Adidas Salomon Case 22. Question 2.
Adidas Salomon had diversified into a mix of sporting googs business, most of which branded apparel among the product line. The apparel and footwear business of adidas, Salomon and taylormade are clearly related business.
Adidas branded footwear, cycling apparel and winter sports apparel. They would be sold in the same retail outlets as running or basketball attire. There does seem to be a good strategic fit in distribution and sales marketing between golf equipment and golf apparel, ski equipment and ski apparel, and bicycle components and bicycle apparel. Few other strategic fit opportunities exist especially in purchasing, product development, or production between Adidas’ apparel and footwear business and its sports equipment business (skis, golf clubs, bicycles wheels). In addition, there seems to be little opportunity to capture synergistic benefits between these sports hardware businesses. The purchasing product design and production activities for ski equipment, bicycle components and golf clubs are likely very dissimilar. Similarly, the customer service activities of these business groups correspond to retailer queries concerning equipment or apparel. However it seems Adidas Salomon would have great difficulties combining customer service activities for business with no common retailers. Last but not least a strategic fit in R&D: their collaboration allows them to launch innovative products in a very short period (every year a new product in each of their segments).
What’s more we can notice value chain match ups in Product R&D: both companies put a huge emphasis on innovation and design development as means of gaining market share. And all of the brands have introduced a number of product innovations that revolutionized their industry. In supply chain activities, all of them are producing footwear and apparel products. In sales and marketing, all Adidas, Salomon, TaylorMade are using...