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Assignment Details
Students’ Details
3. Section C: Contents
- Critically explain the role/relevance of the theory to the company. 20
- Analyse and critically assess how the company exercise or implement the 30
theory.
Please be reminded that you are NOT supposed to do SWOT analysis in this section
4. Section D: Conclusion 10
- Summarize the report and explain what you have learned from this assignment.
5. Quality of the written assignment 10
- Format, layout, idea flow, languages, references, word count and structure.
Total Marks 100
(-) Minus (Non-compliance to structure/formats/instructions as stated in the
Course Plan 202110)
NOTE: A total of 30 marks can be deducted from this part. Marks should be
deducted from the total marks of the assignment (if any).
The competitor is one of the most influencing factors to a company. There are several competitors for
AMD company which include Intel, Nvidia, Apple, etc. However, we will mainly focus on Intel and Nvidia as
both companies are the main competitors for AMD. (Damchevski, 2021). Intel, the same as AMD was founded
in 1968. The headquarters was located at the same place as AMD. Since Intel has dominated the market for
around 20 years, intel has a significant strong financial background, it also means that Intel can spend a lot on
R&D to advance their microprocessor innovation. As we are aware, the CPU invented by Intel was good
enough but was not as fast as AMD’s CPU. (Alcorn, 2021). Next, Nvidia is a computer system design services
company. They specialize in innovating the GPU. GPU is the thing that plays an essential role for the graphics
on the laptop, gaming, machine learning, etc. (Gillis & Steele, 2020)
AMD’s Products
CPU and APU products
- Athlon – x86-compatible microprocessors designed entry level (CPUs) (APUs)
- Ryzen – x86-64 microprocessors designed consumer (CPUs) (APUs)
- Epyc – x86-64 microprocessors designed server (CPUs)
- Opteron – x86 former micro server (APUs)
- etc.
Graphics products
- Radeon – consumer line of graphics cards
- Mobility Radeon – offers power-optimized visions of graphics chips
- Radeon Pro – Workstation Graphics card
- Radeon Instinct – server and workstation targeted machine learning
AMD’s Performance
Performance Tuning is a tool that for AMD’s ground-breaking adjusting and overclocking. It allows
users to overclock or undervolt the GPU, control the engine and memory clocks, adjust the fan speed desired.
AMD’s performance tuning has two kinds which is auto tuning and tuning control (manual).
Weather
Moreover, the concept of weather (天) is also one of the five fundamental factors of Sun Tzu Art of
War. It is also important for the business analysis in this era. Weather describes the external factors that cannot
be controlled, and it also can be said as meteorology (Sergio. C 2020). In the era of ancient China, weather
usually refers to the changes of day and night, seasonal changes such as spring, summer, autumn, and winter.
Some seasons are difficult for the planning of the war strategy. For example, the expenses will be very high to
fight in the wintertime. Nowadays, The weather stands for opportunity. It defines as susceptible of occurrences
with uncertainty which involving the exposure to risk. To success in business field, this concept is
indispensable. First, thinking of the needs of the consumer is a must. When your products or services match
with the needs, it will be easier to allow your company penetrates in the market. For example, the word ‘green’
is the main idea in the business nowadays. It can stand for organic, environmentally friendly, and 3R which
includes reuse, recycle, and reduce. These elements will allow your company to reach at a higher level in the
future. Some companies such as the Foodpanda is the one of the famous companies in the Malaysia that do the
food delivery with no restaurant and automobiles. The founder of the Foodpanda noticed the needs of the
market and created it to satisfy the people who don’t have time to buy food during work or those who are lazy
to buy food outside.
Terrain
The third factor from Five Factors Theory is Terrain (地). Terrain refers to whether the route to be
taken is long or short, whether the ground is treacherous or safe, wide, or narrow regarding the ease of
movement, and whether the ground will determine the death or survival of an army. As for now, we can
generally refer Terrain as the environment in which an organization operates (Caredda, 2020). During the
planning progress before a war, the general should briefly know about the characteristics of the terrain around
the target war place before declaring the war, because if you can derive most of the advantages from terrain,
you can defeat your enemies with ease. Nowadays, Terrain refers to a place where buyer and seller can meet
and discuss before any transaction of goods and services is carried out. Terrain also refers to the market to be
chosen by the company to invest, whether to be local market, national market, or international market.
Generalship of a Commander
The fourth factor is Generalship of a Commander. Based on the Chinese word 将 , it refers to
commander managing his organisation (Caredda, 2020). It is a process of selecting the right person from a
group of recruits to best suited for a specific position and the organization. It also refers to the commander’s
qualities of wisdom (智), trustworthiness (信), benevolence (仁), courage (勇), and discipline (严). According
to Fox (2010), the word ‘wisdom’ means the commanders have the intelligence to lead their group. If
commanders want to be effective, they must be proficient in the works they do. This means their technical
ability must surpass expectations and are able to care for others. Next, the word ‘trustworthiness’ means
commanders must show their skills and knowledge to their organization on how they deal with challenges that
may affect them. This allows the organization to put their trust into their commanders. The word ‘benevolence’
means the commanders’ ability to show respect to whoever they met like comrades or enemies. The other word
‘courage’ means the commanders must have the courage to face challenges through their decision making.
Courage helps commanders to find opportunity in many risks. The final word ‘discipline’ means the
commander’s duty to train their followers. According to Sun Zi, “discipline” is enforced through consistent
reward and punishment consistently (Fox, 2010).
Weather
In terms of weather, we can say that the COVID-19 Pandemic is the most suitable example for the
weather in the situation now. Actually, AMD company has a quite effective advertising strategy. AMD spends
less on conventional advertising and marketing, but its attention is on attracting fans on Facebook and do the
weekly or monthly giveaway (MBA Skool Team, 2019). This is because the AMD company knows that
Facebook is a best platform to promote their product and allow many people to know them. This can show that
the advertising strategy of AMD is very successful. They don’t need to create a new platform, but they choose
a largest platform in the world to promote their product. Since the consumers’ wallets were hitting by the
pandemic of the COVID-19 virus and online teaching and learning were universalized globally, AMD
company used the set at lower cost to get higher incomes. This is one of its pricing strategies during the
pandemic. This strategy allows many products are affordable for majority of consumer. For example, the best
cheap processor in 2021 is AMD Ryzen 3 3300X. It will indeed save consumers some cash while still offering
the type of performance that most users need or want (John. L 2021).
Terrain
As one of the market leaders in semiconductor industry, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) is based in
Santa Clara, California, United States of America and operates with more than 35 locations across the world.
AMD has operations around the world, which includes R&D facilities, international sales offices, and joint
ventures with assembly & test manufacturing facilities in Malaysia and China.
AMD has its base located in Santa Clara with its operations spread over all aspects of the world, with
its largest convergence of workforce stationed in Washington County in Oregon with more than 18,000
individuals at a few branches. A few offices are arranged in 63 nations such as Argentina, Russia, India,
Ireland, Malaysia, Costa Rica, China and more. AMD group is also having various generation plants and
improvement focuses on few nations such as Israel and China. With the help of AMD’s gigantic dissemination
divert, AMD is allowed to enter markets that appeared to be inconceivable at one time (MBA Skool Team,
2019).
Generalship of a commander
The theory, generalship of a commander is important in AMD because a big company requires a
suitable leader who can manage the organization well with the qualities of wisdom, trustworthiness,
benevolence, courage, and discipline. It is important to have a leader that can help maintain their organization
properly. As a large company, the AMD executive teams, especially the presidents, must ensure that the
company can still run through the whole team which requires someone to lead them to be effective, and they
need the qualities stated in the generalship of a commander. It is also important to have these types of qualities
as leaders because the decision made can affect the outcome of the company. These qualities are important to
the employees of the company as well as they need to be leaded by a good example.
One of the CEO, Lisa Su has been shown possessing qualities of a leader. According to Duffy (2020),
when AMD was about to go bankrupt, Su took the risk and built high quality computing applications even
though it has its cons but then it paid off as AMD is rising and the company and the improvements continue
until the present day and does the same thing taking risk to ensure everything went smoothly which shows one
of her qualities as a leader, courage. When Su took over as CEO, she spent a lot of years until now making
decisions on what not to do and instead find out what the company is good at, leaving a good impression for
the whole company, meaning she has the quality of trustworthiness. To ensure the company keeps its pacing
smooth, Su hires employees who are passionate while ensuring they have the same core values as AMD which
are: ambition, hard work, determination, and teamwork, meaning she cares for the employees too but also
expect them to possess the skills expected to contribute to the company (Doler, 2021).
The management system of the AMD was established by the AMD leadership and executive team. The
leader of this executive team was Dr. Lisa Su. She is AMD’s president and CEO assisted by a group of
executive members. Dr. Lisa Su is responsible for integrating AMD’s business units, sales, global operations,
and all aspects of product strategy and as well as execution (AMD, n.d.). Every member of the executive team
must manage their own department which includes sales & marketing, production & operation, financial, and
human resources. From the AMD executive team, we can know that the organizational structure of AMD was
well because every employee knows what their task is, and this can avoid confusion and misunderstanding.
For example, Mr. Devinder Kumar was responsible for the global finance organization, Mr. Mark Papermaster
was responsible for corporate technical direction, Ms. Ruth Cotter was responsible for overseas worldwide
marketing and human resources, and Mr. Keivan Keshvari was responsible for global operation organization
(AMD, n.d.). Besides this, AMD has planned a product lifecycle to ensure their progress was maintained. The
product lifecycle was started from concept then follow by feasibility, planning, execution, production, and
sustaining. Furthermore, AMD has mapped a corporate responsibility program to manage the work (AMD,
n.d.). This program included design, silicon manufacturing, assembly and test, product shipping, end-product
manufacturing, customer use, and product end of use.
Section D
According to Niklas Goeke (2016), Sun Zi's Art of War is the most well-known text on military tactics
and strategy ever written in ancient Chinese literature. Outside of China, it is a well-known and respected
Chinese military classic. As the world's oldest military treatise, it is universally regarded as one of China's
greatest cultural legacies, and it continues to have a profound influence on the globe today. Although the book's
exact origin and authorship have been disputed, military historians agree that it was most likely composed
between 400 and 320 B.C., around 100 years after the birth of two well-known Chinese philosophers,
Confucius, and Lao Tzu. Today, the book is nearly 2,400 years old. It's incredible that the book can still catch
the attention and attract the curiosity of current researchers and authors. Sun Zi's Art of War has the potential
to influence military and political ideas, and premier military institutions throughout the world would want to
have copies in their libraries.
War is necessary for the state's administration. According to Tzu, there are five continuous variables
that regulate warfare. These five criteria must be considered while developing a military strategy. This
necessitates answering questions like: Which of your leaders inspires you to follow moral law? Who stands to
benefit the most from the arrangement of the heavens and earth? Which side has better-trained leaders and
soldiers? Tzu claims that by asking these kinds of questions, you can determine who would win. Furthermore,
because war is founded on deceit, your force must look unfit to attack while it is ready to assault. You must
appear passive when you are actively deploying your warriors. (Elle McFarlane,2020).
Sun Zi's Art of War was renowned for its ability to manage its generals and warriors in battle. But, in
today's world, we finally adopt some of Sun Zi's principles. Sun Zi’s art of war was frequently used as a
metaphor for a company's ability to win or compete with its rivals. Sun Zi's Art of War is becoming more well-
known than previously, owing to Western companies' adoption of certain of Sun Zi's concepts in their
management and planning of company objectives.
All our group members looked up Sun Zi’s Art of War throughout the discussion of our project. We
discovered while researching that each of Sun Zi's concepts is quite relevant in the business world. As a result,
businesspeople should learn about the Sun Zi Art of War. We should study Sun Zi’s Art of War as accounting
students since it not only helps us manage our businesses in the future, but also teaches us how to handle
people.
Through this assignment, there are several key success factors of AMD Company. First is Hard work
and a clear vision. AMD CEO, Lisa had a clear vision for AMD's future and was prepared to put in the effort
to make it a reality. She realised straight away that she wouldn't be able to get any results right away. Patience
and faith in the company's goal were key factors in its comeback. Also, AMD has been leading the company
for decades because to its superior management and organisational structure. Communication between upper
management and lower management, especially first-line employees, allows them to be clear on the company's
aims and visions. This will encourage employees to behave passionately in the workplace. Furthermore, the
win customer’s trust is also one of the key factors of success in AMD Company. To turn a business around, all
of the employees must believe in the future, yet this is insufficient. You must also persuade your consumers.
Customers must believe in the company's long-term viability. (Lydia Dishman,2018).
As a conclusion, AMD (Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.) is a worldwide semiconductor company based
in Santa Clara, California. They provide a wide range of high-tech items to meet consumers' needs in a more
convenient manner. Toshiba Company also employs Sun Zi Art of War tactics to improve the effectiveness
and efficiency of its administration. As a result, the Sun Zi Art of War is extremely beneficial nowadays.
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