Disney The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney, is an American diversified multinational mass media corporation headquartered

in Walt Disney Studios, Burbank, California. It is the largest media conglomerate in the world in terms of revenue. Disney was founded on October 16, 1923, by Walt and Roy Disney as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, and established itself as a leader in the American animation industry before diversifying into live-action film production, television, and travel. The company is best known for the products of its film studio, the Walt Disney Studios, and today one of the largest and best-known studios in Hollywood. Disney also owns and operates the ABC broadcast television network; cable television networks such as Disney Channel, ESPN, A+E Networks, and ABC Family; publishing, merchandising, and theatre divisions; and owns and licenses 14 theme parks around the world. It also has a successful music division. The company has been a component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average since May 6, 1991. An early and well-known cartoon creation of the company, Mickey Mouse, is a primary symbol of The Walt Disney Company. The Four Ps of Disney The Walt Disney Company is very good at the product and placing aspects of the four Ps, resulting from over eighty years experience in the business. This history has given them an advantage of instinct and familiarity when it comes to selling their products. As new theatrical productions are released, it allows for new product lines based off the features characters to be made and sold in strategically placed stores throughout the United States. The stores are located in malls and super centers, in urban locations in order to for them to be visible, and they are nationally located within their theme parks where they will be heavily sought after by eager vacationing families. The next two Ps are promotion and pricing. Promotion is intertwined throughout The Walt Disney Company, surfacing in theatrical productions, books, consumer products and theme parks. Every aspect of Disney promotes not only itself but every other aspect as well in a circular rotation and, as Roy Disney was quoted earlier, keeps [consumers] Mickey Mouse minded.

SWOT analysis Strengths

Incredibly strong brand awareness. Walt Disney brand has been known for more than 90 years in US and has been widely recognized worldwide, especially due to its Disney Channel, Disney Park resorts and movies from Walt Disney studios. The company is perceived as the primary family entertainment provider and was the 13th most valuable brand (valued at $27.4 billion) in the world in 2012. Unique and wide portfolio. Walt Disneys products include broadcast television network ABC and cable networks such as Disney Channel or ESPN, which is one of

the most watched cable networks in the world. Combining the significant audience reach of these cable networks, (ESPN has nearly 300 million and Disney Channel 240 million subscribers) and the solid growth of cable television, Disneys product portfolio provides a competitive advantage for the company over its competitors. Competency in acquisitions. One of the strongest sides the company has is its competency in acquisitions. The Walt Disney Company has acquired Pixar Animation Studios in 2006, Marvel Entertainment in 2009 and Lucasfilm in 2012. The former 2 acquisitions have already proved to be very successful in terms of revenue and profit growth. Disney is the largest worldwide licensor of characterbased merchandise and producer of children's film related products based on retail sales Diversified businesses. The business operates five different business segments: media networks, parks and resorts, studio environment, consumer products and interactive media. These companys segments are operated online and offline, in many different economies and are generating their income using different business models. Due to such diverse operations, Disney is less affected by changes in external environment than its competitors are. Localization of products. Recently, Disney has started adapting its products to suit local tastes. Besides the parks and resorts, companys movies and consumer products are adapted for Chinese market to attract more visitors. This is rarely initiated by the movie studio itself and is something that few other studios are doing.

Weaknesses
Heavy dependence on income from North America. Although, Disney operates in more than 200 countries, it heavily depends on US and Canada markets for its income. More than 70% of the business the revenues come from US alone, while the major Disneys competitor News Corporation receives less than 50% of revenues from US, making it less vulnerable to changes in US market. Few opportunities for significant growth through acquisitions. The Walt Disney Company is the largest entertainment provider in the world and has become so due to acquisition of competitors. The last Disneys acquisition had to be approved by Federal Trade Commission so that the company wouldnt have to deal with antitrust problems. This means that the size of the Disneys business has become a concern for the government due to significant market concentration and that the company has very few opportunities to acquire competitors. Declining DVD market. Disneys Home Entertainment revenues declined 9% in fiscal 2012. Still a large and wide-margined business for Disney, the ongoing slowdown stems from the rollout of low-priced DVD rental kiosks and alternative media outlets. Home Entertainment, for reference, contributed only 5% of total revenue in 2012, though.

Opportunities
Growth of paid TV industries in emerging economies. The Asia Pacific region accounted for more than 50% market share of the world pay TV subscribers (394 million) in 2011. It was expected to grow to more than 55% by the end of 2016, where China would account for more than 27% of the market. The similar growth is expected in India as well. Disney Company has already entered these markets and should continue to strengthen its position there to benefit from such high industry growth. Expansion of movie production to new countries. Disney has an opportunity to expand its movie production to such countries as India or China, where movie production industries have developed good quality infrastructure. This would result in lower movie production costs and more localized movies for India and Chinas markets. Expansion of cruise business. Disney music channel Disney school of management and training

Threats
Intense competition. Disney operates in very competitive industries such as media, tourism, parks and resorts, interactive entertainment and others. The competitive landscape changes quite drastically in the media industry, where news and TV go online and new competitors with new business models compete more successfully than incumbent media companies. Increasing piracy. The advancements in technology allow copying, transmitting and distributing copyrighted material much easier. With an increasing number of internet users and the speed of internet, this poses a great risk to Disneys income, as fewer people would go to watch movies in a cinema or buy its DVD, when its freely available online. Strong growth of online TV and online movie renting. Besides internet piracy, Disneys media and movie production businesses may suffer from online TV and online movie rental growth. Subscription to online TV streaming and movie rental websites costs much less than to usual cable television providers. In addition, internet infrastructure is often managed by different companies, thus taking the power away from cable network providers. Security threats due to terrorism Change in the younger generation's preferences

Euro Disney and Hong Kong Disney Disneyland Paris first began operations in April of 1992 as EuroDisney SCA. Located 20 miles east of Paris by the river Marne, this location was chosen out of the 200 potential locations in Europe including Spain, France, Italy, and Greece. The park was designed to be the biggest and

the most lavish theme park of the Walt Disney Company. It was slated to be bigger than any other Disneyland in the world. But all was not magical for EuroDisney. Disney faced a lot of problems at the beginning of EuroDisney as well as during its journey throughout the years. European audiences failed to accept Disney the way the Japanese did. Tokyo Disneyland was an instant success (more than 14 million visitors between 1990 and 1992, mostly repeat visitors). This reflected a stark contrast in terms of spending; Japanese customers spent close to $600 on a visit to the park while European customers were reluctant to spend $280 a day. Primarily their highly priced ticket costs and hotel tariffs posed a problem, and Disneys financing policies (high initial investments) and marketing plans had to be revised many times to ensure that the company became profitable. Financial losses kept building up and restructuring of many policies was needed to reach a better financial position. The French hated EuroDisney because to them it represented every bit of American imperialism; and they were most unwilling to accept Disney and its American culture. EuroDisney ignored the first signs of acceptance issues that cropped up in the planning stage, leading to a cultural disaster. EuroDisneys constant emphasis on style and size hurt local sentiment. They invested millions of dollars on unnecessary details like trams and bigger castles, which only added to the investment costs. By doing this they separated the government, banks and financial institutions, ad agencies, and other concerned parties leading to further downfall of EuroDisney. Factors like devaluation of Franc, Gulf war, economic slowdown at the end of 1980, other attractions like the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona, etc. affected EuroDisney. Alcohol ban in the park came as a shock to the local customers for the French were the biggest consumers of wine in the world and they preferred having wine with their meals. Grooming standards for the staff had to be modified to suit the local culture. They made the mistake of relying on wrong information and assumed that Europeans did not eat breakfast. When the crowd poured in there was not enough capacity to serve breakfast to all the people. EuroDisney faced a major financial crunch and the parent company had to fund them for a while in order to get them out of their financial issues. In short the company faced a lot of trouble but they managed to make EuroDisney a profitable venture over the years. The turnaround began when Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal invested $500 million in EuroDisney, thus owning a 24% stake. But actual changes were seen when Frenchman Philippe Bourguignon took over as CEO in 1993; he negotiated with the bankers to help bring Disney out of the problems it faced. The most important changes that were made was in terms of marketing instead of centralized promotions, he separated marketing offices region wise and they tailored different promotions to appeal to each local market. The central theme however remained an authentic Disney day out. The name of the park was changed from EuroDisney to Disneyland Paris. This was to reflect that the park remained rooted in its original concept. By the year 1996, Disneyland Paris was becoming Frances not visited tourist attraction, getting ahead of the Louvre Art Museum and the Eiffel Tower. Many small changes in the park reflected their learning of the European culture. With this Disney planned further expansion; they added California Adventure Park to

the Anaheim complex, and Walt Disney Studios Theme Park to Disneyland Paris. Some new attractions were added to Disneyland Tokyo and Hong Kong as well. The real root of Disneys failure in Paris lay in its success in Tokyo. Since the park was an immediate success in Tokyo, Disney executives assumed that they could replicate this success in the Paris Disneyland as well. In a way, the Tokyo model misguided the Disney executives from developing an appropriate model for Paris Disneyland. In 2005 Disneyland Paris faced bankruptcy, especially when the Armageddon themed ride flopped but they blamed a lot of external factors for this failure. At this point, the Charles de Guelle airport opened up to offer low cost airlines in order to make Paris a more attractive vacation destination. The first original European based character was also created. By this time Disney had a mixed international experience great success in Tokyo, and a financial sinkhole in Paris. In order not to make similar mistakes in china, they took special steps for Hong Kong Disneyland. The park had an American feeling blended with the local environment that appealed to the local tastes. A lot of Chinese religious symbolism and aesthetics were used (feng-shui, Chinese almanac, etc.). However the attendance of the park dropped over the second year, as the visitors found very little to excite them, especially people who were not familiar with Disney characters, since Disney characters were banned in China for 40 years. They corrected this gap by introducing marketing initiatives like tour to familiarize visitors with Disneys heritage and the different characters so that they can enjoy the park much better, fantasy gardens where visitors could take pictures with Disney characters, etc. Introduction of local cuisines and attractions proved successful. Disney expansion As part of this project, the group proposes that Disney can consider entry into the following three countries: Brazil
Economy is recovering from the GDP reduction in 2009; consumer market is growing. The unemployment rate is decreasing since the government accelerated generation of employment in the public sector. Exports have increased significantly Attractive destination for FDI; however excessive government regulations for entry and slow judicial system. Gross debts reduced due to increase in international commodity prices and rising taxable income. Infrastructure development looks favourable due to the upcoming FIFA World cup in 2014 as well as the 2016 Olympic Games to be held in Rio.

South Africa: The country can offer good market opportunities for Disney due to the following factors:
The climatic conditions remain comfortable throughout the year, even though it varies from region to region. Due to diverse regions and two of the worlds most renowned wildlife reserves located in South Africa there is abundant opportunity for travel, which can benefit Disney. Excellent infrastructure for travel in terms of road and railways, as well as accommodations.

Real GDP growth of 3%, next quarter its slated to be 3.20% Stable political environment, due to the presence of single democratic political party; they have posed problems to foreign direct investments in the past but opening a Disney themepark in South Africa will actually be beneficial to the country. There will be new jobs created reducing the unemployment level, the GDP will grow further, and South Africa may become more popular as a vacation destination. 2010 FIFA World Cup stimulated infrastructure development in the country, which will be favourable for any new FDI plans. The interest rate and inflation rates are both at 5%, which are moderate. Real estate risk is very low

We recommend Brazils capital Rio de Janeiro because the 2014 football World Cup is scheduled to be held in 12 Brazilian cities and two years later the Olympic Summer games are to be held in Rio de Janeiro; Government officials expect tourism to rise in the course of these events. New roads and railway lines will be built and plans to expand Rios international airport are under way. Also Brazils tech capital So Paulo would be a good investment because its Brazil's largest city. In 2013, So Paulo ranked 6th in Forbes List of the Top 10 Billionaire cities and the total net worth is superior to $120 billion. Brazils market has a lot of potential. The upcoming events in Brazil would also benefit Disneys as improved the government would improve and lay a foundation for the infrastructure.