In September of 1989, Sony (Japan) acquired Columbia Pictures and Tri-Star Pictures (USA) for $4.8 billion in cash and took over some debt.

This acquisition was intended to help make up for the loss Sony took when it came to the Betamax vs VCR wars in the 70s. They thought that this was the time to broaden and try to make a more significant impact.

Shortly after, Sony began having a lot of issues. Most analysts attributed these issues to the difference between American and Japanese management styles.

This is a prime example of a need for cultural blending (as in Question 1), and this (it is believed) is the cause of this acquisitions struggles. Eventually, the revenues started increasing, and Sony wasn't losing as much money, but the acquisition still hasn' t lead to what would be a called a complete success.

Lisa and Jeff both make really good points.

"Cultural blending" is an absolute requirement for the success of a JV, and it naturally would depend on the location of the JV.

I agree completely with Jeff when he says that the culture should more reflect (day-to-day operations) the "home country".

Seeing as how a lot of the time, a JV is the only way to enter into foreign markets, it makes sense that you would want to blend your corporate cultures in with the market you are entering in to.

Also, Lisa makes note that it would not be successful as a "50/50 split", or "meet in the middle", her example is clear and understandable. It can not be assumed that foreign markets will respond to the same corporate culture. Therefore, blending cultures is the only viable option.

Emily makes a great point here when she says that LE employees were motivated to work hard. All of the incentives and retention programs were motivating factors in the work ethic of the employees, but when it comes right down to it, they still had to be the kind of people who have a good work ethic regardless of incentive programs.

In regards to finding more people like this: I do not think that it would be difficult to acquire the 'type' of people that they are looking for. If you are good to your employees, they will be good to you. But the jewels are the people who will work hard regardless of bonuses, they may be harder to find.

After reading the case, Greg's analysis makes the most sense. Sure the company did other things right, but what truly gives them a competitive advantage is the fact that they had such an efficient workforce. And that efficient workforce can be traced to their incentive programs.

It makes sense that when you provide for your employees, they will, in turn, produce for the company. The production numbers were astounding also, and no other companies (relative) could compete with what they had to offer.

It sounds like it was a great place to work (if you were committed to doing your job).

The CLEAR model, although I still have my doubts about it, was the most useful out of all the models that we looked at. It is imperative to know the risks when considering investing in another country, and that model gives you an understandable quantitative value with which to evaluate. As Emily posted, there are always holes in any model because we aren't perfect, however, if I think of this model as valid, it is definitely the best model of the lot.

In using the premium/discount value, it is important to note (as you will gather from the reading) that is taken from the perspective of an investor from the United States.

The premium/discount value is achieve by taking the Opacity score of the country you wish to invest in and subtracting from that the Opacity score of the US. That difference is multiplied by 0.2213, and the premium/discount value (as a percent) is calculated.

As an investor from the United States, in order for you to justify your investment with another country (for example: Indonesia), you would need to achieve a Rate of Return that is 8.54% higher than you would achieve had you invested in the United States.

This example is at the very bottom of the chart in terms of risk (Indonesia is the riskiest country shown on the table), however, if you were to invest in Hong Kong (close to the least riskiest country on the table), you could actually receive a Rate of Return that is LESS than what you would want to receive had you invested that money with the United States.

This score gives you an idea (based on their variables) of their riskiness in terms of investing. It is obvious that the higher the score the riskier the investment potential.

In relation to legitimacy, I am not sure if I fully buy this method of capturing risk. I'm not sure if it is adequate enough to just generalize 5 factors into an integer based score. I'm just not sure.

I agree with Jeff when he says that it would be very hard to threaten our sovereignty. Realistically, as the second article states that most of our ports have been foreign run for a long time. We, as a country, have a habit of expecting the worst after situation like Sept 11th, and Katrina... however, privatization (FDI) is more efficient. I am sure that the committees checking all of the possible scenarios have done their due diligence.

In terms of FDI, I think it is a very beneficial. Like Don said, it can pose a potential risk, but the benefits outweigh the risk in my opinion.

Aleks makes a good point here... in terms of corporate "greed", I don't understand it either... unless it is doing something that causes negative impacts, their prime mission is to maximize stockholder wealth.

We have companies like Plastek (located in Erie) that have moved and are continually moving parts of their manufacturing to Brazil, because it is all around cheaper for them. While that may not directly impact consumers (which it shouldn't) it will directly impact their bottom line... and in turn, raise stock prices, and increase the wealth of the holders.

What I see in the newspapers are people who are directly impacted by the corporate initiatives and they are "sour" because a family member, friend, or acquaintance, lost their job, or was put out in some way... what we need to realize is that, while we want companies to stay in our local economy, we ignore the fact that they need to make a profit too.

In terms of achievement based motivational practices: I think everyone has been involved with, at one time or another, some sort of financial incentive (bonuses, raises, and the like). Those incentives are very important to Individualist societies because they (we), as Figure 3 provides, seek individual financial security and since "everybody is supposed to take care of [themselves]...". Countries with a low UA and high MASC use financial incentives as ways to motivate, and rewards individual for hard and good work.
Countries with a low MASC (feminine side of Figure 7) value a higher quality of life (not-necessarily monetarily related) rather than money.
Based on the findings of Hofstede, I would think that countries that are more Collective, with a lower MASC, and higher UA, would value different types of motivation, rather than financial rewards. Giving individuals financial rewards does not sound like it would play with with a countries that have a higher Collectivism rating because decisions and work are done in standard "we" ways.

Unfortunately, Mike, I disagree with your assessment in regards to this debate. I firmly believe that government spending in bad times is the only viable solution. In bad times people do not have the drive to spend to stimulate the economy, they hoard their money and become frugal. If we leave the market to "dance to the beat of it's own drum" we will never completely recuperate.

The idea is this: If Depressions are caused by a lack of spending, then increasing that spending can pull us out of the depression. Are we to just assume that in troubled times society will stand up on it's own and pull us out of it, or do we need some type of jump start?

Although I want to believe that Hayek hit the nail on the head, I think just from 2008/09 we can see that if we leave the market to handle everything, our economy will collapse.