specialist manufacturer of smartphones being the 5th largest manufacturer of smartphones in the world. Also its recent acquisition of companies such as Saffron Digital and OnLive will help it gain a better competitive advantage in the near future (Gray, 2011). However, since its rivals are also coming up with new strategies, so its overall competitive advantage will be lower. 5. 0 Strategy Option for HTC There are two main strategic options that HTC can choose from, Business level strategy which focuses on the stakeholders in a single market or a corporate level strategy which aims at diversification into different markets. 5. 1 Business Level Strategies One business level strategies can HTC can consider is: * Porters Generic Strategies By looking at this model, we can identify two possible options available to HTC. Either aim for Cost Leadership or Differentiation since HTC exists in the global market. Due to the intense competition and increasing demand for smartphones, HTC could make its smartphones more affordable by lowering their price through producing at a lower cost. If HTC could lower their cost of production though low labour cost by relocation to low cost sites, achieve economies of scale or having superior management who are able to generate greater efficiency then HTC can have a considerable competitive advantage since the cost of a smartphone is quite high. This strategy could also help offset some factors of the 5 force analysis such as weaken the threat of substitutes and make it more difficult for new firms to enter the industry. However, this strategy could lead to price wars between firms and also people might have the perception of low quality associated with low cost and could ruin the high quality innovative image of HTC although this would depend on how low the prices are cut by. Another option they could go for is a differentiation strategy. This strategy would mean that HTC would have change or add functions to its smartphones that would make it different from its competitors. This is a suitable strategy for HTC since they have a strong research and development function. Since rival smartphones such as the iphone and galaxy tab offer similar feature to HTC’s, they got add new functions. Some options might be to make it a more business orientated or a gaming and music oriented phone. The purchase of OnLive, a gaming company (Datamonitor, 2011) and also its newly acquired partnership with Beats Audio (HTC Corp, 2011) would help HTC take up this strategy and make HTC’s perception different from the rest. However, the main problem is high cost in production. If consumers become price sensitive or fail to see the difference, HTC could end up with major losses. 5. 2 Corporate level strategy One corporate level strategy HTC can consider is: * BCG Growth Share Matrix The BCG matrix enables a company to position their products based on their growth rates and relative market share. It enables HTC to look at which products are performing well and gives them an idea of where their resources should be properly allocated to as well as to make important decisions such as keeping or withdrawing their product. HTC should be able to categorize their products according concept. Stars are the products that have relatively high market share and also have a high growth rate. A product that would match this criterion would be the HTC Sensation XL with Beats Audio. These products would need constant investment in order to maintain their current market share (Business Tools amp; Templates, 2009). Cash cows are products have being in the market for some time and acquired a high market share but now experiencing low demand. HTC’s Desire HD would be a named cash cow. HTC can use the steady revenue coming from these products to use in other areas. Question marks are products that have low market share but a high growth rate. This would often be the case if the company neglects a product due to being overshadowed by another popular product. Though growth is high, not enough resources are used on it to build it to become a star. HTC’s Titan would be seen as a question mark (HTC Corp, 2011). Dogs are products which are on the decline and have low share market and low growth due to new superior products introduced by the company. These products would be viewed as draining money where the company can use on question marks and stars. The company must decide whether it is beneficial to keep producing them or scrap them off. HTC’s Desire would be a Dog since many new and improved versions of the Desire has been launched into the market. After identifying where their products lie on the matrix, the company must choose a suitable strategy for the product (Drummond amp; Ensor, 2001). They could choose to: * Build – This is where the company might reduce its prices or offer better promotion in order to build its market share. This strategy might incur a loss in the short run but would give better profits in the long run. This strategy would be suitable for Question marks. * Hold – This strategy is good for Cash Cows where they try to maintain the current market share of the product possibly by offering product extensions. * Harvest – This strategy involves raising prices in order to get a profit in the short run. If the company sees that a product has a relatively limited lifespan, then they could try to bring in as much revenue as possible. This is a good strategy for question marks. * Divest – This is when the company might stop production of a product due to it being unprofitable. Products in the Dog category may have this strategy used on them. 6. 0 Conclusion and Recommendation The Taiwanese manufacturer through its mission to become the world’s leading supplier of communication devices by providing value-added design with powerful Ramp;D influence have laid its mark on the market becoming the 5th largest manufacturer of smartphones in the world. However, many external issues such as political influences, economic changes, changing tastes and preference and also the intense competition in the market have affected the business practices of HTC. Due to this they are in need of a new strategy options to follow in the future. Between the two strategies that were formed, we a strong feeling towards following a differentiation strategy from porter’s generic forces. Consumer tastes and preferences are always changing as they look for something new and innovative. Rather than fight amongst massive companies such as Samsung and Apple who offer similar products, HTC would benefit in the long run by making their smartphone much different than the rest.