Acer Group

Established in 1976, Acer Group uses four PC brands—Acer, Gateway, Packard Bell, and
eMachines—as the foundation for its multi-brand global strategy. Currently the third
largest PC seller in the world (behind only Hewlett-Packard and Dell), Acer employs over
6,000 and had 2008 revenues of $16.65 billion. Impressively, Acer’s operating profi t rose
38 percent from 2007 to 2008, to roughly $415 million. These performance data suggest
that Acer was competing very successfully during the global recession.
There is little question as to the business-level strategy Acer uses. Noting that running a
business with lower costs is good when markets are growing but that doing so is even
better when markets are not growing (which was the case during the global recession),
Acer’s CEO Gianfranco Lanci remains strongly committed to the cost leadership strategy
(this strategy is discussed later in the chapter) as the path to strategic competitiveness and
above-average returns for his firm.