Friday, October 25, 2019

09 Cost Structure Block in Business Model Canvas



Business-model-canvas -cost structure
© Entrepreneurial Insights based on the concept of Alex Osterwalder
In this post we explore the ninth and final building block in the business model canvas serieswhich is called the Cost Structure. We briefly look at what we mean by the cost structure of an organization before delving into the key question every entrepreneur must answer if he/ she is to do a thorough and unflinching analysis of their business models. We also look at what kind of characteristics most cost structures display; cost structure have fixed and variable costs and they can have benefits of economies of scale or economies of scope.
Read on to learn about 1) cost structure, 2) types of businesses, 3) characteristics of cost structures, and a 4) case study of Google.
COST STRUCTURE
This building block represents all the costs that a business can or will incur if it opts for a particular business model. 90% of new businesses fail in the first 3 years because they fail to understand their costs or what it will take to create the goods and services they have promised in their value propositions. At least three other building blocks are contributors to the cost structure block. One must evaluate the cost of creating and delivering the value proposition, creating revenue streams and focus on long-term customer relationships. All three of these blocks represent a financial investment into the business. However, when an entrepreneur has effectively figured out their key resources, key activities and key partnerships the aforementioned costs become easier to calculate. If you have a major cost stream which cannot be matched to a Key Activity, it needs to be given a closer examination. Either your Key Activities block is missing a vital activity or your costs are being inflated by an activity which is unimportant and yet has still been included in the business model. It is important to note that cost can be a fundamental concern for some business model. One example is ‘no frills’ airlines like SouthWest which are completely focused on reducing costs.
Key questions to ask
When doing a thorough analysis of your business model, it is imperative to ask the followingquestions when filling in the Cost Structure building block of the business model canvas;
1.      What are the fundamental costs derived from my business model?
2.      Which Key Resources represent a significant expense to the business?
3.      Which Key Activities represent a significant expense to the business?
4.      How do your Key activities drive costs?
5.      Are the above mentioned activities matched to the Value Propositions for your business?
6.      By exploring different permutations of your business model, do the costs remain fixed or become variable?
7.      Is your business more values driven or cost driven?
TYPES OF BUSINESSES BY COST STRUCTURE
Costs will always remain a major concern for all businesses. It is in fact the universal concern. However, some businesses make it an organizational mission to minimize costs as much as possible and all their strategies and tactics are derived from this one goal. Hence businesses can be categorized into two extremes based on the volume of goods produced; both ends of the spectrum are either cost driven or values driven. Realistically though, companies usually fall somewhere in the middle of this spectrum.
Cost-driven
As the name suggests, such a business model is utterly focused on reducing costs. This is essentially a race to the bottom. This obviously impacts the other building blocks. A business which is cost-driven focuses on creating a lean cost structure through offering cheaply priced value propositions, a high degree of automation, and outsourcing of costly functions. It is important to lower your prices based on internal costs and expenses rather than in response to what the competition is doing. Industries prone to price wars experience this tragedy all the time. During the price war competitors will steadily undercut each other’s prices to attract the price sensitive customer. However, if your competition is able to manage its costs and create operational efficiencies, they will be able to sustain their business on the lower price and continue to attract customers. If your business fails to do so, you may end up arriving at a price you are stuck with, which is unrealistic considering your expenses.
Ryanair is another example of a ‘no frills’ airline which provides a cheap solution to its customer segment for air travel by reducing costs incurred by in-flight meals or other amenities traditionally offered by major airlines. Such airlines have increased seats in their planes and have a limit on luggage size. However, the swift takeover of the market airlines like Ryanair have accomplished clearly show an unmet need that these airlines have fulfilled. Conversely, more expensive airlines have aircrafts which now spend more time on the ground than they do in the air.
Values-driven
Not all companies drive their business based on costs. Some focus completely on the value they are providing to their customers, hence taking the value-driven approach. This strategy is characterized by complete focus on the creation and delivery of a high value, value proposition which is highly customized to the customer segment’s preferences. Luxury hotels opt for a values driven approach. The Hyatt prides itself on its customer services and amenities. They put a lot of effort into creating an experience which customers are willing to pay top dollar for. Employees of the hotel are encouraged to anticipate individual customer’s needs right down to greeting a repeat customer by name and providing them with a room with their preferences already in place.
Another volume specific example is of the transistors used to amplify or switch electronics signals called metal oxide semiconductor field effect transistors or MOSFETs. This is one of the most commonly used transistors in analog and digital circuits. The price per unit is 21 cents. If you buy 10, the price per unit becomes 19 cents and if you buy a hundred the price per unit falls even further to 17 cents. Hence this is a variable cost dependent entirely on the volume you are trying to produce which requires the MOSFETs. There is a price difference depending on how much you buy, leading to economies of scale.
CHARACTERISTICS OF COST STRUCTURES
Cost structures have multiple characteristics. These are highlighted below;
Fixed costs
Fixed costs are business expenses that remain the same regardless of the volume produced by the business. These costs are usually time bound such as monthly salaries or rent for office space and can also be referred to as overhead costs. Manufacturing businesses are typically characterized by high fixed costs due to the investments required in renting the facilities and the equipment. However, it is important to note that fixed costs will not remain the same forever. Instead, they may change with time but will remain stable over a period of time. Hence these costs are also known as sunk costs for the relevant period of time.
Decisions for costs are often related to management. Capital Expenditure or CAPEX are investments in the long-term, things that are bought and go on the balance sheet of the company and will be depreciated over the years.
Variable costs
Variable costs are costs which are heavily dependent on the volume of output a company produces. These are costs incurred when you produce a product. If you do not produce, you will have no variable costs. Similarly you may have delivery costs but if customers aren’t asking for delivery then this is a possible variable cost which you can avoid. These costs are therefore sensitive to changes in demand and supply and cannot be easily predicted. They increase directly proportional to increases in labor and capital. Variable costs are represented by utility bills and raw materials used for production of the end product. The organization and execution of a music festival will typically be characterized by high variable costs.
Another cost close to the management’s hearts and minds are Operational costs or OPEX. These are the costs associated with the day to day running of the company or the used up expenses. Hence a 3D printer is an example of an expense that falls in OPEX. Other OPEX related expenditures are purchase of raw materials, electricity bills and expenditure on maintenance of buildings and machinery. Companies often have different budgets for CAPEX and OPEX.
Economies of scale
The higher the volume, the lower the overall cost per unit. Economies of scale are a benefit enjoyed by most big companies with a high output quota. Essentially this is a cost advantage which big companies can enjoy due to their size, sheer quantity of output or scale of operation. The reason costs fall with higher volumes is because higher volumes spread fixed costs more thinly making the cost per unit fall dramatically; hence the average cost per unit is reduced. Hence a bigger company will have a lower cost per unit output than a smaller company or a company with more facilities will have more of an advantage than one with fewer facilities. Not only do economies of scale help lower fixed costs, they may also help reduce variable costs by creating synergies and increasing efficiency.
Bulk buying is a common indicator of mass production and automatically leads to economies of scale. Bulk buying often leads to lower prices. When you are buying in volume, you often have a stronger negotiating position and can create lower prices for your raw material. This is a tactic used most successfully by Walmart which uses bulk buying to negotiate much lower prices for the items in its stores. It is then able to transfer these savings to its customers, providing them with lower than market prices for regular items.
Economies of scope
Economies of scope refer to the reduction of costs when a business invests in multiple markets or a larger scope of operations. The average cost of production is therefore expected to decrease if a company opts to increase the number of goods it produces. A company will have a structure in place already along with all the departments such as Marketing, Finance or HR operating, so the company can increase their scope and hence economize the entire structure.
Economies of scope based on product diversification are only achieved if the different products have common processes or share the use of some resource. Hence spending on marketing the products or distribution channels may lessen per unit if both products require similar marketing efforts or use the same distribution channel. The uses of product bundling and family branding are also an example of firms trying to achieve economies of scale. However, where economies of scale are easy to achieve and measure, economies of scope present a bigger challenge when trying to measure them
Economies of scope have multiple advantages for the business. These are listed below;
1.      A great deal of flexibility in the design and mix of the product
2.      Increased response rate and decreased response time to market driven changes
3.      Processes are repeatable with a higher degree of control over their execution
4.      Costs are reduced because wastage is minimized in this particular business model
5.      Organizations can more accurately predict changes and cycles
6.      Software and hardware utilized more efficiently
7.      There is less risk associated with a company which sells multiple products, or targets multiple markets or does both. Even if one product or market falters, the company will have alternatives to help tide it over while it readjusts strategy.
Let’s take a look at the Coca Cola brand. Coca Cola already has a number of drinks launched in the brand other than Coke itself. Supposing we look into how Coke can diversify even further by launching an as yet unheard of drink such as Coca Cola Green Tea. Distribution of the different products under one company will use the established Distribution Channel leading to a major saving for the company.
CASE STUDY: GOOGLE
We all recognize Google as a multinational corporation which specializes in internet based products and services. It is one of the biggest internet companies in the world and has made an unprecedented success of its Search Engine Optimization products. It has dedicated fans worldwide and is the most preferred search engine on the internet.
For the purpose of this article, we will take a look at Google’s Cost Structure in particular. Holistically, Google’s cost elements can be divided into four categories which are:
·         R&D,
·         Data center operations,
·         Traffic Acquisition, and
·         Sales and Marketing.
Google invests deeply into its research and development with the purpose of bringing around improvement in existing products and constantly creating new and innovative solutions. This expenditure has helped Google maintain its position at the top despite the typical short-lived cycles of popularity of most internet based successes. This has led to economies of scope for Google because it has resulted in a great deal of product diversification such as Google’s entry into the mobile app market as well as its cloud sharing services.
It is speculated that Google has almost a million servers globally and these servers help process around a billion search requests daily. Google has invested a great deal into these data centers and they represent a significant fixed cost for the company. Even the management of these servers’ represents a major cost for the company. However, due to the high volume of searches these centers process, they are able to increase economies of scale for the company by optimizing the servers search capacities.
Traffic acquisition costs refer to the money given to the Google Network through its Adsense program or to websites which redirect users to Google or provide the Google Toolbar to their customers. All these players help Google in attracting more and more users to its products and services daily.
Finally, Google invests in advertising and marketing to the wide customer base it is targeting. These costs also include the worldwide Sales Force that Google maintains which aims to sell its campaigns as well as its support team, available to handle customer complaints or hiccups.


08 Key Partners in Business Model Canvas



08 Key Partners in Business Model Canvas
Business-model-canvas- Key Partnerships
© Entrepreneurial Insights based on the concept of Alex Osterwalder
In this section, you will learn about the next building block in the Business Model Canvaswhich is Key Partners (or Key Partnerships) that an entrepreneur needs to have to perform its key activities and ultimately provide its value proposition to its customer segment.
We will look at 1) key partnerships, 2) types of partners, 3) motivation behind partnerships, 4)key partners and value propositions, and 5) case studies.
KEY PARTNERSHIPS
A business partnership is when two commercial entities form an alliance, which may either be a really loose relationship where both entities retain their independence and are at liberty to form more partnerships or an exclusive contract which limits the two companies to only that one relationship.
The following factors are very important to keep in mind when forming partnerships:
·         Right Partnership Agreements: Whether your partnership is with a business or an individual, it is important for all the relevant parties to have clear partnership agreements drafted along with legal counsel.
·         Defining Expectations: Many times new businesses fail to establish their expectations from the outset leading to much confusion and conflict later. An entrepreneur needs to ensure that he has shared his expectations openly with his partner and vice versa from the beginning.
·         Impact on your clients: When forming a partnership, it is important to evaluate your value proposition and your key resources and make sure your partner is filling any gaps in either. This can only be done by also evaluating how the partnership will translate to the customer.
·         Win-Win situation: For a partnership to be healthy and sustainable, there need to be visible gains on both ends.
·         Selecting partnerships: Some partnerships may seem lucrative in theory but fail to get off the ground practically. In addition, changes in the business context may also make some business partnerships irrelevant. In such cases, it is important to end these partnerships quickly to avoid further wastage of resources.
This building block refers to the network of suppliers and partners that make the business model effective. The reasons for a company opting for a partnership are myriad, but healthy partnerships are instrumental in making a business success or a failure. A company can optimize its resource utilization, create new resource streams or mitigate risks behind major business decisions by taking on a partner before starting a new course of action. It is important to note here that your organization maybe partnering with a number of organizations for various reasons, but not all their relationships will be key to your business.
Partnerships can change over the course of a business’ lifecycle. The types of partnerships that may be a necessity during year 1 of a start-up will differ significantly from the nature of the required partnership in year 3.
Key Questions
When evaluating the various key partnerships that your business requires, it is fruitful to analyze the nature of the partnership based on the following key questions;
1.      Which partnerships are critical to our business?
2.      Who are our critical suppliers?
3.      Which of our suppliers and partners are sourcing our key resources?
4.      What type of partnerships would suit our needs?
5.      What is the best cluster/ supply chain where I should be located?
TYPES OF PARTNERS
Partners and partnerships can be categorized into four different types;
1.      Strategic alliances: These types of alliances are between non-competitors. So if you are working through different channels, like a news agency can supply news to both online and offline channels.
2.      Co-opetition: There can also be strategic partnerships between partners. Such a partnership will help spread the risk both companies may take. It may also help when both partners are trying to do something new; additionally it could mean a confirmed supply stream. For example, there is a need for earth metals in mobile phones. So securing the supply of rare earth metals could be the reason for competitors to form a strategic partnership.
3.      Joint-Ventures: Another thing could be to develop a joint venture in a new business. Both partners could have a mutual interest in developing new business, possibly due to the emergence of a new market or access to a new geographic area. Both organizations will only opt for such an option if they both provide some inputs into the business. Hence, a Dutch company that specializes in producing cheese might choose to go into a joint venture with milk producing local company to start making cheese in the new region.
4.      Buyer-Supplier Relationships: These are the most common type of partnerships which assures that you have a reliable source of supplies coming in and for your supplier this means they have a steady confirmed buyer for their product.
MOTIVATIONS BEHIND PARTNERSHIPS
Partnerships are a tricky business involving a lot of negotiation and an element of trust. There can be a number of reasons why organizations would make the decision to take on a key partner rather than doing things themselves or taking on a partner but not considering them as key to the success or failure of their business. Primarily, one of the three kinds of motivations can be attributed when a business chooses to enter a partnership.
Optimization and economy of scale
Most organizations are heavily focused on the bottom-line. And many focus on cost-cutting or smart spending through optimizing the allocation of either their resources or activities. This is the most common motivation for people to enter into partnerships of different types.
When you are looking for efficiency in your company or optimizing your productions chains, key partners can help you achieve this goal. It is unrealistic to think, as an entrepreneur that you have the resources in place to conduct all your key activities in-house. Most partnerships give organizations the ability to share their infrastructures or outsource some activities to more cost-effective options.
Citroen, Peugeot and Toyota joined hands to create a small, cheap car for the masses that they tried to sell for 5000-6000 euros. These cars looked almost the same except for the chassis and a few internal and external details.
Reduction of risk and uncertainty
If you have a good relationship with a key partner, you reduce the inherent risk that comes with doing your own business. You also guarantee supply to your business rather than being dependent on suppliers who aren’t key partners and would therefore not give precedence to your business over others.
Many competitors may form strategic partnerships to share the risk of bringing something new into the market while still competing in various aspects in the industry. A classic example of this is the advent of blu-ray technology which was developed in collaboration by some of the world’s premier consumer electronics and computer technology firms. The development of this technology was expensive and several competitors had to get together and decide that they would all be selling their products based on blu-ray technology; hence they needed to collaborate to make blu-ray technology more mainstream. The group joined hands to bring the technology to the mass market but still competes on the basis of their various blu-ray based gadgets in the consumer market.
Acquisition of particular resources and activities
If there are certain things that you don’t have in-house and which would require a heavy investment of time, money or both, a key partner who already has these processes and the infrastructure developed would come in extremely handy.
Business models can be extensive maps of the myriad activities that a business needs to perform or the endless resources required to perform these activities successfully. However, it is rare for a new company to have the resources or capabilities in place to fulfill the mandate set down by the business model. Hence, many new companies are beginning their journeys by forming partnerships that give them access to the required resources or processes that they require, but are unable to own yet. Hence, many mobile operators partner with IT companies to develop the operating system their handsets require rather than bearing the heavy investment such an endeavor would require if done in-house. This also gives the IT company a steady source of revenue as well as the advantage of publicity if the mobile manufacturer’s brand is well recognized. Bicycle companies do not manufacture their bicycle accessories. Instead, they get into selective partnerships with bicycle parts manufacturers who customize the parts like the color or size of the bicycle seat according to the preferences of the manufacturer.
Heineken is one of the most popular producers and suppliers of beers in the world, and it is especially well-known in the Netherlands, where they have created very strong relationships with bar owners. In fact, Heineken frequently invests in new bars by providing not only equipment for free but also investing in the décor of the bar. In return, the bar provides Heineken beer exclusively. Hence, Heineken gets a repeat customer for their beer while the bar owner can minimize the cost of setting up the business. Conversely, however, the bar owner is limited to selling just Heineken, which means that if Heineken increases the prices of its beers, the bar owner has no choice but to abide by the new prices.
KEY PARTNERS AND VALUE PROPOSITIONS
For fast moving consumer goods, availability is key to the success of the company and a major value proposition. For supermarkets and retail chains, distribution partners are key if you want to provide your fast moving consumer goods to the market. Your advantage is that your products will be available to everyone, but the supermarket will drive down your price and resultantly your margins significantly.
Technologies are advancing at a very high rate that increases their risk factor is well. However, if the technology forms a significant value proposition for your business, then you can take on a partner to share the risk and cost associated with the technology in question.
Focus on where you are creating value but consider that the rest can be outsourced if needed. The activities that are adding value to your value proposition must be outsourced very carefully because they are the ones that are key partnerships for your business.




CASE STUDY
Starbucks
Starbucks has established several key partnerships worldwide such as with coffee growers worldwide to grow eco and farmer friendly coffee beans. This key partnership is a typical buyer-supplier relationship, motivated by a need to acquire key resources. Another key partnership is with specialized coffee machine makers who make specialized coffee makers for Starbucks. Again this helps Starbucks mitigate cost because it does not have to invest in infrastructure, R&D, and manpower to create these coffee machines in-house. Instead, it is much more cost effective to partner with an organization that already holds expertise in this area and has the infrastructure in place already to cater to Starbucks’ needs. Conversely, Starbucks provides them with a steady buyer for their product as well as the added boost that the Starbucks brand holds for the coffee machine manufacturer.
A Comparative Analysis of Facebook’s and Google’s Partner Networks
Though Facebook has a number of partners in its network, it isn’t entirely dependent on any of these partners. Most of Facebook’s partners provide valuable content for its users so Facebook partners with content providers such as Netflix, Washington Post, Hulu, etc. to provide movies, articles, music and other forms of content to its subscriber base.
ConverselyGoogle has Google Network members who are content companies that partner with Google to provide content on for its search engine. It provides Advertisers access to these content companies web pages through the Google AdSense program and in return shares revenues from the said program with the relevant companies, leading to a mutually beneficial partnership. Additionally Google also partners with Distribution companies to attract traffic to its websites. However, these are a group of Distributors and Google does not leave itself dependent on any one distributor.