Coca-Cola

The Coca-Cola Company (NYSE: KO) is one of the largest manufacturers, distributors and marketers of nonalcoholic beverage concentrates and syrups in the world and one of the largest corporations in the United States. The company is best known for its flagship product Coca-Cola, invented by pharmacist John Stith Pemberton in 1886. The Coca-Cola formula and brand was bought in 1889 by Asa Candler who incorporated The Coca-Cola Company in 1892. Besides its namesake Coca-Cola beverage, Coca-Cola currently offers nearly 400 brands in over 200 countries or territories.
The company operates a franchised distribution system dating back to 1889 where TCCC only produces syrup concentrate which is then sold to various bottlers throughout the world who hold an exclusive territory.
The Coca-Cola Company is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. Its stock is listed on the NYSE and is part of DJIA and S&P 500.

Revenue
According to the 2005 Annual Report, the company sells beverage products in more than 312 countries or territories. The report further states that of the more than 90 billion beverage servings of all types consumed worldwide every day, beverages bearing the trademarks owned by or licensed to Coca-Cola account for approximately 4.5 billion. Of these, beverages bearing the trademark "Coca-Cola" or "Coke" accounted for approximately 78% of the Company's total gallon sales.
Also according to the 2007 Annual Report, Coca-Cola had gallon sales distributed as follows:
37% in the United States
43% in Mexico, Brazil, Japan and China
20% spread throughout the world

Bottlers
In general, The Coca-Cola Company (TCCC) and/or subsidiaries only produces (or produce) syrup concentrate which is then sold to various bottlers throughout the world who hold a Coca-Cola franchise. Coca-Cola bottlers, who hold territorially exclusive contracts with the company, produce finished product in cans and bottles from the concentrate in combination with filtered water and sweeteners. The bottlers then sell, distribute and merchandise the resulting Coca-Cola product to retail stores, vending machines, restaurants and food service distributors.
One notable exception to this general relationship between TCCC and bottlers is fountain syrups in the United States, where TCCC bypasses bottlers and is responsible for the manufacture and sale of fountain syrups directly to authorized fountain wholesalers and some fountain retailers.
In 2005, Coca-Cola had equity positions in 51 unconsolidated bottling, canning and distribution operations which produced approximately 58% of volume. Significant investees include:
36% of Coca-Cola Enterprises which produces (by population) for 78% of USA, 98% of Canada and 100% of Great Britain (but not Northern Ireland), continental France and the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Belgium and Monaco.
40% of Coca-Cola FEMSA, S.A. de C.V. which produces (by population) for 48% of Mexico, 16% of Brazil, 98% of Colombia, 47% of Guatemala, 100% of Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Panama and Venezuela, and 30% of Argentina
24% of Coca-Cola Hellenic Bottling Company S.A. which produces (by population) for 67% of Italy and 100% of Armenia, Austria, Belarus, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Moldova, Nigeria, Northern Ireland, Poland, Rep. of Ireland, Romania, Russia, Serbia and Montenegro, Slovakia, Slovenia, Switzerland and Ukraine.
34% of Coca-Cola Amatil which produces (by population) for 98% of Indonesia and 100% of Australia, Indonesia, New Zealand, South Korea, Fiji and Papua New Guinea.
27% of Coca-Cola Bottling Co. which is the second largest Coca-Cola bottler in the United States. The company was incorporated in 1980, and "its predecessors have been in the soft drink manufacturing and distribution business since 1902."

Products and brands
The Coca-Cola Company offers nearly 400 brands in over 200 countries, besides its namesake Coca-Cola beverage. This includes other varieties of Coca-Cola such as:
Diet Coke (introduced in 1982), which uses aspartame, a synthetic phenylalanine-based sweetener in place of sugar
Diet Coke Caffeine-Free
Cherry Coke (1985)
Diet Cherry Coke (1986)
Coke with Lemon (2001)
Diet Coke with Lemon (2001)
Vanilla Coke (2002)
Diet Vanilla Coke (2002)
Coca-Cola C2 (2004)
Coke with Lime (2004)
Diet Coke with Lime (2004)
Diet Coke Sweetened with Splenda (2005)
Coca-Cola Zero (2005)
Coca-Cola Black Cherry Vanilla (2006)
Diet Coca-Cola Black Cherry Vanilla (2006)
Coca-Cola Bl?K (2006)
Diet Coke Plus (2007)
Coca-Cola Orange (2007)
Tab was Coca-Cola's first attempt to develop a diet soft drink, using saccharin as a sugar substitute. Introduced in 1963, the product is still sold today, however its sales have dwindled since the introduction of Diet Coke.
The Coca-Cola Company also produces a number of other soft drinks including Fanta (introduced circa 1942 or 1943) and Sprite. Fanta's origins date back to World War II when Max Keith, who managed Coca-Cola's operations in Germany during the war, ran out of the ingredients for Coke, which could be supplied only from the United States. Keith resorted to producing a different soft drink, Fanta, which proved to be a hit, and when Coke took over again after the war, it adopted the Fanta brand as well. The German Fanta Klare Zitrone ("Clear Lemon Fanta") variety became Sprite, another of the company's bestsellers and its response to 7 Up.
During the 1990s, the company responded to the growing consumer interest in healthy beverages by introducing several new non-carbonated beverage brands. These included Minute Maid Juices to Go, Powerade sports beverage, flavoured tea Nestea (in a joint venture with Nestle), Fruitopia fruit drink and Dasani water, among others. In 2001, Minute Maid division launched the Simply Orange brand of juices including orange juice.
In 2004, perhaps in response to the burgeoning popularity of low-carbohydrate diets such as the Atkins Diet, Coca-Cola announced its intention to develop and sell a low-carbohydrate alternative to Coke Classic, dubbed C2 Cola. C2 contains a mix of high fructose corn syrup, aspartame, sucralose, and Acesulfame potassium. C2 is designed to more closely emulate the taste of Coca-Cola Classic. Even with less than half of the food energy and carbohydrates of standard soft drinks, C2 is not a replacement for zero-calorie soft drinks such as Diet Coke. C2 went on sale in the U.S. on June 11, 2004, and in Canada in August 2004. C2's future is uncertain due to disappointing sales.
Coca-Cola is the best-selling soft drink in most countries. While the Middle East is one of the only regions in the world where Coca-Cola is not the number one soda drink, Coca-Cola nonetheless holds almost 25% marketshare (to Pepsi's 75%) and had double-digit growth in 2003. Similarly, in Scotland, where the locally produced Irn-Bru was once more popular, 2005 figures show that both Coca-Cola and Diet Coke now outsell Irn-Bru. In Peru, the native Inca Kola has been more popular than Coca-Cola, which prompted Coca-Cola to enter in negotiations with the soft drink's company and buy 50% of its stakes. In Japan, the best selling soft drink is not cola, as (canned) tea and coffee are more popular. As such, the Coca-Cola Company's best selling brand there is not Coca-Cola, but Georgia.
Some claim Coke is less popular in India due to suspicions regarding the health standards of the drink. However, marketshare data does not back this view. Specifically, in 2005, Coca-Cola India's market share was 60.9%. However, Thums Up, a brand acquired by The Coca-Cola Company, contributes a major part of this market share rather than Coke per se, which lags both Thums Up and Pepsi.
On July 6, 2006, a Coca-Cola employee and two other people were arrested and charged with trying to sell "highly classified" information to the soft drink maker's competitor, PepsiCo for $1.5 million. The recipe for Coca-Cola, perhaps the company's most closely guarded secret, was never in jeopardy. Instead, the information was related to a new beverage in development. Coca-Cola executives verified that the documents were valid and proprietary. At least one glass vial containing a sample of a new drink was offered for sale, court documents said. The conspiracy was revealed by PepsiCo, which notified the authorities when they were approached by the conspirators.
The company announced a new "negative calorie" green tea drink, Enviga, in 2006, along with trying coffee retail concepts Far Coast and Chaqwa.
On May 25, 2007, Coca-Cola announced it would purchase Glaceau, a maker of flavored vitamin-enhanced drinks, flavored waters, and energy drinks, for $4.1 billion in cash.

Corporate Responsibility & Citizenship
The Coca-Cola Company gives back to the communities in which it operates in many ways. Recent acts by the Coca Cola Company which are claimed to have had positive social implications include:

Promoting diversity
Coca-Cola ranked 26th on Fortune magazine's list of the "50 Best Companies for Minorities" in 2004.
WATCHFUL EYE ENTERTAINMENT and Coca-Cola Bottling company was named one of "The Top 100 Employers for the Class of 2004" by Black Collegian magazine.
Coca-Cola was named one of the "50 Best Companies for Latinas to Work for in the U.S." by Latina Style in 2004.
Coca-Cola is among 32 companies that have filed "friend of the court" briefs in support of the University of Michigan's affirmative action policies.
Coca-Cola offers domestic partner health benefits to employees' domestic partners of the same sex, and includes "sexual orientation" and "gender identity" in its equal employment opportunity policy, earning a 100% mark on the Human Rights Campaign Foundation's Corporate Equality Index.

HIV / AIDS in Africa
In September 2002 Coca-Cola announced it would spend up to $5 million per year to fund HIV/AIDS treatment for Africans who work within the company's bottling system. The company had previously offered treatment to its 1,200 corporate workers in Africa. The company's bottling system is made up of 40 independent companies and employs 58,000 people in Africa.
Coca Cola Africa plans to support HIV/AIDS programs as part of a $50 million budget to be granted to African organizations by the end of the decade.

Charitable donations
The Coca-Cola Company and its bottling partners shipped more than 30 million donated 8-oz. servings to Hurricane Katrina Evacuees.
Coca-Cola donated $10 million to tsunami relief efforts in Asia. Employees of Coca-Cola in the region also delivered bottled water, food and other supplies.
After the September 11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Coca-Cola and its affiliates committed to a $12 million financial contribution to disaster relief efforts.

Criticism
The Coca-Cola Company has been involved in a number of controversies and law suits related to its perceived relationship with human rights violations and other perceived unethical practices.
A number of law suits have issued in relation to its allegedly monopolistic and discriminatory practices, some of which have been dismissed, some of which The Coca-Cola Company agreed to change its business practices and some of which settled out of court. It has also been involved in a discrimination case. There have been continuing criticisms regarding the Coca-Cola Company's relation to the Middle East and U.S. foreign policy.
In regards to environmental issues in India, there has been a controversy over pesticides possibly showing up in the product, as well as the company's overuse of local water supplies in some locations, that have sometimes led to severe shortages for regional farmers. Packaging used in Coca-Cola's products have a significant environmental impact but the company strongly opposes attempts to introduce mechanisms such as container deposit legislation.
Its labor practices have been criticised, starting with involvement in the assassinations of trade union-affiliated employees in Guatemala in the 1970s and more recently including allegations that Coca-Cola's bottler, Panamco, hired paramilitary mercenaries who assassinated trade union leaders in Colombia. Several court cases occurred, such as those by United Steelworkers of America and the International Labor Rights Fund in support of SINALTRAINAL, and boycott actions were taken against the company.
Coca-Cola has also been criticised for its interactions with Nazi-Germany during World War II and for the implications of doing business in Israel during the second half of the twentieth century and the early twenty-first century.

Sponsorship
Coca-Cola have sponsored the English Football League since the beginning of the 2004-05 season (beginning August 2004). Other major sponsorships include NASCAR, the NBA, the PGA Tour, NCAA Championships, the Olympics and the FIFA World Cup.

Microsoft

Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) (SEHK: 4338), or often just MS, is an American multinational computer technology corporation with 79,000 employees in 102 countries and global annual revenue of US $51.12 billion as of 2007. It develops, manufactures, licenses and supports a wide range of software products for computing devices. Headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA, its best selling products are the Microsoft Windows operating system and the Microsoft Office suite of productivity software. These products have prominent positions in the desktop computer market, with market share estimates as high as 90% or more as of 2003 for Microsoft Office and 2006 for Microsoft Windows. One of Bill Gates' key visions is "to get a workstation running our software onto every desk and eventually in every home".
Founded to develop and sell BASIC interpreters for the Altair 8800, Microsoft rose to dominate the home computer operating system market with MS-DOS in the mid-1980s. The company released an initial public offering (IPO) in the stock market, which, due to the ensuing rise of the stock price, has made four billionaires and an estimated 12,000 millionaires from Microsoft employees. Throughout its history the company has been the target of criticism for various reasons, including monopolistic business practices-both the U.S. Justice Department and the European Commission, among others, brought Microsoft to court for antitrust violations and software bundling.
Microsoft has footholds in other markets besides operating systems and office suites, with assets such as the MSNBC cable television network, the MSN Internet portal, and the Microsoft Encarta multimedia encyclopedia. The company also markets both computer hardware products such as the Microsoft mouse and home entertainment products such as the Xbox, Xbox 360, Zune and MSN TV. Known for what is generally described as a developer-centric business culture, Microsoft has historically given customer support over Usenet newsgroups and the World Wide Web, and awards Microsoft MVP status to volunteers who are deemed helpful in assisting the company's customers. The company's official website is one of the most visited on the Internet, receiving more than 2.4 million unique page views per day according to Alexa.com, who ranked the site 18th amongst all websites for traffic rank on September 12, 2007.

History
See also: History of Microsoft Windows

1975-1985: Founding
Following the launch of the Altair 8800, Bill Gates called the creators of the new microcomputer, Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (MITS), offering to demonstrate an implementation of the BASIC programming language for the system. After the demonstration, MITS agreed to distribute Altair BASIC. Gates left Harvard University, moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico where MITS was located, and founded Microsoft there. The company's first international office was founded on November 1, 1978, in Japan, entitled "ASCII Microsoft" (now called "Microsoft Japan"). On January 1, 1979, the company moved from Albuquerque to a new home in Bellevue, Washington. Steve Ballmer joined the company on June 11, 1980, and later succeeded Bill Gates as CEO.
DOS (Disk Operating System) was the operating system that brought the company its first real success. On August 12, 1981, after negotiations with Digital Research failed, IBM awarded a contract to Microsoft to provide a version of the CP/M operating system, which was set to be used in the upcoming IBM Personal Computer (PC). For this deal, Microsoft purchased a CP/M clone called 86-DOS from Seattle Computer Products, which IBM renamed to PC-DOS. Later, the market saw a flood of IBM PC clones after Columbia Data Products successfully cloned the IBM BIOS, and by aggressively marketing MS-DOS to manufacturers of IBM-PC clones, Microsoft rose from a small player to one of the major software vendors in the home computer industry. The company expanded into new markets with the release of the Microsoft Mouse in 1983, as well as a publishing division named Microsoft Press.

1985-1995: OS/2 and Windows
In August 1985, Microsoft and IBM partnered in the development of a different operating system called OS/2. On November 20, 1985, Microsoft released its first retail version of Microsoft Windows, originally a graphical extension for its MS-DOS operating system. On March 13, 1986 the company went public with an IPO, with a starting initial offering price of $21.00 and ending at the first day of trading as at US $28.00. In 1987, Microsoft eventually released their first version of OS/2 to OEMs.
In 1989, Microsoft introduced its flagship office suite, Microsoft Office. This was a bundle of separate office productivity applications, such as Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel. On May 22, 1990 Microsoft launched Windows 3.0. The new version of Microsoft's operating system boasted such new features as streamlined user interface graphics and improved protected mode capability for the Intel 386 processor; it sold over 100,000 copies in two weeks. Windows at the time generated more revenue for Microsoft than OS/2, and the company decided to move more resources from OS/2 to Windows. In the ensuing years, the popularity of OS/2 declined, and Windows quickly became the favored PC platform.
During the transition from MS-DOS to Windows, the success of Microsoft's product Microsoft Office allowed the company to gain ground on application-software competitors, such as WordPerfect and Lotus 1-2-3. According to The Register, Novell, an owner of WordPerfect for a time, alleged that Microsoft used its inside knowledge of the DOS and Windows kernels and of undocumented Application Programming Interface features to make Office perform better than its competitors. Eventually, Microsoft Office became the dominant business suite, with a market share far exceeding that of its competitors.
In 1993, Microsoft released Windows NT 3.1, a business operating system with the Windows 3.1 user interface but an entirely different kernel. In 1995, Microsoft released Windows 95, a new version of the company's flagship operating system which featured a completely new user interface, including a novel start button; more than a million copies of Microsoft Windows 95 were sold in the first four days after its release. The company also released its web browser, Internet Explorer, with the Windows 95 Plus! Pack in August 1995 and subsequent Windows versions.

1995-2005: Internet and legal issues
In the mid-90s, Microsoft began to expand its product line into computer networking and the World Wide Web. On August 24, 1995, it launched a major online service, MSN (Microsoft Network), as a direct competitor to AOL. MSN became an umbrella service for Microsoft's online services. The company continued to branch out into new markets in 1996, starting with a joint venture with NBC to create a new 24/7 cable news station, MSNBC. Microsoft entered the personal digital assistant (PDA) market in November with Windows CE 1.0, a new built-from-scratch version of their flagship operating system, specifically designed to run on low-memory, low-performance machines, such as handhelds and other small computers. Later in 1997, Internet Explorer 4.0 was released for both Mac OS and Windows, marking the beginning of the takeover of the browser market from rival Netscape. In October, the Justice Department filed a motion in the Federal District Court in which they stated that Microsoft had violated an agreement signed in 1994, and asked the court to stop the bundling of Internet Explorer with Windows.
The year 1998 was significant in Microsoft's history, with Bill Gates appointing Steve Ballmer as president of Microsoft but remaining as Chair and CEO himself. The company released Windows 98, an update to Windows 95 that incorporated a number of Internet-focused features and support for new types of devices. On April 3, 2000, a judgment was handed down in the case of United States v. Microsoft, calling the company an "abusive monopoly" and forcing the company to split into two separate units. Part of this ruling was later overturned by a federal appeals court, and eventually settled with the U.S. Department of Justice in 2001.
In 2001, Microsoft released Windows XP, the first version that encompassed the features of both its business and home product lines. XP introduced a new graphical user interface, the first such change since Windows 95. Later, with the release of the Xbox Microsoft entered the multi-billion-dollar game console market dominated by Sony and Nintendo. Microsoft encountered more turmoil in March 2004 when antitrust legal action was brought against it by the European Union for abusing its market dominance (see European Union Microsoft antitrust case), eventually resulting in a judgement to produce new versions of its Windows XP platform-called Windows XP Home Edition N and Windows XP Professional N-that did not include its Windows Media Player.

2006-present: Vista and other transitions
In 2006, Bill Gates announced a two year transition period from his role as Chief Software Architect, which would be taken by Ray Ozzie, and planned to remain the company's chairman, head of the Board of Directors and act as an adviser on key projects. As of December 2007, Windows Vista, released in January 2007, is Microsoft's latest operating system. Microsoft Office 2007 was released at the same time; its "Ribbon" user interface is a significant departure from its predecessors. On 1st February, 2008, Microsoft made an unsolicited bid to purchase the fully diluted outstanding shares of Yahoo for up to $44.6 billion, following the company's struggle against rival search-engine company, Google.

Product divisions
To be more precise in tracking performance of each unit and delegating responsibility, Microsoft reorganized into seven core business groups-each an independent financial entity-in April 2002. Later, on September 20, 2005, Microsoft announced a rationalization of its original seven business groups into the three core divisions that exist today: the Windows Client, MSN and Server and Tool groups were merged into the Microsoft Platform Products and Services Division; the Information Worker and Microsoft Business Solutions groups were merged into the Microsoft Business Division; and the Mobile and Embedded Devices and Home and Entertainment groups were merged into the Microsoft Entertainment and Devices Division.

Platform Products and Services Division
This division produces Microsoft's flagship product, the Windows operating system. It has been produced in many versions, including Windows 3.1, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows 2000, Windows Me, Windows Server 2003, Windows XP and Windows Vista. Almost all IBM compatible personal computers come with Windows preinstalled. The current desktop version of Windows is Windows Vista. The online service MSN, the cable television station MSNBC and the Microsoft online magazine Slate are all part of this division. (Slate was acquired by The Washington Post on December 21, 2004.) At the end of 1997, Microsoft acquired Hotmail, the most popular webmail service, which it rebranded as "MSN Hotmail". In 1999, Microsoft introduced MSN Messenger, an instant messaging client, to compete with the popular AOL Instant Messenger. Along with Windows Vista, MSN Messenger became Windows Live Messenger.
Microsoft Visual Studio is the company's set of programming tools and compilers. The software product is GUI-oriented and links easily with the Windows APIs, but must be specially configured if used with non-Microsoft libraries. The current version is Visual Studio 2008. The previous version, Visual Studio 2005 was a major improvement over its predecessor, Visual Studio.Net 2003, named after the .NET initiative, a Microsoft marketing initiative covering a number of technologies. Microsoft's definition of .NET continues to evolve. As of 2004, .NET aims to ease the development of Microsoft Windows-based applications that use the Internet, by deploying a new Microsoft communications system, Indigo (now renamed Windows Communication Foundation). This is intended to address some issues previously introduced by Microsoft's DLL design, which made it difficult, even impossible in some situations, to manage, install multiple versions of complex software packages on the same system (see DLL-hell), and provide a more consistent development platform for all Windows applications (see Common Language Infrastructure). In addition, the Company established a set of certification programs to recognize individuals who have expertise in its software and solutions. Similar to offerings from Cisco, Sun Microsystems, Novell, IBM, and Oracle Corporation, these tests are designed to identify a minimal set of proficiencies in a specific role; this includes developers ("Microsoft Certified Solution Developer"), system/network analysts ("Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer"), trainers ("Microsoft Certified Trainers") and administrators ("Microsoft Certified Systems Administrator" and "Microsoft Certified Database Administrator").
Microsoft offers a suite of server software, entitled Windows Server System. Windows Server 2003, an operating system for network servers, is the core of the Windows Server System line. Another server product, Systems Management Server, is a collection of tools providing remote-control abilities, patch management, software distribution and a hardware/software inventory. Other server products include:
Microsoft SQL Server, a relational database management system;
Microsoft Exchange Server, for certain business-oriented e-mail features;
Small Business Server, for messaging and other small business-oriented features; and
Microsoft BizTalk Server, for employee integration assistance and other functions.

Business Division
The Microsoft Business Division produces Microsoft Office, which is the company's line of office software. The software product includes Word (a word processor), Access (a personal relational database application), Excel (a spreadsheet program), Outlook (Windows-only groupware, frequently used with Exchange Server), PowerPoint (presentation software), and Publisher (desktop publishing software). A number of other products were added later with the release of Office 2003 including Visio, Project, MapPoint, InfoPath and OneNote.
The division focuses on developing financial and business management software for companies. These products include products formerly produced by the Business Solutions Group, which was created in April 2001 with the acquisition of Great Plains. Subsequently, Navision was acquired to provide a similar entry into the European market, resulting in the planned release of Microsoft Dynamics NAV in 2006. The group markets Axapta and Solomon, catering to similar markets, which is scheduled to be combined with the Navision and Great Plains lines into a common platform called Microsoft Dynamics.

Entertainment and Devices Division
Microsoft has attempted to expand the Windows brand into many other markets, with products such as Windows CE for PDAs and its "Windows-powered" Smartphone products. Microsoft initially entered the mobile market through Windows CE for handheld devices, which today has developed into Windows Mobile 6. The focus of the operating system is on devices where the OS may not directly be visible to the end user, in particular, appliances and cars. The company produces MSN TV, formerly WebTV, a television-based Internet appliance. Microsoft used to sell a set-top Digital Video Recorder (DVR) called the UltimateTV, which allowed users to record up to 35 hours of television programming from a direct-to-home satellite television provider DirecTV. This was the main competition in the UK for British Sky Broadcasting's (BSkyB) SKY + service, owned by Rupert Murdoch. UltimateTV has since been discontinued, with DirecTV instead opting to market DVRs from TiVo Inc. before later switching to their own DVR brand.
Microsoft sells computer games that run on Windows PCs, including titles such as Age of Empires, Halo and the Microsoft Flight Simulator series. It produces a line of reference works that include encyclopedias and atlases, under the name Encarta. Microsoft Zone hosts free premium and retail games where players can compete against each other and in tournaments. Microsoft entered the multi-billion-dollar game console market dominated by Sony and Nintendo in late 2001, with the release of the Xbox. The company develops and publishes its own video games for this console, with the help of its Microsoft Game Studios subsidiary, in addition to third-party Xbox video game publishers such as Electronic Arts and Activision, who pay a license fee to publish games for the system. The Xbox also has a successor in the Xbox 360, released on 2005-11-22 in North America and other countries. With the Xbox 360, Microsoft hopes to compensate for the losses incurred with the original Xbox. However, Microsoft made some decisions considered controversial in the video gaming community, such as releasing the console with high failure rates, selling two different versions of the system, one without the HDD and providing limited backward compatibility with only particular Xbox titles. . In addition to the Xbox line of products, Microsoft also markets a number of other computing-related hardware products as well, including mice, keyboards, joysticks, and gamepads, along with other game controllers, the production of which is outsourced in most cases. As of 15 November 2007, Microsoft announced the purchase of Musiwave, Openwave's mobile phone music sales business.

Business culture
Microsoft has often been described as having a developer-centric business culture. A great deal of time and money is spent each year on recruiting young university-trained software developers and on keeping them in the company. For example, while many software companies often place an entry-level software developer in a cubicle desk within a large office space filled with other cubicles, Microsoft assigns a private or semiprivate closed office to every developer or pair of developers. In addition, key decision makers at every level are either developers or former developers. In a sense, the software developers at Microsoft are considered the "stars" of the company in the same way that the sales staff at IBM are considered the "stars" of their company.
Within Microsoft the expression "eating our own dog food" is used to describe the policy of using the latest Microsoft products inside the company in an effort to test them in "real-world" situations. Only prerelease and beta versions of products are considered dog food. This is usually shortened to just "dogfood" and is used as noun, verb, and adjective. The company is also known for their hiring process, dubbed the "Microsoft interview", which is notorious for off-the-wall questions such as "Why is a manhole cover round?" and is a process often mimicked in other organizations, although these types of questions are rarer now than they were in the past. For fun, Microsoft also hosts the Microsoft Puzzle Hunt, an annual puzzle hunt (a live puzzle game where teams compete to solve a series of puzzles) held at the Redmond campus.
As of 2006, Microsoft employees, not including Bill Gates, have given over $2.5 billion dollars to non-profit organizations worldwide, making Microsoft the worldwide top company in per-employee donations. Starting around 2005, a blogger claiming to be an employee of Microsoft, dubbing itself Mini-Microsoft, claims that the company has become a "passionless, process-ridden, lumbering idiot," due in part to ineffective management, and calls for the company to be downsized. In January 2007, the Harris Interactive/The Wall Street Journal Reputation Quotient survey came to the conclusion that Microsoft had the world's best corporate reputation, citing strong financial performance, vision & leadership, workplace environment rankings, and the charitable deeds of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

User culture
Technical reference for developers and articles for various Microsoft magazines such as Microsoft Systems Journal (or MSJ) are available through the Microsoft Developer Network, often called MSDN. MSDN also offers subscriptions for companies and individuals, and the more expensive subscriptions usually offer access to pre-release beta versions of Microsoft software. In recent years, Microsoft launched a community site for developers and users, entitled Channel9, which provides many modern features such as a wiki and an Internet forum. Another community site that provides daily videocasts and other services, On10.net, launched on March 3, 2006.
Most free technical support available through Microsoft is provided through online Usenet newsgroups (in the early days it was also provided on CompuServe). There are several of these newsgroups for nearly every product Microsoft provides, and often they are monitored by Microsoft employees. People who are helpful on the newsgroups can be elected by other peers or Microsoft employees for Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP) status, which entitles people to a sort of special social status, in addition to possibilities for awards and other benefits.
By 2005, the city of Seattle in the state of Washington had 2,500 users who owned smartphone and desktop computer versions of the JamBayes Traffic Forecasting Service, developed by researchers at Microsoft and the University of Washington. Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Sequoia Capital, Skymoon Ventures, Crescendo Ventures, ZenShin Capital Partners, Artis Capital, Gold Hill Capital, and several individuals gave Dash USD$45 million for Dash Express which Wired News says "learns from its users". "If a Dash owner is moving 5 miles per hour in a 45 mph zone, Dash servers will realize he's in traffic and warn other Dash drivers to choose faster routes".

Corporate affairs

Corporate structure
The company is run by a Board of Directors consisting of ten people, made up of mostly company outsiders (as is customary for publicly traded companies). Current members of the board of directors are: Steve Ballmer, James Cash, Jr., Dina Dublon, Bill Gates, Raymond Gilmartin, Reed Hastings, David Marquardt, Charles Noski, Helmut Panke, and Jon Shirley. The ten board members are elected every year at the annual shareholders' meeting, and those who do not get a majority of votes must submit a resignation to the board, which will subsequently choose whether or not to accept the resignation. There are five committees within the board which oversee more specific matters. These committees include the Audit Committee, which handles accounting issues with the company including auditing and reporting; the Compensation Committee, which approves compensation for the CEO and other employees of the company; the Finance Committee, which handles financial matters such as proposing mergers and acquisitions; the Governance and Nominating Committee, which handles various corporate matters including nomination of the board; and the Antitrust Compliance Committee, which attempts to prevent company practices from violating antitrust laws.
There are several other aspects to the corporate structure of Microsoft. For worldwide matters there is the Executive Team, made up of sixteen company officers across the globe, which is charged with various duties including making sure employees understand Microsoft's culture of business. The sixteen officers of the Executive Team include the Chairman and Chief Software Architect, the CEO, the General Counsel and Secretary, the CFO, senior and group vice presidents from the business units, the CEO of the Europe, the Middle East and Africa regions; and the heads of Worldwide Sales, Marketing and Services; Human Resources; and Corporate Marketing. In addition to the Executive Team there is also the Corporate Staff Council, which handles all major staff functions of the company, including approving corporate policies. The Corporate Staff Council is made up of employees from the Law and Corporate Affairs, Finance, Human Resources, Corporate Marketing, and Advanced Strategy and Policy groups at Microsoft. Other Executive Officers include the Presidents and Vice Presidents of the various product divisions, leaders of the marketing section, and the CTO, among others.

Stock
When the company debuted its IPO in March 13, 1986, the stock price was US $21. By the close of the first trading day, the stock had closed at twenty-eight dollars, equivalent to 9.7 cents when adjusted for the company's first nine splits. The initial close and ensuing rise in subsequent years made several Microsoft employees millions. The stock price peaked in 1999 at around US $119 (US $60.928 adjusting for splits). While the company has had nine stock splits, the first of which was in September 18, 1987, the company did not start offering a dividend until January 16, 2003. The dividend for the 2003 fiscal year was eight cents per share, followed by a dividend of sixteen cents per share the subsequent year. The company switched from yearly to quarterly dividends in 2005, for eight cents a share per quarter with a special one-time payout of three dollars per share for the second quarter of the fiscal year.
Around 2003 the stock price began a slow descent. Despite the company's ninth split on February 2, 2003 and subsequent increases in dividend payouts, the price of Microsoft's stock continued to fall for the next several years.

Diversity
In 2005, Microsoft received a 100% rating in the Corporate Equality Index from the Human Rights Campaign, a ranking of companies by how progressive the organization deems their policies concerning LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transsexual) employees. Partly through the work of the Gay and Lesbian Employees at Microsoft (GLEAM) group, Microsoft added gender expression to its anti-discrimination policies in April 2005, and the Human Rights Campaign upgraded Microsoft's Corporate Equality Index from its 86% rating in 2004 to its current 100% rating.
In April 2005, Microsoft received wide criticism for withdrawing support from Washington state's H.B. 1515 bill that would have extended the state's current anti-discrimination laws to people with alternate sexual orientations. Microsoft was accused of bowing to pressure from local evangelical pastor Ken Hutcherson who met with a senior Microsoft executive and threatened a national boycott of Microsoft's products. Microsoft also revealed they were paying evangelical conservative Ralph Reed's company Century Strategies a $20,000 monthly fee. Over 2,000 employees signed a petition asking Microsoft to reinstate support for the bill. Under harsh criticism from both outside and inside the company's walls, Microsoft decided to support the bill again in May 2005.
Microsoft hires many foreign workers as well as domestic ones, and is an outspoken opponent of the cap on H1B visas, which allow companies in the United States to employ certain foreign workers. Bill Gates claims the cap on H1B visas make it difficult to hire employees for the company, stating "I'd certainly get rid of the H1B cap."

Logos and slogans
In 1987, Microsoft adopted its current logo, the so-called "Pacman Logo" designed by Scott Baker. According to the March 1987 Computer Reseller News Magazine, "The new logo, in Helvetica italic typeface, has a slash between the o and s to emphasize the "soft" part of the name and convey motion and speed." Dave Norris, a Microsoft employee, ran an internal joke campaign to save the old logo, which was green, in all uppercase, and featured a fanciful letter O, nicknamed the blibbet, but it was discarded.
Microsoft's logo with the "Your potential. Our passion." tagline below the main corporate name, is based on the slogan Microsoft had as of 2008. In 2002, the company started using the logo in the United States and eventually started a TV campaign with the slogan, changed from the previous tagline of "Where do you want to go today?."

Criticism

Corporate
Since the 1980s, Microsoft has been the focus of much controversy in the computer industry. Most criticism has been for its business tactics, often described with the motto "embrace, extend and extinguish". Microsoft initially embraces a competing standard or product, then extends it to produce their own incompatible version of the software or standard, which in time extinguishes competition that does not or cannot use Microsoft's new version. These and other tactics have led to various companies and governments filing lawsuits against Microsoft. Microsoft has been called a "velvet sweatshop" in reference to allegations of the company working its employees to the point where it might be bad for their health. The first instance of "velvet sweatshop" in reference to Microsoft originated from a Seattle Times article in 1989, and later became used to describe the company by some of Microsoft's own employees.
Free software proponents point to the company's joining of the Trusted Computing Platform Alliance (TCPA) as a cause of concern. A group of companies that seek to implement an initiative called Trusted Computing (which is claimed to set out to increase security and privacy in a user's computer), the TCPA is decried by critics as a means to allow software developers to enforce any sort of restriction they wish over their software.
Advocates of free software also take issue with Microsoft's promotion of Digital Rights Management (DRM) and total cost of ownership (TCO) comparisons with its "Get the facts" campaign. Digital Rights Management is a technology that allows content providers to impose restrictions on the methods by which their products are used on consumer hardware; and subsequently, detractors contend that such technology is an infringement on fair use and other rights, especially given that it inhibits legal activities such as re-mixing or reproduction of material for use in slide shows. The "Get the facts" campaign argues that Windows Server has a lower TCO than Linux and lists a variety of studies in order to prove its case. Proponents of Linux unveiled their own study arguing that, contrary to one of Microsoft's claims, Linux has lower management costs than Windows Server. Another study by the Yankee Group claims that upgrading from one version of Windows Server to another costs less than switching from Windows Server to Linux.

Products
For criticism of Windows Vista, see Criticism of Windows Vista
For criticism of Windows XP, see Criticism of Windows XP
For criticism of Windows 2000, see the criticism section of the Windows 2000 article
For criticism of Windows Me, see the criticism section of the Windows Me article
For criticism of Windows 9x, see the criticism section of the Windows 9x article
For criticism of Internet Explorer, see Criticism of Internet Explorer
For criticism of Microsoft Office, see the criticism section of the Microsoft Office article

See also
General
Pirates of Silicon Valley ? A movie based on the rise of Apple and Microsoft.
Microsoft
Actimates ? Set of toys developed by Microsoft.
Pcsafety ? Part of Microsoft's technical support that deals with malware and virus issues.
Trustworthy Computing ? Microsoft's initiative for increasing security and reliability on PCs.
Ultra Mobile PC ? Joint specification by Microsoft and others for a small form factor tablet PC.
Microsoft Studios ? A division responsible for the creation of video content for Microsoft and its partners.
Microsoft Research ? A division responsible for the research of computer sciences.
Studies related to Microsoft
Lists
List of assets owned by Microsoft Corporation
List of companies acquired by Microsoft Corporation
List of Microsoft software applications
List of Microsoft topics

Notes and references

IBM

International Business Machines Corporation (abbreviated IBM, nicknamed "Big Blue"; NYSE: IBM) is a multinational computer technology and consulting corporation headquartered in Armonk, New York, USA. The company is one of the few information technology companies with a continuous history dating back to the 19th century. IBM manufactures and sells computer hardware and software, and offers infrastructure services, hosting services, and consulting services in areas ranging from mainframe computers to nanotechnology.
IBM has been known through most of its recent history as the world's largest computer company; with over 370,000 employees worldwide, IBM is the largest information technology employer in the world. It is also the most profitable. Since 1990, IBM's annual sales growth has trailed behind the US economic growth due to global deregulation and competition.
IBM holds more patents than any other U.S. based technology company. It has engineers and consultants in over 170 countries and IBM Research has eight laboratories worldwide. IBM employees have earned three Nobel Prizes, four Turing Awards, five National Medals of Technology, and five National Medals of Science. As a chip maker, IBM is among the Worldwide Top 20 Semiconductor Sales Leaders.

History
See also: Computing Tabulating Recording Corporation (CTR) and Herman Hollerith
See also: List of IBM products
The company which became IBM was founded in 1888 as the Tabulating Machine Company by Herman Hollerith, in Broome County, New York. It was incorporated as Computing Tabulating Recording Corporation (CTR) on June 16, 1911, and was listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 1916. IBM adopted its current name in 1924, when it became a Fortune 500 company.
The author Edwin Black has alleged that, during World War II, IBM CEO Thomas J. Watson used overseas subsidiaries to provide the Third Reich with punch card machines that could help the Nazis to track down the European Jewry. IBM denies that they had control over these subsidiaries after the Nazis took control of them. A lawsuit against IBM based on these allegations was dismissed.
In the 1950s, IBM became the dominant vendor in the emerging computer industry with the release of the IBM 701 and other models in the IBM_700/7000_series of mainframes. The company's dominance became even more pronounced in the 1960s and 1970s with the IBM System/360 and IBM System/370 mainframes, however antitrust actions by the United States Department of Justice, the rise of minicomputer companies like Digital Equipment Corporation and Data General, and the introduction of the microprocessor all contributed to dilution of IBM's position in the industry, eventually leading the company to diversify into other areas including personal computers, software, and services.
In 1981 IBM introduced the IBM Personal Computer which is the original version and progenitor of the IBM PC compatible hardware platform.
IBM's PC division was bought by Chinese company Lenovo on May 1, 2005 for $655 million in cash and $600 million in Lenovo stock. On January 25, 2007, Ricoh announced purchase of IBM Printing Systems Division for $725 million and investment in 3-year joint venture to form a new Ricoh subsidiary, InfoPrint Solutions Company; Ricoh will own a 51% share, and IBM will own a 49% share in InfoPrint.

Current projects

Eclipse
Eclipse is a platform-independent, Java-based software framework. Eclipse was originally a proprietary product developed by IBM as a successor of the VisualAge family of tools. Eclipse has subsequently been released as free/open source software under the Eclipse Public License.

developerWorks
developerWorks is a website run by IBM for software developers and IT professionals. It contains a large number of how-to articles and tutorials, as well as software downloads and code samples, discussion forums, podcasts, blogs, wikis, and other resources for developers and technical professionals. Subjects range from open, industry-standard technologies like Java, Linux, SOA and web services, web development, Ajax, PHP, and XML to IBM's products (WebSphere, Rational, Lotus, Tivoli and DB2). In 2007 developerWorks was inducted into the Jolt Hall of Fame.

alphaWorks
alphaWorks is IBM's source for emerging software technologies. These technologies include:
Flexible Internet Evaluation Report Architecture - A highly flexible architecture for the design, display, and reporting of Internet surveys.
IBM History Flow Visualization Application - A tool for visualizing dynamic, evolving documents and the interactions of multiple collaborating authors.
IBM Linux on POWER Performance Simulator - A tool that provides users of Linux on Power a set of performance models for IBM's POWER processors.
Database File Archive And Restoration Management - An application for archiving and restoring hard disk files using file references stored in a database.
Policy Management for Autonomic Computing - A policy-based autonomic management infrastructure that simplifies the automation of IT and business processes.
FairUCE - A spam filter that verifies sender identity instead of filtering content.
Unstructured Information Management Architecture (UIMA) SDK - A Java SDK that supports the implementation, composition, and deployment of applications working with unstructured information.
Accessibility Browser - A web-browser specifically designed to assist people with visual impairments, to be released as open-source software. Also known as the "A-Browser," the technology will aim to eliminate the need for a mouse, relying instead completely on voice-controls, buttons and predefined shortcut keys.

Semiconductor design and manufacturing
Virtually all modern console gaming systems use microprocessors developed by IBM. The Xbox 360 contains the Xenon tri-core processor, which was designed and produced by IBM in less than 24 months. Sony's PlayStation 3 features the Cell BE microprocessor designed jointly by IBM, Toshiba, and Sony. Nintendo's seventh-generation console, Wii, features an IBM chip codenamed Broadway. The older Nintendo GameCube also utilizes the Gekko processor, designed by IBM.
In May 2002, IBM and Butterfly.net, Inc. announced the Butterfly Grid, a commercial grid for the online video gaming market. In March 2006, IBM announced separate agreements with Hoplon Infotainment, Online Game Services Incorporated (OGSI), and RenderRocket to provide on-demand content management and blade server computing resources.

Open Client Offering
IBM announced it will launch its new software, called "Open Client Offering" which is to run on Microsoft's Windows, Linux and Apple's Macintosh. The company states that its new product allows businesses to offer employees a choice of using the same software on Windows and its alternatives. This means that "Open Client Offering" is to cut costs of managing whether Linux or Apple relative to Windows. There will be no necessity for companies to pay Microsoft for its licenses for operations since the operations will no longer rely on software which is Windows-based. One of Microsoft's office alternatives is the Open Document Format software, whose development IBM supports. It is going to be used for several tasks like: word processing, presentations, along with collaboration with Lotus Notes, instant messaging and blog tools as well as an Internet Explorer competitor - the Firefox web browser. IBM plans to install Open Client on 5 percent of its desktop PCs.

UC2: Unified Communications and Collaboration
UC2 (Unified Communications and Collaboration) is an IBM and Cisco joint project based on Eclipse and OSGi. It will offer the numerous Eclipse application developers a unified platform for an easier work environment.
The software based on UC2 platform will provide major enterprises with easy-to-use communication solutions, such as the Lotus based Sametime. In the future the Sametime users will benefit from such additional functions as click-to-call and voice mailing.

Internal programs
Extreme Blue is a company initiative that uses experienced IBM engineers, talented interns, and business managers to develop high-value technology. The project is designed to analyze emerging business needs and the technologies that can solve them. These projects mostly involve rapid-prototyping of high-profile software and hardware projects.
In May 2007, IBM unveiled Project Big Green -- a re-direction of $1 billion per year across its businesses to increase energy efficiency.

IBM Software Group
This group is one of the major divisions of IBM. The various brands include:
Information Management Software - database servers and tools, text analytics, and content management.
Lotus Software - Groupware, collaboration and business software. Acquired in 1995.
Rational Software - Software development and application lifecycle management. Acquired in 2002.
Tivoli Software - Systems management. Acquired in 1996.
WebSphere - Integration and application infrastructure software..

Corporate culture of IBM

Big Blue
Big Blue is a nickname for IBM; several theories exist regarding its origin. One theory, substantiated by people who worked for IBM at the time, is that IBM field reps coined the term in the 1960s, referring to the color of the mainframes IBM installed in the 1960s and early 1970s. "All blue" was a term used to describe a loyal IBM customer, and business writers later picked up the term. Another theory suggests that Big Blue simply refers to the Company's logo. A third theory suggests that Big Blue refers to a former company dress code that required many IBM employees to wear only white shirts and many wore blue suits. In any event, IBM keyboards, typewriters, and some other manufactured devices, have played on the "Big Blue" concept, using the color for enter keys and carriage returns.

Sales
IBM has often been described as having a sales-centric or a sales-oriented business culture. Traditionally, many IBM executives and general managers are chosen from the sales force. The current CEO, Sam Palmisano, for example, joined the company as a salesman and, unusually for CEOs of major corporations, has no MBA or postgraduate qualification. Middle and top management are often enlisted to give direct support to salesmen when pitching sales to important customers.

Uniform
A dark (or gray) suit, white shirt, and a "sincere" tie was the public uniform for IBM employees for most of the 20th century. During IBM's management transformation in the 1990s, CEO Lou Gerstner relaxed these codes, normalizing the dress and behavior of IBM employees to resemble their counterparts in other large technology companies.

IBM company values and "Jam"
In 2003, IBM embarked on an ambitious project to rewrite company values. Using its Jam technology, the company hosted Intranet-based online discussions on key business issues with 50,000 employees over 3 days. The discussions were analyzed by sophisticated text analysis software (eClassifier) to mine online comments for themes. As a result of the 2003 Jam, the company values were updated to reflect three modern business, marketplace and employee views: "Dedication to every client's success", "Innovation that matters - for our company and for the world", "Trust and personal responsibility in all relationships".
In 2004, another Jam was conducted during which 52,000 employees exchanged best practices for 72 hours. They focused on finding actionable ideas to support implementation of the values previously identified. A new post-Jam Ratings event was developed to allow IBMers to select key ideas that support the values. The board of directors cited this Jam when awarding Palmisano a pay rise in the spring of 2005.
In July and September 2006, Palmisano launched another jam called InnovationJam. InnovationJam was the largest online brainstorming session ever with more than 150,000 participants from 104 countries. The participants were IBM employees, members of IBM employees' families, universities, partners, and customers. InnovationJam was divided in two sessions (one in July and one in September) for 72 hours each and generated more than 46,000 ideas. In November 2006, IBM declared that they will invest $US 100 million in the 10 best ideas from InnovationJam.

Open source
IBM has been influenced by the Open Source Initiative, and began supporting Linux in 1998. The company invests billions of dollars in services and software based on Linux through the IBM Linux Technology Center, which includes over 300 Linux kernel developers. IBM has also released code under different open-source licenses, such as the platform-independent software framework Eclipse (worth approximately US$40 million at the time of the donation) and the Java-based relational database management system (RDBMS) Apache Derby. IBM's open source involvement has not been trouble-free, however (see SCO v. IBM).

Project Management Center of Excellence
The IBM Project Management Center of Excellence (PM COE) is a program dedicated to defining and executing the steps IBM must take to strengthen its project management capabilities. Functioning as IBM's think tank, the PM COE combines external industry trends and directions with IBM business, organizational, and geographic requirements and insight. Upon this foundation deliverables (such as project management policy, practices, methods, and tools) are developed.
All IBM Project Managers (PMs) on the Project Management track (dimension) must complete either accreditation or IBM certification. Junior PMs (Associate PM and Advisory PM) are accredited after self-assessment and authorization from supervisors. Senior PMs (Senior PM and Executive PM) must go through a stringent IBM certification process. By validating project managers' expertise and skills against consistent worldwide standards, certification helps maintain customer confidence in the high quality of IBM professionals and it recognizes IBM professionals for their skills and experience.
Becoming certified is public recognition of achieving a significant career milestone and demonstrating expertise in the profession. Prior to applying for IBM certification each individual must have:
successfully passed PMI exam (i.e. be a certified PMP).
verifiable documentation and approval for mastery/expertise in a well-defined set of PM skills.
several years of PM experience spanning at least 3 verifiable projects within the immediate 5 years (including specific role, team size, and budget requirements).
verifiable documentation and proof of at least one area of specialty.
demonstrated the use of IBM's Worldwide Project Management Method (WWPMM).
completed extensive classroom and online education and testing.
IBM PM Certification is a well-defined review and verification process with many intricate details. In its most simplified form, it broadly involves:
Candidate preparing a detailed package with proof of above requirements.
Package review, approval, and support by at least two levels of Senior Management.
Package review and re-verification by PM COE expert.
Personal interviews with the PM COE Certification board.
Candidates whose experience, skills, knowledge and education are deemed valid, verifiable and accurate, are certified by the board as either Certified Senior Project Manager (CSPM) or Certified Executive Project Manager (CEPM).
IBM PM Certification is a significant achievement for any IBMer. It is a deliberately long process with multiple checkpoints designed to ensure the integrity, fairness and validity of the certification.

Corporate affairs

Diversity and workforce issues
IBM's efforts to promote workforce diversity and equal opportunity date back at least to World War I, when the company hired disabled veterans. IBM was the only technology company ranked in Working Mother magazine's Top 10 for 2004, and one of two technology companies in 2005 (the other company being Hewlett-Packard).
The company has traditionally resisted labor union organizing, although unions represent some IBM workers outside the United States.
In the 1990s, two major pension program changes, including a conversion to a cash balance plan, resulted in an employee class action lawsuit alleging age discrimination. IBM employees won the lawsuit and arrived at a partial settlement, although appeals are still underway. IBM also settled a major overtime class-action lawsuit in 2006.
Historically IBM has had a good reputation of long-term staff retention with few large scale layoffs. In more recent years there have been a number of broad sweeping cuts to the workforce as IBM attempts to adapt to changing market conditions and a declining profit base. After posting weaker than expected revenues in the first quarter of 2005, IBM eliminated 14,500 positions from its workforce, predominantly in Europe. In May 2005, IBM Ireland said to staff that the MD(Micro-electronics Division) facility was closing down by the end of 2005 and offered a settlement to staff. However, all staff that wished to stay with the Company were redeployed within IBM Ireland. The production moved to a company called Amkor in Singapore who purchased IBM's Microelectronics business in Singapore and is widely agreed that IBM promised this Company a full load capacity in return for the purchase of the facility. On June 8, 2005, IBM Canada Ltd. eliminated approximately 700 positions. IBM projects these as part of a strategy to "rebalance" its portfolio of professional skills & businesses. IBM India and other IBM offices in China, the Philippines and Costa Rica have been witnessing a recruitment boom and steady growth in number of employees due to lower wages.
On October 10, 2005, IBM became the first major company in the world to formally commit to not using genetic information in its employment decisions. This came just a few months after IBM announced its support of the National Geographic Society's Genographic Project.
Gay rights
IBM provides employees' same sex partners with benefits and provides an anti-discrimination clause. The Human Rights Campaign has consistently rated IBM at 100%, the highest score, on its index of gay-friendliness since 2003 (in 2002, the year it began compiling its report on major companies, IBM scored 86%).

Logos
Logos designed in the 1970s tended to be sensitive to the technical limitations of photocopiers, which were then being widely deployed. A logo with large solid areas tended to be poorly copied by copiers in the 1970s, so companies preferred logos that avoided large solid areas. The 1972 IBM logos are an example of this tendency. With the advent of digital copiers in the mid-1980s this technical restriction had largely disappeared; at roughly the same time, the 13-bar logo was abandoned for almost the opposite reason - it was difficult to render accurately on the low-resolution digital printers (240 dots per inch) of the time.

Board of directors
Current members of the board of directors of IBM are:
Cathleen Black President, Hearst Magazines
William Brody President, Johns Hopkins University
Ken Chenault Chairman and CEO, American Express Company
Juergen Dormann Chairman of the Board, ABB Ltd
Michael Eskew Chairman and CEO, United Parcel Service, Inc.
Shirley Ann Jackson President, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Minoru Makihara Senior Corporate Advisor and former Chairman, Mitsubishi Corporation
Lucio Noto Managing Partner, Midstream Partners LLC
James W. Owens Chairman and CEO, Caterpillar Inc.
Samuel J. Palmisano Chairman, President and CEO, IBM
Joan Spero President, Doris Duke Charitable Foundation
Sidney Taurell, Chairman and CEO, Eli Lilly and Company
Lorenzo Zambrano Chairman and CEO, Cemex SAB de CV

GE

Keith Sherin, Vice Chairman, CFO
Robert Wright, Vice Chairman, Chairman, NBC Universal
John Rice, Vice Chairman, President and CEO, GE Infrastructure
Lloyd Trotter, Vice Chairman, President & CEO, GE Industrial
Gary M. Reiner, Senior Vice President, CIO
William Conaty, Senior Vice President, Human Resources
Pamela Daley, Senior Vice President, Corporate Business Development
Mark Little Senior Vice President, GE Global Research
Brackett Denniston, Senior Vice President & General Counsel
Michael Neal, President & CEO, GE Commercial Financial Services
Joseph Hogan, President & CEO, GE Healthcare
Ferdinando Beccalli-Falco, President & CEO, GE International
Jeff Zucker, President & CEO, NBC Universal
Daniel Henson, Chief Marketing Officer
Industry
Conglomerate
Products
Aircraft Jet Engines
Electricity
Entertainment
Finance
Gas Turbine
Generation
Industrial Automation
Lighting
Medical Imaging Equipment
Medical Software
Motors
Plastics
Railway Locomotives
Wind Turbine
Revenue
? US$163.391 billion (2006)
Net income
? US$20.829 billion (2006)
Employees
~319,000 (2006)
Subsidiaries
GE Commercial Finance
GE Industrial
GE Infrastructure
GE Money
GE Healthcare
NBC Universal (80%)
Slogan
Imagination at Work
Website
http://www.ge.com
The General Electric Company, or GE (NYSE: GE) is a multinational American technology and services conglomerate incorporated in the State of New York.. In terms of market capitalization, GE is the world's second largest company and also second in the BrandZ ranking. In the 1960s, aspects of U.S. tax laws and accounting practices led to a rise in the assembly of conglomerates. GE, which was a conglomerate long before the term was coined, is arguably the most successful organization of this type.

History
In 1876, Ohio-born Thomas Edison opened a new laboratory in Menlo Park, New Jersey. Out of the laboratory came arguably the most famous invention of all-a practical incandescent electric lamp. By 1890, Edison had organized his various businesses into the Edison General Electric Company.
In 1879, Elihu Thomson and Edwin J. Houston formed the rival Thomson-Houston Electric Company. It merged with various companies and was later led by Charles A. Coffin, a former shoe manufacturer from Lynn, Massachusetts. Mergers with competitors and the patent rights owned by each company made them dominant in the electrical industry. As businesses expanded, it became increasingly difficult for either company to produce complete electrical installations relying solely on their own technology.
In 1892, these two major companies combined, in a merger arranged by financier J. P. Morgan, to form the General Electric Company, with its headquarters in Schenectady, New York.
In 1896, General Electric was one of the original 12 companies listed on the newly-formed Dow Jones Industrial Average and still remains after 111 years (it is the only one of the original companies remaining on the Dow - though it has not always been in the DOW index).
In 1911 the National Electric Lamp Company (NELA) was absorbed into General Electric's existing lighting business. GE then established its lighting division headquarters at Nela Park in East Cleveland, Ohio. Nela Park was the world's first industrial park, and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1975, and is still the headquarters for GE's lighting business.
The Radio Corporation of America (RCA) was founded by GE in 1919 to further international radio.
General Electric was one of the eight major computer companies through most of the 1960s - with IBM, the largest, called "Snow White" followed by the "Seven Dwarfs": Burroughs, NCR, Control Data Corporation, Honeywell, RCA, UNIVAC and GE. (There was also Scientific Data Systems, much smaller than the seven dwarfs). GE had an extensive line of general purpose and special purpose computers. Among them were the GE 200, GE 400, and GE 600 series general purpose computers, the GE 4010, GE 4020, and GE 4060 real time process control computers, and the Datanet 30 message switching computer. A Datanet 600 computer was designed, but never sold. It has been said that GE got into computer manufacturing because in the 1950s they were the largest user of computers outside of the United States federal government. In 1970 GE sold its computer division to Honeywell.
In 1986 GE reacquired RCA, primarily for the NBC television network. The remainder was sold to various companies, including Bertelsmann and Thomson SA.
In 2002 Francisco Partners and Norwest Venture Partners acquired a division of GE called GE Information Systems (GEIS). The new company, named GXS, is based in Gaithersburg, MD. GXS is a leading provider of B2B e-Commerce solutions. GE maintains a minority ownership position in GXS.
In 2004 GE bought Vivendi's television and movie assets, becoming the third largest media conglomerate in the world. The new company was named NBC Universal. Also in 2004 GE completed the spinoff of most of its mortgage and life insurance assets into an independent company, Genworth Financial, based in Richmond, Virginia.
Genpact, a BPO company established by GE in the late 90's, was formerly known as GE Capital International Services (GECIS). GE hived off 60% stake in GENPACT to a consortium in 2004. GE is still a major client to Genpact getting its services in customer service, finance and analytics.
For a complete list of acquisitions and divestitures, see General Electric timeline.

Past controversies
GE has faced criminal action regarding its defense related operations. GE was convicted in 1990 of defrauding the U.S. Department of Defense, and again in 1992 on charges of corrupt practices in the sale of jet engines to Israel.

Corporate affairs
GE is a multinational conglomerate headquartered in Fairfield, Connecticut. Its New York headquarters are located at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in Rockefeller Center, known as the GE Building for the prominent GE logo on the roof. Through its RCA subsidiary, it has been associated with the Center since its construction in the 1930s.
The company describes itself as composed of a number of primary business units or "businesses." Each "business" is itself a vast enterprise, many of which would, even as a standalone company, rank in the Fortune 500. The list of GE businesses varies over time as the result of acquisitions, divestitures and reorganizations. General Electric's tax return is the largest return filed in the United States; the 2005 return was approximately 24,000 pages when printed out, and 237 megabytes when submitted electronically.
In 2005 GE launched its "Ecomagination" initiative in an attempt to position itself as a "green" company. GE is currently one of the biggest players in the wind power industry, and it is also developing new environment-friendly products such as hybrid locomotives, desalination and water reuse solutions, and photovoltaic cells. The company has even set goals for its subsidiaries to lower their greenhouse gas emissions.
On 21 May 2007, General Electric announced it would sell its GE Plastics division to petrochemicals manufacturer Saudi Basic Industries Corp. for net proceeds of $11.6 billion. The transaction took place on August 31, 2007, and the company name changed to SABIC Innovative Plastics, with Brian Gladden as CEO.

CEO
Jeff Immelt is the current chairman of the board and chief executive officer of General Electric. He was selected by GE's Board of Directors in 2000 to replace John Francis Welch Jr. (Jack Welch) following his retirement.
Previously, Immelt had headed up GE's Medical Systems division (now GE Healthcare) as its President and CEO. He has been with GE since 1982 and is on the board of two non-profit organizations.
His tenure as the Chairman and CEO started at a time of crisis - he took over the role on September 7, 2001, four days before the terrorist attacks on the United States, which killed two employees and cost GE's insurance business $600 million - as well as having a direct effect on the company's Aircraft Engines sector.

Brand
General Electric has the fourth most recognized brand in the world, worth almost $49 billion.
CEO Jeff Immelt had the new brand commissioned in 2004, after he took the reins as chairman, to unify the diversified businesses of GE. The brand included a change of the corporate color palette, small modifications to the GE Logo, a new customized font (GE Inspira), and a new slogan, "imagination at work" replacing the longtime slogan "we bring good things to life". The new brand requires many headlines to be lowercased and adds visual "white space" to documents and advertising to promote an open and approachable company. The new brand was designed by Wolff Olins and is used extensively on GE's marketing, literature and website.

Businesses
GE's divisions include GE Commercial Finance, GE Industrial, GE Infrastructure (including GE-Aviation and Smiths Aerospace), GE Consumer Finance, GE Healthcare, and NBC Universal, an entertainment company.
Through these businesses, GE participates in a wide variety of markets including the generation, transmission and distribution of electricity (eg. Nuclear, gas and solar), lighting, industrial automation, medical imaging equipment, motors, railway locomotives, aircraft jet engines, aviation services and materials such as plastics, silicones and abrasives. It was co-founder and is 80% owner (with Vivendi) of NBC Universal, the National Broadcasting Company. Through GE Commercial Finance, GE Consumer Finance, GE Equipment Services, and GE Insurance it offers a range of financial services as well. It has a presence in over 100 countries.
Since over half of GE's revenue is derived from financial services, it is arguably a financial company with a manufacturing arm. It is also one of the largest lenders in countries other than the United States, such as Japan. Even though the first wave of conglomerates (such as ITT, Ling-Temco-Vought, Tenneco, etc) fell by the wayside by the mid-1980s, in the late 1990s, another wave (consisting of Westinghouse, Tyco, and others) tried and failed to emulate GE's success.

Corporate achievements
In 2004, GE was named number one company for employers and employees on the Forbes 500 Global Player list.
Over the years GE has received several awards honoring them for their accomplishments, values and reputation:
In Fortune Magazine's 2005 "Global Most Admired Companies" list, GE ranked first overall. (February 2005)
In Fortune Magazine's 2006 "America's Most Admired Companies" list, GE ranked first overall. (March 2006)
GE was named to the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index as one of the world's leaders in environmental, social and economic programs.
GE ranked ninth on Fortune Magazine's "50 Most Desirable MBA Employers" list. (April 2004)

Analyst coverage
See Yahoo! analyst coverage
Germanotta, Jeffrey (William Blair & Company, L.L.C.)
Cornell, Robert (Lehman Brothers)
Parent, Nicole (Credit Suisse First Boston)
Dray, Deane (Goldman Sachs)

Environmental record
General Electric has a history of large-scale air and water pollution. Based on year 2000 data, researchers at the Political Economy Research Institute listed the corporatation as the fourth-largest corporate producer of air pollution in the United States, with more than 4.4 million pounds per year of toxic chemicals released into the air. General Electric has also been implicated in the creation of toxic waste. According to EPA documents, only the United States Government and Honeywell are responsible for producing more Superfund toxic waste sites. To be placed in proper context, however, one must recall the size of the company. When compared to a more polluting, but much smaller company, like the aforementioned Honeywell, GE's record is much better than many of its competitors.
In 1983, New York State Attorney General Robert Abrams filed suit in Federal District Court to compel G.E. to pay for the cleanup of what was claimed to be more than 100,000 tons of chemicals dumped (legally, at the time) from their plant in Waterford. In 1999, the company agreed to pay a $250 million settlement in connection with claims it polluted the Housatonic River and other sites with polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and other hazardous substances. In 2002, after spending millions of dollars on advertisements intended to avert the project, General Electric was ordered to clean up a 40 mile stretch of the Hudson River it had contaminated with PCBs. In 2003, acting on concerns that the plan proposed by GE did not "provide for adequate protection of public health and the environment," the United States Environmental Protection Agency issued a unilateral administrative order for the company to "address cleanup at the GE site" in Rome, Georgia, also contaminated with PCBs.
In May 2005 GE announced the launch of a program called "Ecomagination," intended, in the words of CEO Jeffrey Immelt ""to develop tomorrow's solutions such as solar energy, hybrid locomotives, fuel cells, lower-emission aircraft engines, lighter and stronger durable materials, efficient lighting, and water purification technology," prompting the The New York Times to observe that, "while General Electric's increased emphasis on clean technology will probably result in improved products and benefit its bottom line, Mr. Immelt's credibility as a spokesman on national environmental policy is fatally flawed because of his company's intransigence in cleaning up its own toxic legacy."

Nokia

Nokia Corporation (OMX: NOK1V, NYSE: NOK, FWB: NOA3) is a Finnish multinational communications corporation, focused on wired and wireless telecommunications, with 112,262 employees in 120 countries, sales in more than 150 countries and global annual revenue of 51.058 billion euros as of 2007. It is the world's largest manufacturer of mobile telephones: its global device market share was about 40% in Q4 of 2007. Nokia produces mobile phones for every major market segment and protocol, including GSM, CDMA, and W-CDMA (UMTS). Nokia's subsidiary Nokia Siemens Networks produces telecommunications network equipments, solutions and services.
Nokia's corporate headquarters are located in Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki. It has sites for research and development, manufacturing and sales in many continents throughout the world. Nokia employed 21,453 people in R&D in 2006. Nokia Research Center, founded in 1986, is Nokia's industrial research unit of about 800 researchers, engineers and scientists. It has sites in seven countries: Finland, Denmark, Germany, China, Japan, United Kingdom and United States. Production facilities are located at Espoo, Oulu and Salo, Finland; Manaus, Brazil; Beijing, Dongguan and Suzhou, China; Fleet, England; Bochum (closing planned for mid-2008), Germany; Kom?rom, Hungary; Chennai, India; Reynosa, Mexico; Cluj-Napoca, Romania and Masan, South Korea. Nokia's Design Department remains in Salo, Finland.
Nokia plays a very large role in the economy of Finland: it is by far the largest Finnish company, accounting for about a third of the market capitalization of the Helsinki Stock Exchange (OMX Helsinki) as of 2007; a unique situation for an industrialized country. It is an important employer in Finland and several small companies have grown into large ones as Nokia's subcontractors. Nokia increased Finland's GDP by more than 1.5% in 1999 alone. In 2004 Nokia's share of the Finland's GDP was 3.5% and accounted for almost a quarter of Finland's exports in 2003. In 2006, Nokia generated revenue that for the first time exceeded the state budget of Finland.
Finns have ranked Nokia many times as the best Finnish brand and employer. Nokia is listed as the 5th most valuable global brand in BusinessWeek's Best Global Brands list of 2007 (1st non-US company), the 20th most admirable company worldwide in Fortune's World's Most Admired Companies list of 2007 (1st in network communications, 4th non-US company), and is the world's 119th largest company in Fortune Global 500 list of 2007, up from 131 of the previous year.

History

Pre-telecommunications era
What is known today as Nokia (pronounced /?no?ki?/, Finnish IPA: [?noki?]) was established in 1865 as a wood-pulp mill by Knut Fredrik Idestam on the banks of the Tammerkoski rapids in the town of Tampere, in south-western Finland. The company was later relocated to the town of Nokia by the Nokianvirta river, which had better resources for hydropower production. That's also where the company got its name that it still uses today. The name Nokia originated from the river which flowed through the town. The river itself, Nokianvirta, was named after the old Finnish word originally meaning a dark, furry animal that was locally known as the nokia, or sable, later pine marten.
Finnish Rubber Works established its factories in the beginning of 20th century nearby and began using Nokia as its brand. Shortly after World War I Finnish Rubber Works acquired Nokia Wood Mills as well as Finnish Cable Works, a producer of telephone and telegraph cables. All these three companies were merged into the Nokia Corporation in 1967.
The Nokia Corporation created in the 1967 fusion was involved in many sectors, producing at one time or another paper products, bicycle and car tires, footwear (including Wellington boots), personal computers, communications cables, televisions, electricity generation machinery, capacitors, aluminium, etc.

Telecommunications era
The seeds of the current incarnation of Nokia were planted with the founding of the electronics section of the cable division in the 1960s. In the 1967 fusion, that section was separated into its own division, and began manufacturing telecommunications equipment.
First mobile phones
Nokia had been producing commercial and military mobile radio communications technology since the 1960s. Since 1964 Nokia had developed VHF-radio simultaneously with Salora Oy, which later in 1971 also developed the ARP-phone. In 1979 the merger of these two companies resulted in the establishment of Mobira Oy. Mobira began developing mobile phones for the Nordic Mobile Telephony (NMT) network standard that went online in the 1980s and in 1982 it introduced its first car phone, the Mobira Senator for NMT 450 networks.
Nokia bought Salora Oy in 1984 and now owning 100% of the company, changed the company's telecommunication branch name to Nokia-Mobira Oy. The Mobira Talkman, launched in 1984, was one of the world's first transportable phones. In 1987, Nokia introduced one of the world's first handheld phones, the Mobira Cityman 900. While the Mobira Senator of 1982 had weighed 9.8 kg (21.6 lb) and the Talkman just under 5 kg (11 lb), the Mobira Cityman weighed only 800 g (28 oz) with the battery and had a price tag of 24,000 Finnish marks (approximately EUR 4,560). Despite the high price, the first phones were almost snatched from the sales assistants' hands. Initially, the mobile phone was a 'yuppie' product and a status symbol.
In 1988, Jorma Nieminen, resigning from the post of CEO of the mobile phone unit, along with two other employees from the unit, started a notable mobile phone company of their own, Benefon Oy. One year later, Nokia Mobira Oy became Nokia Mobile Phones and in 1991 the first GSM phone was launched.
Nokia's involvement in GSM
Nordic Mobile Telephony was the world's first mobile telephony standard that enabled international roaming, and provided valuable experience for Nokia for its close participation in developing Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM). It is a digital standard which came to dominate the world of mobile telephony in the 1990s, in mid-2006 accounting for about two billion mobile telephone subscribers in the world, or about 80% percent of the total, in more than 200 countries. The world's first commercial GSM call was made in 1991 in Helsinki over a Nokia-supplied network, by then Prime Minister of Finland Harri Holkeri, using a Nokia phone.
Networking equipment
In the 1970s, Nokia became more involved in the telecommunications industry by developing the Nokia DX200, a digital switch for telephone exchanges. In 1982, a DX200 switch became the world's first digital telephone switch to be put into operational use. The DX200 became the workhorse of the network equipment division. Its modular and flexible architecture enabled it to be developed into various switching products.
For a while in the 1970s, Nokia's network equipment production was separated into Telefenno, a company jointly owned by the parent corporation and by a company owned by the Finnish state. In 1987 the state sold its shares to Nokia and in 1992 the name was changed to Nokia Telecommunications.
In the 1970s and 1980s Nokia developed the Sanomalaitej?rjestelm? ("Message device system") for Finnish Defence Forces.
Personal computers
In the 1980s, Nokia produced a series of personal computers called MikroMikko. However, the PC division was sold to ICL, which later became part of Fujitsu. That company later transferred its personal computer operations to Fujitsu Siemens Computers, which shut down its only factory in Finland (in the town of Espoo, where computers had been produced since the 1960s) at the end of March 2000, thus ending large-scale PC manufacturing in the country
Challenges of growth
In the 1980s, during the era of its CEO Kari Kairamo, Nokia expanded into new fields, mostly by acquisitions. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the corporation ran into serious financial problems, a major reason being its heavy losses by the television manufacturing division (these problems probably contributed to Kairamo taking his own life in 1988). Nokia responded by streamlining its telecommunications divisions, and by divesting itself of the television and PC divisions. Jorma Ollila, who became the CEO in 1992, made a strategic decision to concentrate solely on telecommunications. Thus, during the rest of the 1990s, Nokia continued to divest itself of all of its non-telecommunications divisions.
The exploding worldwide popularity of mobile telephones, beyond even Nokia's most optimistic predictions, caused a logistics crisis in the mid-1990s. This prompted Nokia to overhaul its entire logistics operation. Logistics continues to be one of Nokia's major advantages over its rivals, along with greater economies of scale.

In the new millennium
In April 2003, the troubles of the networks equipment division caused the corporation to resort to similar streamlining practices on that side, with layoffs and organizational restructuring. This, however, diminished Nokia's public image in Finland, and produced a number of court cases along with an episode of a documentary television show critical towards Nokia.
Despite these occasional crises, Nokia has been phenomenally successful in its chosen field. This growth has come mostly during the era of Jorma Ollila and his team of about half a dozen close colleagues. In June 2006, this era came to an end with Ollila leaving the CEO position to become the chairman of Shell. The new CEO of Nokia is Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo.
On February 2006 Nokia and Sanyo announced a MOU to create a joint venture addressing the CDMA handset business. A few months later, in June, both companies announced ending their negotiations without agreement. Nokia also stated their decision to pull out of CDMA R&D, with the intention to continue CDMA business in selected markets.
On February 10, 2006, Nokia acquired Intellisync Corporation, a provider of data and PIM synchronization software.
On June 19, 2006, Nokia and Siemens AG announced the companies are to merge their mobile and fixed-line phone network equipment businesses to create one of the world's largest network firms. Both companies will have a 50% stake in the infrastructure company, to be headquartered in the Helsinki area, and to be called Nokia Siemens Networks. The companies predict annual sales of euro 16 billion and cost savings of euro 1.5 billion a year by 2010. About 20,000 Nokia employees will be transferred to this new company.
In March 2007, Nokia signed a memorandum with Cluj-Napoca City Council, Romania to open a new plant near the city in Jucu commune.
In May 2007 Nokia announced its Nokia 1100, with over 200 million units shipped, is the best-selling mobile phone of all time and the world's top-selling consumer electronics product.
In July 2007 Nokia acquired all assets of Twango, the comprehensive media sharing solution for organizing and sharing photos, videos and other personal media.
In August 2007 Nokia launched a series of web services under the brand name Ovi that allows users to download games, maps and music directly to their phones.
In September 2007 Nokia announced their intention to acquire Enpocket, a supplier of mobile advertising technology and services.
In October 2007 Pending shareholder and regulatory approval, Nokia acquires Navteq, a U.S.-based supplier of digital mapping data, for a price of $8.1B.
At the Nokia World conference in December 2007, Nokia announced their "Comes With Music" program: Nokia device buyers are to receive a year of complimentary access to music downloads.

Product divisions
Nokia comprises four business groups: Mobile Phones, Multimedia, Enterprise Solutions and Networks, plus various horizontal entities such as Customer and Market Operations, and Technology Platforms.
On June 20, 2007, Nokia announced that it would reorganize into three business units, effective January 1, 2008:
Devices: This division combines its existing mainline mobile phones division with the separate subdivisions manufacturing Multimedia (Nseries) and Enterprise (Eseries) class devices, headed by Kai ?ist?m?.
Services and Software: This combines the existing Technology Platforms division with other services monetized independently, headed by Niklas Savander.
Markets: The successor organization to Nokia's Customer and Market Operations division, represents the sales, marketing, integration and strategy functions of the company, led by Anssi Vanjoki.

Mobile Phones
Nokia's Mobile Phones division provides the general public with mobile voice and data products across a wide range of mobile devices. The division aims to target primarily high-volume category sales of mobile phones and devices, with consumers being the most important customer segment. The devices are based on GSM/EDGE, 3G/WCDMA and CDMA cellular technologies.
Nokia believes that design, brand, ease of use and price are mainstream mobile phones' most important considerations to customers. Nokia's product portfolio includes camera phones with features such as megapixel cameras and MP3 players which appeal to the mass market.
In the first quarter of 2006 Nokia sold over 15 million MP3 capable mobile phones, which means that Nokia is not only the world's leading supplier of mobile phones and digital cameras (as most of Nokia's mobile telephones feature digital cameras, it is also believed that Nokia has recently overtaken Kodak in camera production making it the largest in the world), Nokia is now also the leading supplier of digital audio players (MP3 players). Nokia aims to sell 80 million music phones by the end of 2006, outpacing sales of devices such as the iPod from Apple.
In the year 2007 , Nokia increased its range by offering 5 megapixel camera mobile phone Nokia N95 having Carl Zeiss Lens.

Multimedia
The Multimedia division's purpose is to design devices and applications that bring multimedia experiences to their customers. These devices allow people to create, access and consume multimedia, as well as share their experiences with others. The devices are included with a wide range of connectivity such as GSM, 3G/WCDMA, WLAN and Bluetooth. Nokia Multimedia Nseries extensively uses Symbian OS.
The Multimedia group also works with other companies outside the telecommunications industry to make advances in the technology and bring new applications and possibilities in areas such as Internet services, optics, music synchronization and streaming media.
Loudeye
In August 2006, Nokia acquired online music distributor Loudeye Corp for $60 m. The company has been developing this into an online music service in the hope of using it to generate handset sales. The service is expected to launch in late 2007 and would rival iTunes.
MOSH
In August 2007, Nokia launched their new social network, dubbed MOSH. MOSH by Nokia is the first-ever social network built by a handset manufacturer. MOSH aims to bring social, media-based networks to the mobile environment. Users can upload, download, share, and bookmark a variety of media - audio files, video files, documents, applications, games, images.
Comes With Music
On December 4, 2007, Nokia unveiled their plans for the "Nokia Comes With Music" initiative, a program that would partner with Universal Music Group International to bundle a year's worth of unlimited, DRM-free downloads with the purchase of a Nokia phone. Following the termination of the year of free downloads, tracks can be kept without having to renew the subscription. Downloads will be both PC- and mobile-based. However, listening to the music requires headphones compatible with Nokia's proprietary jack or a proprietary-to-standard headphone converter.

Enterprise Solutions
As the name implies, the Nokia Enterprise Solutions offers businesses, corporations and institutions a broad range of products and solutions, such as enterprise-grade mobile devices, underlying security infrastructure, software and services. Nokia also works with a range of companies to provide network security, bring mobilized corporate e-mail and extend corporate telephone systems to work with Nokia's mobile devices.

Nokia Siemens Networks
Nokia Siemens Networks (previously Nokia Networks) provides mobile network infrastructure, communications and networks service platforms, as well as professional services to operators and service providers. Networks focuses in: GSM, EDGE, 3G/WCDMA and WiMAX radio access networks; core networks with increasing IP and multiaccess capabilities; and services.
At the end of 2005, Nokia Networks had more than 150 mobile network customers in more than 60 countries, with its systems serving in excess of 400 million subscribers.
On June 19, 2006 Nokia and Siemens AG announced the companies are to merge their mobile and fixed-line phone network equipment businesses to create one of the world's largest network firms, called Nokia Siemens Networks. The Nokia Siemens Networks brand identity, created by London and Tokyo based branding agency Moving Brands, was subsequently launched at the 3GSM World Congress in Barcelona in February 2007 .

.mobi and the Mobile Internet
Nokia was the first proponent of a Top Level Domain (TLD) specifically for the mobile internet and, as a result, was instrumental in the launch of the .mobi domain name extension in September 2006 as an official backer. Since then, Nokia has launched the largest mobile portal, Nokia.mobi, which receives over 100 million visits a month. It followed that with the launch of a mobile Ad Service to cater to the growing demand for mobile advertisement.

Corporate affairs

Historical logos

Corporate governance
The operations of Nokia are managed by the Group Executive Board (left), under the direction of the Board of Directors (right). The Chairman and the rest of the Group Executive Board members are appointed by the Board of Directors. Only the Chairman of the Group Executive Board can belong to both, the Board of Directors and the Group Executive Board. The operations of the company are managed within the framework set by the Finnish Companies Act, Nokia's Articles of Association and Corporate Governance Guidelines, and related Board adopted charters.

Corporate culture
Nokia's official corporate culture manifesto, The Nokia Way, emphasises the speed and flexibility of decision-making in a flat, networked organization, although the corporation's size necessarily imposes a certain amount of bureaucracy. Equality of opportunities and openness of communication are also stressed, along with management leadership and employee participation.
Nokia is a progressive and forward-thinking mobile technology group that spends a significant amount of its revenue on research and development, and prides itself on often being the first to market with new products and applications.
The official business language of Nokia is English. All documentation is written in English, and is used in official intra-company spoken communication and e-mail.
Until May 2007, the Nokia Values were Customer Satisfaction, Respect, Achievement, and Renewal. In May 2007, Nokia redefined its values after initiating a series of discussions worldwide as to what the new values of the company should be. Based on the employee suggestions, the new values were defined as: Engaging You, Achieving Together, Passion for Innovation and Very Human.

Research cooperation with universities
Helsinki University of Technology, Finland
Tampere University of Technology, Finland
Stanford University, United States
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, United States
University of Cambridge, United Kingdom

Toyota

Toyota Corporation is a multinational corporation headquartered in Japan. Toyota is presently the world's largest automaker followed by GM. In terms of name recognition, Toyota is also the only car manufacturer to appear in the top 10 of the BrandZ name recognition ranking.
In 1934, while still a department of Toyota Industries, it created its first product Type A engine and its first passenger car (the Toyota AA) in 1936. The company was founded in 1937 by Japanese industrialist Kiichiro Toyoda as a spinoff from his father's company Toyota Industries to create automobiles. Toyota owns and operates Toyota, Lexus, Scion brands and has a majority shareholding in Daihatsu Motors , and has minority shareholdings in Fuji Heavy Industries, Isuzu Motors, and the engine, motorcycle and marine craft manufacturer Yamaha Motors. The company includes 522 subsidiaries.
Toyota is headquartered in Toyota and Nagoya in Aichi Prefecture and in Tokyo. It also provides financial services through its division Toyota Financial Services and also creates robots besides automobiles. The company along with the original Toyota Industries form bulk of the Toyota Group, one of the largest conglomerates in the world.

Founding and earlier history
In 1933, Toyoda Automatic Loom Works created a new division devoted to the production of automobiles under the direction of the founder's son, Kiichiro Toyoda. Kiichiro Toyoda had traveled to Europe and the United States in 1929 to investigate automobile production, and had begun researching gasoline-powered engines in 1930. Toyoda Automatic Loom Works was encouraged to develop Automobile production by the Japanese government, which needed domestic vehicle production partly due to the worldwide money shortage and partly due to the war with China. In 1934, the division produced its first Type A Engine, which was used in the first Model A1 passenger car in May 1935 and the G1 truck in August 1935. Production of the Model AA passenger car started in 1936. Early vehicles bear a striking resemblance to the Dodge Power Wagon and Chevrolet, with some parts actually interchanging with their American originals.
Although the Toyota Group is best known today for its cars, it is still in the textile business and still makes automatic looms, which are now fully computerized, and electric sewing machines which are available worldwide.
Toyota Motor Co. was established as an independent and separate company in 1937. Although the founding family's name is Toyoda, the company name was changed in order to signify the separation of the founders' work life from home life, to simplify the pronunciation, and to give the company a happy beginning. Toyota is considered luckier than Toyoda in Japan, where eight is regarded as a lucky number, and eight is the number of strokes it takes to write Toyota in katakana. In Chinese, the company and its vehicles are still referred to by the equivalent characters, with Chinese reading.
During the Pacific War (World War II) the company was dedicated to truck production for the Imperial Japanese Army. Because of severe shortages in Japan, military trucks were kept as simple as possible. For example, the trucks had only one headlight on the center of the hood. The war ended shortly before a scheduled Allied bombing run on the Toyota factories in Aichi.
After the war, commercial passenger car production started in 1947 with the model SA. The quality and production principles on which Toyota is based originated in an education program from the United States Army in the postwar era. In 1950 a separate sales company, Toyota Motor Sales Co., was established (which lasted until July 1982). In April 1956 the Toyopet dealer chain was established. The following year, the Toyota Crown became the first Japanese car to be exported to the United States and Toyota's American and Brazilian divisions, Toyota Motor Sales Inc. and Toyota do Brazil S.A., were also established. Toyota began to expand in the 1960s with a new research and development facility, a presence in Thailand was established, the 10 millionth model was produced, a Deming Prize and partnerships with Hino Motors and Daihatsu were also established. The first Toyota built outside Japan was in April 1963, at Port Melbourne in Australia. By the end of the decade, Toyota had established a worldwide presence, as the company had exported its one-millionth unit.

Later history and management
The Toyota Motor Company was awarded its first Japanese Quality Control Award at the start 1970s and began participating in a wide variety of Motorsports. Due to the 1973 oil crisis consumers in the lucrative U.S. market began turning to small cars with better fuel economy. American car manufacturers had considered small economy cars to be an "entry level" product, and their small vehicles were not made to a high level of quality in order to keep the price low. Japanese customers, however, had a long-standing tradition of demanding small fuel-efficient cars that were manufactured to a high level of quality. Because of this, companies like Toyota, Honda, and Nissan established a strong and growing presence in North America in the 1970s.
In 1982, the Toyota Motor Company and Toyota Motor Sales merged into one company, the Toyota Motor Corporation. Two years later, Toyota entered into a joint venture with GM called NUMMI, the New United Motor Manufacturing, Inc, operating an automobile manufacturing plant in Fremont, California. The factory was an old General Motors plant that had been closed for several years. Toyota then started to establish new brands at the end of the 1980s, with the launch of their luxury division Lexus in 1989.
In the 1990s Toyota began to branch out from producing mostly compact cars by adding many larger and more luxurious vehicles to its lineup, including a full sized pickup, the T100 (and later the Toyota Tundra), several lines of SUVs, a sport version of the Camry, known as the Camry Solara, and the Scion brand, a group of several affordable, yet sporty, automobiles targeted specifically to young adults. Toyota also began production of the world's best selling hybrid car, the Toyota Prius, in 1997.
With a major presence with Europe, due to the success of Toyota Team Europe, the corporation decided to set up TMME, Toyota Motor Europe Marketing & Engineering, to help market vehicles in the continent. Two years later, Toyota set up a base in the United Kingdom, TMUK, as the company's cars had become very popular among British drivers. Bases in Indiana, Virginia and Tianjin were also set up. In 1999, the company decided to list itself on the New York and London Stock Exchange.
In 2001, Toyota's Toyo Trust and Banking merged to form the UFJ, United Financials of Japan, which was accused of corruption by the Japan's government for making bad loans to alleged Yakuza crime syndicates with executives accused of blocking Financial Service Agency inspections. The UFJ was listed among Fortune Magazine's largest money-losing corporations in the world, with Toyota's chairman serving as a director. At the time, the UFJ was one of the largest shareholders of Toyota. As a result of Japan's banking crisis, the UFJ was merged again to become Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group.
In 2002, Toyota managed to enter a Formula One works team and establish joint ventures with French motoring companies Citro?n and Peugeot, a year after Toyota started producing cars in France.
On December 7, 2004, a U.S. press release was issued stating that Toyota would be offering Sirius Satellite Radios. However, as late as Jan. 27, 2007, Sirius Satellite Radio and XM Satellite radio kits were not available for Toyota factory radios. While the press release enumerated nine models, only limited availability existed at the dealer level in the U.S. Major Lexus dealerships have been offering satellite radio kits for Lexus vehicles since 2005, in addition to factory-equipped satellite radio models.
In 2007, Toyota released an update of its full size truck, the Toyota Tundra, produced in two American factories, one in Texas and one in Indiana. "Motor Trend" named the Tundra "Truck of the Year," and the 2007 Toyota Camry "Car of the Year" for 2007. It also began the construction of two new factories, one to build the Toyota Rav4 in Woodstock, Ontario and the other to build the Toyota Highlander in Blue Springs, Mississippi.

Toyota today
Toyota has grown to a large multinational corporation from where it started and expanded to different worldwide markets and countries by becoming the largest seller of cars in the beginning of 2007, the most profitable automaker ($11 billion in 2006) along with increasing sales in, among other countries, the United States. The world headquarters of Toyota are located in its home country in Toyota, Aichi, Japan. Its subsidiary, Toyota Financial Services sells financing and participates in other lines of business. Toyota brands include Scion and Lexus and the corporation is part of the Toyota Group. Toyota also owns majority stakes in Daihatsu, and 8.7% of Fuji Heavy Industries, which manufactures Subaru vehicles. They also acquired 5.9% of Isuzu Motors Ltd. on November 7, 2006 and will be introducing Isuzu diesel technology into their products.
Toyota has introduced new technologies including one of the first mass-produced hybrid gas-electric vehicles, of which it says it has sold 1 million globally (2007-06-07) , Advanced Parking Guidance System (automatic parking), a four-speed electronically controlled automatic with buttons for power and economy shifting, and an eight-speed automatic transmission. Toyota, and Toyota-produced Lexus and Scion automobiles, consistently rank near the top in certain quality and reliability surveys, primarily J.D. Power and Consumer Reports.
In 2005, Toyota, combined with its half-owned subsidiary Daihatsu Motor Company, produced 8.54 million vehicles, about 500,000 fewer than the number produced by GM that year. Toyota has a large market share in the United States, but a small market share in Europe. Its also sells vehicles in Africa and is a market leader in Australia. Due to its Daihatsu subsidiary it has significant market shares in several fast-growing Southeast Asian countries.
In the Fortune Global 500, Toyota Motor is the 8th largest company in the world. Since the recession of 2001, it has gained market share in the United States. Toyota's market share struggles in Europe where its Lexus brand has three tenths of one percent market share, compared to nearly two percent market share as the U.S. luxury segment leader.
In the first three months of 2007, Toyota together with its half-owned subsidiary Daihatsu reported number one sales of 2.348 million units. Toyota's brand sales had risen 9.2% largely on demand for Corolla and Camry sedans. The difference in performance was largely attributed to surging demand for fuel-efficient vehicles. In November 2006, Toyota Motor Manufacturing Texas added a facility in San Antonio. Toyota has experienced quality problems and was reprimanded by the government in Japan for its recall practices. Toyota currently maintains over 16% of the US market share and is listed second only to GM in terms of volume. Toyota Century is the official state car of the Japanese imperial family, namely for the Emperor of Japan Akihito.

Worldwide presence
Toyota has factories all over the world, manufacturing or assembling vehicles for local markets, including the Corolla. Toyota has manufacturing or assembly plants in Japan, Australia, Canada, Indonesia, Poland, South Africa, Turkey, the United Kingdom, the United States, France, Brazil, and more recently Pakistan, India, Argentina, Czech Republic, Mexico, Malaysia, Thailand, China, Vietnam, Venezuela, the Philippines, and Russia.
Toyota has invested considerably into cleaner-burning vehicles such as the Toyota Prius, based on technology such as the Hybrid Synergy Drive. In 2002, Toyota successfully road-tested a new version of the RAV4 which ran on a Hydrogen fuel cell. Scientific American called the company its Business Brainwave of the Year in 2003 for commercializing an affordable hybrid car.
Toyota North America
Toyota North America headquarters is located in New York City and operates at a holding company level in North America. Its manufacturing headquarters is located in Erlanger, Kentucky, and is known as Toyota Motor Manufacturing North America, or TMMNA. Toyota has large presence in the United States with five major assembly plants in Huntsville, Alabama; Georgetown, Kentucky; Princeton, Indiana; San Antonio, Texas; Buffalo, West Virginia; and a new one being built in Blue Springs, Mississippi. Toyota also has a joint-venture operation with General Motors at New United Motor Manufacturing Inc. (NUMMI), in Fremont, CA, which began in 1984, and with Subaru at Subaru of Indiana Automotive, Inc. (SIA), in Lafayette, IN, which started in 2006. Production on a new manufacturing plant in Tupelo, Mississippi is scheduled for completion in 2010; it will be producing the Toyota Highlander. North America is a major automobile market for Toyota. In these assembly plants, the Toyota Camry and the 2007 Toyota Tundra are manufactured, among others. Toyota uses a number of slogans in its American TV commercials such as It's time to move forward, Smart way to keep moving forward, or Moving forward. It has started producing larger trucks, such as the new Toyota Tundra, to go after the large truck market in the United States. Toyota is also pushing hybrid vehicles in the US such as the Toyota Prius, Toyota Camry Hybrid, Highlander Hybrid, and various Lexus products. Toyota has sold more hybrids vehicles in the country than any other manufacturer. Toyota is a public corporation and the company is traded at the Tokyo Stock Exchange, New York Stock Exchange and the London Stock Exchange as a stock.Toyota also sponsors Chivas de Guadalajara.
United States employees and investments
Toyota directly employed around 34,675 people in the United States, invested USD $15.5 billion, produced 1.2 million vehicles using US and foreign auto parts, sold 2.54 million vehicles, and donated USD $340 million to nonprofits. It has in total 10 plants, USD $2.9 billion per year payroll, purchased USD $28 billion in parts and supplies from 30 states. It created around 386,000 jobs in the United States as result of Toyota's spending and demand from suppliers. It celebrated its 50th year anniversary in the United States in 2007 .

Hybrids: regular and plug-in hybrid vehicles
Toyota is one of the largest companies to push hybrid vehicles in the market and the first to commercially mass-produce and sell such vehicles, an example being the Toyota Prius. The company eventually began providing this option on the main smaller cars such as Camry and later with the Lexus divisions, producing some hybrid luxury vehicles. It labeled such technology in Toyota cars as "Hybrid Synergy Drive" and in Lexus versions as "Lexus Hybrid Drive."
The Prius has become the top selling hybrid car in America. Toyota, as a brand, now has three hybrid vehicles in its lineup: the Prius, Highlander, and Camry. The popular minivan Toyota Sienna is scheduled to join the hybrid lineup by 2010, and by 2030 Toyota plans to offer its entire lineup of cars, trucks, and SUVs with a Hybrid Synergy Drive option.
The Hybrid Synergy drive is the most widely rolled-out environment-friendly system in the automotive industry to date. More than 1,000,000 units have been sold. Toyota's CEO has committed to making every car of Toyota a hybrid vehicle eventually (though all hybrid versions may not be sold in the U.S.). .
Lexus also has their own hybrid lineup, consisting of the GS 450h, RX 400h, and launched in 2007, the LS 600h/LS 600h L.

Plug-in hybrids
After General Motors announced it would produce the Chevrolet Volt plug-in hybrid, Toyota announced that it, too, would make one. Toyota is currently testing its "Toyota Plug-in HV' in Japan, the United States, and Europe. Like GM's Volt, it uses a lithium-ion battery pack. The PHEV could have a lower environmental impact than existing hybrids.

Toyota in motorsports

Rallying
Toyota's presence in motorsport can be traced back to the early 1970s, when Swedish driver, Ove Andersson drove for Toyota during the RAC Rally of Great Britain. During the winter of 1972, Andersson formed Andersson Motorsport in his native country and began running a Rallying program for Toyota. The move turned out to be an impractical one and three years after establishing his team, Andersson moved its base from Sweden to Brussels in Belgium. From there the team was renamed, Toyota Team Europe.
Toyota's first win in motorsport came at the 1975 1000 Lakes Rally of Finland, when Hannu Mikkola and his co-driver, Atso Aho, won the event in a Toyota Corolla. Three years later, the team moved to a new base in Cologne, in western Germany. It wasn't until the 1980s when Toyota began to gain notable success, especially in the African rallies, where Bj?rn Waldeg?rd and Juha Kankkunen were usually top of the time sheets. The team then set-up its all purpose motorsport facility in Cologne three years later, which is still used today.
In the 1990 season, Carlos Sainz gave Toyota its first ever championship win in a four-wheel drive Toyota Celica and repeated the feat two years later. In 1993, Toyota bought the team from Andersson and named it Toyota Motorsport GmbH, in the same year Juha Kankkunen won the WRC title and Toyota won the constructors' championship, becoming the first Japanese manufacturer to do so. This success was repeated a year earlier, but this time it was Frenchman Didier Auriol who was responsible.
1995 proved to be a difficult year for Toyota, as the team were caught using illegal turbo chargers and were given a 12-month ban by the FIA. The company returned to rallying in the 1996 season, but its competition, notably Mitsubishi and Subaru, had a clearer advantage over their cars.
1997 would prove to be another uncompetitive year for Toyota, with the team still behind its fellow Japanese manufacturers, Subaru and Mitsubishi, and Carlos Sainz the highest placed Toyota driver in the drivers' championship in third place, 11 points behind champion Tommi M?kinen. Sainz came within one point of the 1998 title, when his Corolla suffered an engine failure on the final stage of the final rally in Great Britain, while Toyota were within six points of the constructors' championship, many people place the blame on Toyota's choice to run Belgian Freddy Loix as one of the team's points scoring drivers at the Rally Catalunya instead of regular driver Didier Auriol, because Auriol managed to win the event ahead of second-placed Loix.
Toyota decided to quit running in the WRC at the end of the 1999 season, quoting that "all that can be achieved has been achieved". The team managed to secure the manufacturers' title in their last season, 18 points ahead of their nearest rival Subaru, while Didier Auriol came within 10 points of the Drivers' title. Toyota were replaced the following season by Peugeot, who went on to win the manufacturers' title in succession from 2000-2002.
In March 2007, Toyota debuted its Super 2000 Corolla rally car, which will compete in the Australian Rally Championship.

Champ Car
Toyota raced in CART from 1996 to 2002. Its early years in the series were marked by struggles. Toyota-powered cars, campaigned by the All-American Racers and PPI Motorsports teams, languished at the back of the grid, slow and unreliable. Toyota didn't even lead a lap until Alex Barron led 12 laps at the Vancouver street circuit in September 1998.
Toyota started seeing its fortunes improve in 1999 as Scott Pruett took pole position at the final race of the season at the California Speedway. The next year, Juan Pablo Montoya gave Toyota its first-ever CART win at the Milwaukee Mile, the first of 5 races won by Toyota-powered cars that year. Toyota-powered cars won six races in 2001. In 2002, Toyota's final year in the championship, it turned things around completely from its bleak debut. Toyota won the Manufacturer's championship, 10 races, and Cristiano Da Matta rode Toyota power to the driver's championship, with Bruno Junqueira, also Toyota-powered car, finished second.

Le Mans
Toyota started recruiting staff for their Le Mans efforts in 1997, with an aim to start a Formula One team. Toyota's efforts for a Le Mans car was the Toyota GT-One, which was driven by ex-Formula One drivers: Martin Brundle; Thierry Boutsen and Ukyo Katayama. The 3.6 litre twin-turbo GT-Ones were beaten in 1998 and 1999 but came close to victory, breaking down late in the race. The GT-One held the lap record for the Sarthe Circuit up until 2006 however.

Indy Racing League
Toyota moved to the Indy Racing League in 2003 and provided factory support to former CART teams Penske Racing and Chip Ganassi Racing as well as other teams. They were one of the top engines in their first year, winning the Indianapolis 500 with Gil de Ferran and the championship with Scott Dixon. However, 2004 and 2005 were not so kind and wins were few and far between. Following the 2005 season, the Penske and Ganassi teams announced they would switch engines to Honda, leaving Toyota with no championship contenders. As a result of this and their intent to re-allocate resources for NASCAR, Toyota announced they would leave the series during the off-season.

NASCAR
Toyota races the Toyota Tundra in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series and the Toyota Camry in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series as well as the NASCAR Nationwide Series.
Todd Bodine became the first driver to give Toyota their first ever NASCAR championship by winning the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series Title in 2006.
Nextel Cup
After success in the Craftsman Truck Series, Toyota moved to both the Nextel Cup and Busch Series with the Toyota Camry for 2007. Three relatively new, small teams spearheaded the initial Toyota Cup program: Michael Waltrip Racing, Bill Davis Racing, and Team Red Bull. Toyota has struggled in its first season in Nextel Cup, harnessing only two poles in 36 races, and posting only one five top-5 and ten top-10 finishes across Toyota teams.
Michael Waltrip Racing
Michael Waltrip - #55 NAPA Camry
Dale Jarrett - #44 UPS Camry
David Reutimann - #00 Burger King/Dominos Camry
Bill Davis Racing
Dave Blaney - #22 Caterpillar Camry
Team Red Bull
Brian Vickers - #83 Red Bull Camry
A.J. Allmendinger - #84 Red Bull Camry
Joe Gibbs Racing (beginning in 2008, switching from Chevrolet)
Denny Hamlin - #11 FedEx Camry
Kyle Busch - #18 M&M's/Interstate Batteries Camry
Tony Stewart - #20 Home Depot Camry
Riley D'Hondt Motorsports (Part-time)
Marc Goossens - #91 Commonwealth Camry
Wyler Racing (Part-time)
Johnny Benson - #46 Wyler Camry
Busch Series
In addition to moving to Nextel Cup, Toyota also made its debut in the Busch Series in 2007. The car manufacturer found relatively more success in the Busch Series than Cup, winning two races with Jason Leffler and David Reutimann and posting 15 top-5 finishes and 35 top-10 finishes after 32 of 35 races.
Braun Racing
Various drivers - #10 RVs.com/Fan1st.com Camry
Jason Leffler - #38 Great Clips Camry
Michael Waltrip Racing
David Reutimann - #99 Aaron's Camry
Riley D'Hondt Motorsports (Part-time)
David Green - #91 unsponsored Camry
Germain Racing (Part-time)
Todd Bodine - #03 Germain Camry
Truck Series
Waltrip Racing
A.J. Allmendinger - #00 Red Bull Tundra
Germain Racing
Justin Hobgood - #03 Toyota Dealers Tundra
Ted Musgrave - #9 Team ASE Tundra
Todd Bodine - #30 Lumber Liquidators Tundra
Red Horse Racing
Aaron Fike - #1 Red Horse Racing Tundra
Bill Davis Racing
Mike Skinner - #5 Toyota Tundra Tundra
Johnny Benson - #23 Toyota Dealers Tundra
Tyler Walker (suspended) - #36 360 OTC Tundra
HT Motorsports
Terry Cook - #59 Melling Tools Tundra
Wyler Racing
Jack Sprague - #60 Con-Way Transportation Tundra

Formula One (F1)
In 2002 Toyota started racing in Formula One with Toyota Team Europe, based in Cologne, Germany. Despite a huge investment, the team's performances have been considered less than average by fans and pundits alike.
In 2004, designer Mike Gascoyne was hired to help turn things around (as he had done previously at Jordan Grand Prix and Renault F1). However, due to a lack of results and a difference in opinion with the management about how the team should progress he was released from his contract early midway through the 2006 season; by 2005 the team had advanced from the midfield to infrequently challenging for the top positions. Jarno Trulli achieved two second places and one third place in the first five races of the season, helping the team to retain second position in the Constructors Championship for several races before finishing 4th in the constructors championship. Drivers for season 2008 are Jarno Trulli and Timo Glock. Timo Glock will replace Ralf Schumacher.
In 2007, Toyota are also supplying engines to the Williams team.

Toyota economy

Toyota core segment in the market
Hybrids are viewed by some automakers as a core segment of the future vehicle market.

TRD
Toyota Racing Development was brought about to help develop true high performance racing parts for many Toyota vehicles. TRD has often had much success with their aftermarket tuning parts, as well as designing technology for vehicles used in all forms of racing.

Shareholders
Toyota is publicly traded on the Tokyo Stock Exchange under number 7203 (first section). Also on NYSE under NYSE: TM.

Holdings
Toyota reports on its consolidated financial statements 540 consolidated subsidiaries and 226 affiliates.
Toyota Motor North America (100% - 2004)
Toyota Tsusho - Trading company for the Toyota Group
Toyota Canada Inc. owned via Toyota Motor North America
Daihatsu Motor Company (51.2% - March 31, 2006)
DENSO (24.74% - September 30, 2006)
Toyota Industries (23.51% - March 31, 2006
Aisin Seiki Co. (23.0% - September 30, 2006)
Fuji Heavy Industries (8.69% - September 30, 2006)
PT Toyota Astra Motor (49% - 2003)
PT Toyota Motor Manufacturing Indonesia (95% - 2003)

Accounting Ratios

The Toyota Production System
Toyota has long been recognized as an industry leader in manufacturing and production. Three stories of its origin have been found, one that they studied Piggly-Wiggly's just-in-time distribution system, one that they followed the writings of W. Edwards Deming, and one that they were given the principles from an Army training program (see above reference). Regardless of the origin, the principles, described in Jeffrey Liker's The Toyota Way, are as follows:
Base your management decisions on a long-term philosophy, even at the expense of short-term goals
Create continuous process flow to bring problems to surface
Use "pull" systems to avoid overproduction
Level out the workload
Build a culture of stopping to fix problems, to get quality right the first time
Standardized tasks are the foundation for continuous improvement and employee empowerment
Use visual control so no problems are hidden
Use only reliable, thoroughly tested technology that serves your people and processes
Grow leaders who thoroughly understand the work, live the philosophy, and teach it to others
Develop exceptional people and teams who follow your company's philosophy
Respect your extended network of partners and suppliers by challenging them and helping them improve
Go and see for yourself to thoroughly understand the situation (genchi genbutsu)
Make decisions slowly by consensus, thoroughly considering all options; implement decisions rapidly
Become a learning organization through relentless reflection and continuous improvement

Toyota philosophy
In Toyota philosophy, zeronise consists in reducing pollution, traffic deaths and road congestion.

Non-automotive activities

Philanthropy
Toyota is supporter of Toyota Family Literacy Program along with National Center for Family Literacy, helping low-income community members for education, United Negro College Fund (40 annual scholarships), National Underground Railroad Freedom Center ($1 million) among others. Toyota created Toyota USA Foundation.

Higher education
Toyota established the Toyota Technological Institute in 1981, as Sakichi Toyoda had planned to establish a university as soon as he and Toyota became successful. Toyota Technological Institute founded the Toyota Technological Institute at Chicago in 2003. Toyota is supporter of "Toyota Driving Expectations Program," "Toyota Youth for Understanding Summer Exchange Scholarship Program," "Toyota International Teacher Program," "Toyota TAPESTRY," "Toyota Community Scholars" (scholarship for high school students), "United States Hispanic Chamber of Commerce Internship Program," and "Toyota Funded Scholarship." It has contributed to number of local education and scholarship programs such as to University of Kentucky, Indiana, etc.

Robotics
Toyota has been developing multitask robots destined for elderly care, manufacturing, and entertainment.

Finance
Toyota Financial Services Corporation provides financing to Toyota customers.

Agricultural biotechnology
Toyota invests in several small start-up businesses and partnerships in biotechnology, including:
P.T. Toyota Bio Indonesia in Lampung, Indonesia
Australian Afforestation Pty. Ltd. in Western Australia and Southern Australia
Toyota Floritech Co., Ltd. in Rokkasho-Mura, Kamikita District, Aomori Prefecture
Sichuan Toyota Nitan Development Co., Ltd. in Sichuan, China
Toyota Roof Garden Corporation in Miyoshi-Cho, Aichi Prefecture

Manufacturing facilities
Australia
Altona, Victoria - Camry and Aurion (formerly Avalon). 111,610 vehicles and 98,209 engines in 2006.
Canada
Toyota Motor Manufacturing Canada, Cambridge, Ontario - 1.8L (1ZZ-FE) engines, Corolla, Matrix, Lexus RX and from 2008 RAV4.
France
Toyota Motor Manufacturing France, Onnaing-Valenciennes - Yaris
Indonesia
PT Toyota Motor Manufacturing Indonesia, Cikampek, West Java - Innova, Avanza, Fortuner, and Hilux Vigo 4x2 pick-up
Mexico
Toyota Motor Manufacturing de Baja California, Baja California - Toyota Tacoma
Thailand
Toyota Gateway Plant, Chachoengsao - Toyota Vios, Yaris, Corolla, Camry
Toyota Samrong Plant, Samrong - Toyota Hilux Vigo, Fortuner
Toyota Banpho Plant, Chachoengsao - Toyota Hilux Vigo (Export model)
Turkey
Toyota Motor Manufacturing Turkey Inc., Sakarya - Toyota Corolla-Verso,Auris,
United Kingdom
Toyota Manufacturing UK, Burnaston, Derbyshire and Deeside, North Wales - Auris, Avensis and Corolla
United States
Toyota Motor Manufacturing Alabama, Huntsville, Alabama - V6 and V8 Engines.
Toyota Motor Manufacturing Kentucky, Georgetown, Kentucky - Camry, Avalon and Solara, as well as the AZ and GR engines.
Toyota Motor Manufacturing Indiana, Princeton, Indiana - Tundra, Sequoia and Sienna. 364,983 vehicles produced in 2005. (127,431 Tundra, 44,852 Sequoia and 192,700 Sienna)
Toyota Motor Manufacturing Texas, San Antonio, Texas - Tundra. Annual capacity of 200,000 pickup trucks.
Toyota Motor Manufacturing West Virginia, Buffalo, West Virginia - ZZ, MZ, and GR engines; automatic transaxles
Toyota Motor Manufacturing Mississippi, Tupelo, Mississippi - Toyota Highlander (est. 150,000/year) This facility is being built. The facility or company is named "Toyota Motor Manufacturing, Mississippi, Inc."

Joint venture, licensed, and contract factories
Czech Republic
Toyota Peugeot Citro?n Automobile Czech (joint venture with PSA Peugeot Citro?n), Kol?n, Czech Republic - Aygo
Japan
Toyota Industries, Japan (contract facility) - Vitz/Yaris and RAV4
China
Tianjin FAW Toyota - Toyota Corolla, Toyota Crown, Toyota Reiz, Toyota Vios.
Guangzhou Toyota - Toyota Camry
Pakistan
Indus Motors Company ltd. (IMC) is a joint venture between the House of Habib, Toyota Motor Corporation Japan (TMC), and Toyota Tsusho Corporation Japan (TTC) for assembling, progressive manufacturing and marketing of Toyota vehicles in Pakistan since July 01, 1990. IMC's production facilities are located at Port Qasim Industrial Zone near Karachi in an area measuring over 105 acres (0.42 km?).
United States
NUMMI (joint venture with GM), Fremont, California - Corolla and Tacoma
Subaru of Indiana Automotive, Inc. (contract facility, starting in Spring 2007), Lafayette, Indiana - Camry
India
Toyota Kirloskar Industries, Bangalore((innova))
Vietnam
Toyota Motor Vietnam (Vios, Corolla, Camry, Land Cruiser, Hiace, Innova)

See also
The Toyota Group
List of Toyota vehicles
List of Toyota engines
List of Toyota transmissions
Toyota automobile collectibles
Toyota Production System
Toyota Center, a sports arena in Houston, Texas where the company owns naming rights
Australian Motor Industries
?lectricit? de France

References
2005 Toyota Highlander Hybrid. Retrieved January 11, 2004 from CanadianDriver Communications, Inc. (2004)
Toyota up close Sales figures of Toyota.
Toyota becomes 3rd ranked US automaker behind GM and Ford Bloomberg Report.
Consumer Reports reverses practice of automatically recommending all new Toyota cars and trucks, Oct 16, 2007 ("Consumer Reports will no longer recommend any new or redesigned Toyota-built models without reliability data on a specific design," the publication said in a statement. "Previously, new and redesigned models were recommended because of the automaker's excellent track record.")

External links
Toyota Motor official global site, in English
Toyota Motor official global site, in Japanese
Toyota Safety Brand site

Intel

Intel Corporation (NASDAQ: INTC; SEHK: 4335) is the world's largest semiconductor company and the inventor of the x86 series of microprocessors, the processors found in most personal computers. Founded in 1968 as Integrated Electronics Corporation and based in Santa Clara, California, USA, Intel also makes motherboard chipsets, network cards and ICs, flash memory, graphic chips, embedded processors, and other devices related to communications and computing. Founded by semiconductor pioneers Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore, and widely associated with the executive leadership and vision of Andrew Grove, Intel combines advanced chip design capability with a leading-edge manufacturing capability. Originally known primarily to engineers and technologists, Intel's successful "Intel Inside" advertising campaign of the 1990s made it and its Pentium processor household names.
Intel was an early developer of SRAM and DRAM memory chips, and this represented the majority of its business until the early 1990s. While Intel created the first commercial microprocessor chip in 1971, it was not until the creation of the personal computer (PC) that this became their primary business. During the 1990s, Intel invested heavily in new microprocessor designs and in fostering the rapid growth of the PC industry. During this period Intel became the dominant supplier of microprocessors for PCs, and was known for aggressive and sometimes controversial tactics in defense of its market position, as well as a struggle with Microsoft for control over the direction of the PC industry. The 2007 rankings of the world's 100 most powerful brands published by Millward Brown Optimor showed the company's brand value falling 10 places - from number 15 to number 25.

Corporate history
Intel was founded in 1968 by Gordon E. Moore (a chemist and physicist) and Robert Noyce (a physicist and co-inventor of the integrated circuit) when they left Fairchild Semiconductor. A number of other Fairchild employees also went on to participate in other Silicon Valley companies. Intel's third employee was Andy Grove, (a chemical engineer), who ran the company through much of the 1980s and the high-growth 1990s. Grove is now remembered as the company's key business and strategic leader. By the end of the 1990s, Intel was one of the largest and most successful businesses in the world.

Origin of the name
At its founding, Gordon Moore and Robert Noyce wanted to name their new company "Moore Noyce". This name, however, sounded remarkably similar to "more noise" - an ill-suited name for an electronics company, since noise is typically associated with bad interference. They then used the name NM Electronics for almost a year, before deciding to call their company INTegrated ELectronics or "Intel" for short. However, Intel was already trademarked by a hotel chain, so they had to buy the rights for that name at the beginning.

Company's evolution
Intel has grown through several distinct phases. At its founding, Intel was distinguished simply by its ability to make semiconductors, and its primary product were static random access memory (SRAM) chips. Intel's business grew during the 1970s as it expanded and improved its manufacturing processes and produced a wider range of products, still dominated by various memory devices.
While Intel created the first microprocessor in 1971 and one of the first microcomputers in 1972, by the early 1980s its business was dominated by dynamic random access memory chips. However, increased competition from Japanese semiconductor manufacturers had by 1983 dramatically reduced the profitability of this market, and the sudden success of the IBM personal computer convinced then-CEO Grove to shift the company's focus to microprocessors and to change fundamental aspects of that business model. By the end of the 1980s this decision had proven successful, and Intel embarked on a 10-year period of unprecedented growth as the primary (and most profitable) hardware supplier to the PC industry.
After 2000, growth in demand for high-end microprocessors slowed and competitors garnered significant market share, initially in low-end and mid-range processors but ultimately across the product range, and Intel's dominant position was reduced. In the early 2000s then-CEO Craig Barrett attempted to diversify the company's business beyond semiconductors, but few of these activities were ultimately successful.
In 2005, CEO Paul Otellini reorganized the company to refocus its core processor and chipset business on platforms (enterprise, digital home, digital health, and mobility) which led to the hiring of over 20,000 new employees. In September of 2006 due to falling profits, the company announced a restructuring that resulted in layoffs of 10,500 employees or about 10 percent of its workforce by July of 2006. Its research lab located at Cambridge University was closed at the end of 2006.

Sale of XScale processor business
On June 27, 2006, the sale of Intel's XScale assets was announced. Intel agreed to sell the XScale processor business to Marvell Technology Group for an estimated $600 million in cash and the assumption of unspecified liabilities. The move is intended to permit Intel to focus its resources on its core x86 and server businesses. The acquisition was completed on November 9, 2006.

Market history

SRAMS and the microprocessor
The company's first products were shift register memory and random-access memory integrated circuits, and Intel grew to be a leader in the fiercely competitive DRAM, SRAM, and ROM markets throughout the 1970s. Concurrently, Intel engineers Marcian Hoff, Federico Faggin, Stanley Mazor and Masatoshi Shima invented the first microprocessor. Originally developed for the Japanese company Busicom to replace a number of ASICs in a calculator already produced by Busicom, the Intel 4004 was introduced to the mass market on November 15, 1971, though the microprocessor did not become the core of Intel's business until the mid-1980s. (Note: Intel is usually given credit with Texas Instruments for the almost-simultaneous invention of the microprocessor.)

From DRAM to microprocessors
In 1983, at the dawn of the personal computer era, Intel's profits came under increased pressure from Japanese memory-chip manufacturers, and then-President Andy Grove drove the company into a focus on microprocessors. Grove described this transition in the book Only the Paranoid Survive. A key element of his plan was the notion, then considered radical, of becoming the single source for successors to the popular 8086 microprocessor.
Until then, manufacture of complex integrated circuits was not reliable enough for customers to depend on a single supplier, but Grove began producing processors in three geographically distinct factories, and ceased licensing the chip designs to competitors such as Zilog and AMD. When the PC industry exploded in the late 1980s and 1990s, Intel was one of the primary beneficiaries.

Intel, x86 processors, and the IBM PC
Despite the ultimate importance of the microprocessor, the 4004 and its successors the 8008 and the 8080 were never major revenue contributors at Intel. As the next processor, the 8086 (and its variant the 8088) was completed in 1978, Intel embarked on a major marketing and sales campaign for that chip nicknamed "Operation Crush", and intended to win as many customers for the processor as possible. One design win was the newly-created IBM PC division, though the importance of this was not fully realized at the time.
IBM introduced its personal computer in 1981, and it was rapidly successful. In 1982, Intel created the 80286 microprocessor, which, two years later, was used in the IBM PC/AT. Compaq, the first IBM PC "clone" manufacturer, in 1985 produced a desktop system based on the faster 80286 processor and in 1986 quickly followed with the first 80386-based system, beating IBM and establishing a competitive market for PC-compatible systems and setting up Intel as a key component supplier.
In 1975 the company had started a project to develop a highly-advanced 32-bit microprocessor, finally released in 1981 as the Intel iAPX 432. The project was too ambitious and the processor was never able to meet its performance objectives, and it failed in the marketplace. Intel extended the x86 architecture to 32 bits instead.
386 microprocessor
During this period Andy Grove dramatically redirected the company, closing much of its DRAM business and directing resources to the microprocessor business. Of perhaps greater importance was his decision to "single-source" the 386 microprocessor. Prior to this, microprocessor manufacturing was in its infancy, and manufacturing problems frequently reduced or stopped production, interrupting supplies to customers. To mitigate this risk, these customers typically insisted that multiple manufacturers produce chips they could use to ensure a consistent supply. The 8080 and 8086-series microprocessors were produced by several companies, notably Zilog and AMD. Grove made the decision not to license the 386 design to other manufacturers, instead producing it in three geographically distinct factories in Santa Clara, CA; Hillsboro, OR; and the Phoenix, Arizona suburb of Chandler; and convincing customers that this would ensure consistent delivery. As the success of Compaq's Deskpro 386 established the 386 as the dominant CPU choice, Intel achieved a position of near-exclusive dominance as its supplier. Profits from this funded rapid development of both higher-performance chip designs and higher-performance manufacturing capabilities, propelling Intel to a position of unquestioned leadership by the early 1990s.
486, Pentium, and Itanium
Intel introduced the 486 microprocessor in 1989, and in 1990 formally established a second design team, designing the processors code-named "P5" and "P6" in parallel and committing to a major new processor every two years, versus the four or more years such designs had previously taken. The P5 was introduced in 1993 as the Intel Pentium, substituting a trademarked name for the former part number (numbers, like 486, cannot be trademarked). The P6 followed in 1995 as the Pentium Pro and improved into the Pentium II in 1997. New architectures were developed alternately in Santa Clara, California and Hillsboro, Oregon.
The Santa Clara design team embarked in 1993 on a successor to the x86 architecture, codenamed "P7". The first attempt was dropped a year later, but quickly revived in a cooperative program with Hewlett-Packard engineers, though Intel soon took over primary design responsibility. The resulting implementation of the IA-64 64-bit architecture was the Itanium, finally introduced in June 2001. The Itanium's performance running legacy x86 code did not achieve expectations, and it failed to effectively compete with 64-bit extensions to the original x86 architecture, first from AMD (the AMD64), then from Intel itself (the Intel 64 architecture, formerly known as EM64T). As of November 2007, Intel continues to develop and deploy the Itanium.
The Hillsboro team designed the Willamette processor (code-named P67 and P68) which was marketed as the Pentium 4, and later developed the 64-bit extensions to the x86 architecture, present in some versions of the Pentium 4 and in the Intel Core 2 chips. Many chip variants were developed at an office in Haifa, Israel.
Pentium flaw
In June 1994, Intel engineers discovered a flaw in the floating-point math subsection of the Pentium microprocessor. Under certain data dependent conditions, low order bits of the result of floating-point division operations would be incorrect, an error that can quickly compound in floating-point operations to much larger errors in subsequent calculations. Intel corrected the error in a future chip revision, but nonetheless declined to disclose it.
In October 1994, Dr. Thomas Nicely, Professor of Mathematics at Lynchburg College independently discovered the bug, and upon receiving no response from his inquiry to Intel, on October 30 posted a message on the Internet. Word of the bug spread quickly on the Internet and then to the industry press. Because the bug was easy to replicate by an average user (there was a sequence of numbers one could enter into the OS calculator to show the error), Intel's statements that it was minor and "not even an erratum" were not accepted by many computer users. During Thanksgiving 1994, the New York Times ran a piece by journalist John Markoff spotlighting the error. Intel changed its position and offered to replace every chip, quickly putting in place a large end-user support organization. This resulted in a $500 million charge against Intel's 1994 revenue.
Ironically, the "Pentium flaw" incident, Intel's response to it, and the surrounding media coverage propelled Intel from being a technology supplier generally unknown to most computer users to a household name. Dovetailing with an uptick in the "Intel Inside" campaign, the episode is considered by some to have been a positive event for Intel, changing some of its business practices to be more end-user focused and generating substantial public awareness, while avoiding (for most users) a lasting negative impression.
Intel Inside, Intel Systems Division, and Intel Architecture Labs
During this period, Intel undertook two major supporting programs that helped guarantee their processor's success. The first is widely-known: the 1990 "Intel Inside" marketing and branding campaign. This campaign established Intel, which had been a component supplier little-known outside the PC industry, as a household name. The second program is little-known: Intel's Systems Group began, in the early 1990s, manufacturing PC "motherboards", the main board component of a personal computer, and the one into which the processor (CPU) and memory (RAM) chips are plugged. Shortly after, Intel began manufacturing fully-configured "white box" systems for the dozens of PC clone companies that rapidly sprang up. At its peak in the mid-1990s, Intel manufactured over 15% of all PCs, making it the third-largest supplier at the time. By manufacturing leading-edge PC motherboards systems, Intel enabled smaller manufacturers to compete with larger manufacturers, accelerating the adoption of the newest microprocessors and system architecture, including the PCI bus, USB and other innovations. This led to more rapid adoption of each of its new processors in turn.
During the 1990s, Intel's Architecture Lab (IAL) was responsible for many of the hardware innovations of the personal computer, including the PCI Bus, the PCI Express (PCIe) bus, the Universal Serial Bus (USB), Bluetooth wireless interconnect, and the now-dominant architecture for multiprocessor servers. IAL's software efforts met with a more mixed fate; its video and graphics software was important in the development of software digital video, but later its efforts were largely overshadowed by competition from Microsoft. The competition between Intel and Microsoft was revealed in testimony by IAL Vice-President Steven McGeady at the Microsoft antitrust trial.
Another factor contributing to rapid adoption of Intel's processors during this period were the successive release of Microsoft Windows operating systems, each requiring significantly greater processor resources. The releases of Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows 2000 provided impetus for successive generations of hardware.

Competition, antitrust and espionage
Two factors combined to end this dominance: the slowing of PC demand growth beginning in 2000 and the rise of the low-cost PC. By the end of the 1990s, microprocessor performance had outstripped software demand for that CPU power. Aside from high-end server systems and software, demand for which dropped with the end of the "dot-com bubble", consumer systems ran effectively on increasingly low-cost systems after 2000. Intel's strategy of producing ever-more-powerful processors and obsoleting their predecessors stumbled, leaving an opportunity for rapid gains by competitors, notably AMD. This in turn lowered the profitability of the processor line and ended an era of unprecedented dominance of the PC hardware by Intel.
Intel's dominance in the x86 microprocessor market led to numerous charges of antitrust violations over the years, including FTC investigations in both the late 1980s and in 1999, and civil actions such as the 1997 suit by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) and a patent suit by Intergraph. Intel's market dominance (at one time it controlled over 85% of the market for 32-bit PC microprocessors) combined with Intel's own hardball legal tactics (such as its infamous 338 patent suit versus PC manufacturers) made it an attractive target for litigation, but few of the lawsuits ever amounted to anything.
A case of industrial espionage arose in 1995 that involved both Intel and AMD. Guillermo Gaede, an Argentine formerly employed both at AMD and at Intel's Arizona plant, was arrested for attempting in 1993 to sell the i486 and Pentium designs to AMD and to certain foreign powers. Gaede videotaped data from his computer screen at Intel and mailed it to AMD, which alerted Intel and authorities, resulting in Gaede's arrest. Gaede was convicted and sentenced to 33 months in prison in June of 1996.

Partnership with Apple
On June 6, 2005, Apple CEO Steve Jobs announced that Apple would be transitioning from its long favored PowerPC architecture to the Intel x86 architecture, because the future PowerPC road map was unable to satisfy Apple's needs. The first Apple computers containing Intel CPUs were announced on January 10, 2006. Apple initially planned to put Intel chips in all of their computers by the end of 2007, and later announced that it would be complete by the end of 2006, but Apple managed to have its entire consumer product line running on Intel processors by early August 2006. The Apple Xserve server was updated to Intel Xeon processors from November 2006 and is offered in a configuration similar to Apple's Mac Pro.

Core Duo advertisement controversy
In 2007, the company released a print advertisement for its Core Duo processor featuring six African American runners appearing to bow down to a Caucasian male inside of an office setting. According to Nancy Bhagat, Vice President of Intel Corporate Marketing, the general public found the ad to be "insensitive and insulting". The campaign was quickly pulled and several Intel executives made public apologies on the corporate website.

Corporate affairs
In September 2006, Intel had nearly 100,000 employees and 200 facilities world wide. Its 2005 revenues were $38.8 billion and its Fortune 500 ranking was 49th. Its stock symbol is INTC, listed on the NASDAQ.

Leadership and corporate structure
Robert Noyce was Intel's CEO at its founding in 1968, followed by co-founder Gordon Moore in 1975. Andy Grove became the company's President in 1979 and added the CEO title in 1987 when Moore became Chairman. In 1997 Grove succeeded Moore as Chairman, and Craig Barrett, already company president, took over. On May 18, 2005, Barrett handed the reins of the company over to Paul Otellini, who previously was the company president and was responsible for Intel's design win in the original IBM PC. The board of directors elected Otellini CEO, and Barrett replaced Grove as Chairman of the Board. Grove stepped down as Chairman, but will be retained as a special adviser.
Current members of the board of directors of Intel are Craig Barrett, Charlene Barshefsky, Susan Decker, James Guzy, Reed Hundt, Paul Otellini, James Plummer, David Pottruck, Jane Shaw, John Thornton, and David Yoffie.

Employment
Intel is not typical of its Silicon Valley counterparts. Its culture is not as relaxed and informal as companies such as Google or Sun Microsystems. It has a fairly strict meritocracy that rewards work generously and does not keep underrated employees around for very long.
The firm promotes very heavily from within, most notably in its executive suite. The company has resisted the trend toward outsider CEOs. Paul Otellini was a 30-year veteran of the company when he assumed the role of CEO. All of his top lieutenants have risen through the ranks after many years with the firm. In many cases, Intel's top executives have spent their entire working careers with Intel, a very rare occurrence in volatile Silicon Valley.
Intel has a mandatory retirement policy for its CEO when they reach age 65, but only one CEO, Barrett, has actually retired at 65. Previous CEOs all retired before reaching that age; Grove retired at 62, while both Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore retired at 58. At 57, Otellini has a long career at the helm ahead of him, assuming he goes until age 65 and performs satisfactorily.
No one has an office; everyone, even Otellini, sits in a cubicle. This is designed to promote egalitarianism among employees, but some new hires have difficulty adjusting to this change. Intel is not alone in this policy. Hewlett-Packard has a similar no-office policy.
Outside of California, the company has facilities in China, Israel, Ireland, India, Philippines, and Russia internationally. In the U.S. Intel employs significant numbers of people in Colorado, Massachusetts, Arizona, New Mexico, Oregon, Texas, Washington, and Utah. In Oregon, Intel is the state's largest employer with over 16,000 employees, primarily in Hillsboro. The company is the largest industrial employer in New Mexico while in Arizona the company has over 10,000 employees.
Diversity Initiative
Intel has a Diversity Initiative, including employee diversity groups as well as supplier diversity programs. Like many companies with employee diversity groups, they include groups based on race and nationality as well as sexual identity and religion. In 1994, Intel sanctioned one of the earliest corporate Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender employee groups, and supports a Muslim employees group, a Jewish employees group, and a Bible-based Christian group.
Intel received a 100% rating on the first Corporate Equality Index released by the Human Rights Campaign in 2002. It has maintained this rating in 2003 and 2004. In addition, the company was named one of the 100 Best Companies for Working Mothers in 2005 by Working Mother magazine. However, Intel's working practices still face criticism, most notably from Ken Hamidi, a former employee who has been subject to multiple unsuccessful lawsuits from Intel.

Finances
Intel's market capitalization is $153.42 billion (October 31, 2007). It publicly trades on NASDAQ with the symbol INTC, and is a member of the following indices: Dow Jones Industrial Average, S&P 500, NASDAQ-100, SOX (PHLX Semiconductor Sector), and GSTI Software Index.
INTC is a widely-held stock, with almost 5.85 billion shares outstanding. Institutional investors and mutual funds hold 60% of this stock, and corporate insiders, including Gordon Moore and Andy Grove, hold only about 3%. Intel achieved its all-time high closing stock price on August 31, 2000 at $74.87. Since then, it reached a low closing price of $14.62 on September 23, 2002. As of late October 2007, the stock price was trading in a range between $25.50 and $26.50.

Advertising and brand management
Intel has become one of the world's most recognizable computer brands following its long-running "Intel Inside" campaign. The campaign, which started in 1990, was created by Intel marketing manager Dennis Carter. The five-note jingle was introduced the following year and by its tenth anniversary was being heard in 130 countries around the world.
The Intel Inside program was very lucrative for advertisers and further served to broaden the company's awareness as a key ingredient inside PCs. Intel paid half the advertising costs for any ad that used the "Intel Inside" logo. If the ads didn't meet these requirements, Intel did not pay half the cost, and the advertiser was prohibited from using the "Intel Inside" logo. PC companies advertising products containing Intel chips are required to include the jingle in their film and television advertisements in order to receive the reimbursement.
The Centrino advertising campaign has been hugely successful, leading to the ability to access wireless internet from a laptop becoming linked in consumers' minds to Intel chips. In the UK this has caused some controversy, as the ASA upheld complaints that this was a misleading advert.
In December 2005, Intel phased out the "Intel Inside" campaign in favor of a new logo and the slogan, "Leap ahead". The new logo is clearly inspired by the "Intel Inside" logo.
In 2006, Intel expanded its promotion of open specification platforms beyond Centrino, to include the Viiv media centre PC and the business desktop Intel vPro.
In mid January 2006, Intel announced that they were dropping the long running Pentium name from its processors. The Pentium name was first used to refer to the P5 core Intel processors (Pent refers to the 5 in P5,) and was done to circumvent court rulings that prevent the trademarking of a string of numbers, so competitors could not just call their processor the same name, as had been done with the prior 386 and 486 processors. (Both of which had copies manufactured by both IBM and AMD). They phased out the Pentium names from mobile processors first, when the new Yonah chips, branded Core Solo and Core Duo, were released. The desktop processors changed when the Core 2 line of processors were released.
In March 2007, the Intel logo was shown briefly in one of the scenes of the movie, "The Last Mimzy."
Though some[attribution needed] in the Macintosh community were concerned that Intel's branding, including the decals and jingle, would be used with the new Intel-based Macintoshes (see Apple Intel transition), this has not occurred.
As from 2008, Intel plans to shift the emphasis of its "Intel Inside" campaign from traditional media such as television and print to newer media such as the Internet. Intel will require that a minimum of 35% of the money it provides to the companies in its co-op program be used for online marketing.
Intel's "Intel Inside" campaign has generally been considered to be world class marketing. However, over the years there have been several plays on the Intel branding scheme which have appeared on the web. While such jabs at Intel are obviously beyond the company's ability to control, they do tend to show that not everyone believes that Intel's programs and policies are always world class. For example, there is the popular "evil inside" logo, the ubiquitous picture of a tombstone with "R.I.P Intel Inside"
Sonic logo
The famous "D? D? G? D? A?" jingle, sonic logo, tag, audio mnemonic (MP3 file of sonic logo) was written by Walter Werzowa from the Austrian 1980s sampling band Edelweiss.

Open source support
Intel has a significant participation in the open source communities. For example, in 2006 Intel released MIT-licensed X.org drivers for their integrated graphics cards of the i965 family of chipsets. On other occasions, Intel released FreeBSD drivers for some networking cards, available under a BSD-compatible licence, which were also ported to OpenBSD. Intel also released its EFI core named as EDK under a BSD-compatible licence.
However, after the release of the wireless products called Intel Pro/Wireless 2100, 2200BG/2225BG/2915ABG and 3945ABG in 2005, Intel was criticized for not granting free redistribution rights for the firmwares that are necessary to be included in the operating systems for the wireless devices to operate. As a result of this, Intel became a target of campaigns to allow free operating systems to include binary firmwares on terms acceptable to the open source community. Linspire-Linux creator Michael Robertson outlined the difficult position that Intel was in releasing to Open Source, as Intel did not want to upset their large customer Microsoft. Theo de Raadt of OpenBSD also claimed that Intel is being "an Open Source fraud" after an Intel employee presented a distorted view of the situation on an open-source conference. In spite of the significant negative attention Intel received as a result of the wireless dealings, the binary firmware still has not gained a license compatible with free software principles.

Competition
During the 1980s, Intel was among the top ten worldwide semiconductor sales leaders (10th in 1987), dominated by Japanese chip makers. In 1991, Intel achieved the number one ranking and has held it ever since. Other top semiconductor companies include AMD, Samsung, Texas Instruments, Toshiba and STMicroelectronics.
Further information: Semiconductor sales leaders by year
Competitors in PC chipsets include VIA Technologies, SiS, ATI, and NVIDIA. Intel's competitors in networking include Freescale, Infineon, Broadcom, Marvell Technology Group and AMCC, and its competitors in flash memory include Spansion, Samsung, Qimonda, Toshiba, STMicroelectronics, and Hynix.
The only major competitor to Intel on the x86 processor market is Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), with which Intel has had full cross-licensing agreements since 1976: each partner can use the other's patented technological innovations without charge after a certain time. However, the cross-licensing agreement is canceled in the event of an AMD bankruptcy or takeover. Some smaller competitors such as VIA and Transmeta produce low-power processors for small factor computers and portable equipment.

Lawsuits
In September 2005, Intel filed its response to an AMD lawsuit, disputing AMD's claims, and stating that its business practices are fair and lawful. In its rebuttal, Intel laid out the skeleton of its legal defense, which included a deconstruction of AMD's offensive strategy and levied the charge that AMD's long-struggling market position is largely a result of bad business decisions and management incompetence, including underinvestment in essential manufacturing capacity and over-reliance on contracting out chip foundries.
Legal experts predict the lawsuit will most likely drag out for a number of years, since Intel's response indicates they are not likely to try to settle with AMD.
In October 2006, a Transmeta lawsuit was filed against Intel for patent infringement covering computer architecture and power efficiency technologies. In October 2007, the Transmeta-Intel lawsuit was settled, with Intel agreeing to pay an initial US$150 million and US$20 million per year for the next 5 years. Both companies agreed to drop lawsuits against each other while Intel was granted a perpetual non-exclusive license to use current and future patented Transmeta technologies in its chips for 10 years.

Anti-competitive allegations by regulatory bodies
In July 2007, the European Commission formally accused Intel of anti-competitive practices, mostly against its main competitor AMD. The allegations, going back to 2003, include giving preferential prices to computer makers getting most or all CPU chips from Intel, paying computer makers to delay or cancel the launch of products using AMD chips and providing CPU chips at below cost to governments and educational institutions.
Intel responded that the allegations were unfounded and instead qualified its market behavior as consumer-friendly. General counsel Bruce Sewell also responded that the Commission had misunderstood some factual assumptions concerning price and manufacturing costs.
If found guilty of stifling competition, Intel could be fined up to 10% of its annual revenue. Rival AMD also subsequently launched a website focusing on these allegations.
In September 2007, South Korean regulators formally accused Intel of breaking antitrust law. The inquiry began in February 2006 when officials raided Intel's South Korean offices. If found guilty, the company risks being fined up to 3% of its annual sales.

Quotes

See also

References

McDonalds

McDonald's Corporation (NYSE: MCD) is the world's largest chain of fast food restaurants, primarily selling hamburgers, cheeseburgers, chicken products, french fries, breakfast items, soft drinks, milkshakes and desserts. More recently, it also offers salads, fruit, snack wraps, and carrot sticks.

History
The business began in 1940, with a restaurant opened by siblings Dick and Mac McDonald in San Bernardino, California. Their introduction of the "Speedee Service System" in 1948 established the principles of the modern fast-food restaurant. The present corporation dates its founding to the opening of a franchised restaurant by Ray Kroc, in Des Plaines, Illinois on April 15, 1955, the ninth McDonald's restaurant overall. Kroc later purchased the McDonald brothers' equity in the company and led its worldwide expansion.
With the successful expansion of McDonald's into many international markets, the company has become a symbol of globalization and the spread of the American way of life. Its prominence has also made it a frequent topic of public debates about obesity, corporate ethics and consumer responsibility.

Corporate overview

Facts and figures
McDonald's restaurants are found in 120 countries and territories around the world and serve nearly 54 million customers each day. The company also operates other restaurant brands, such as Piles Caf?, and has a minority stake in Pret a Manger. The company owned a majority stake in Chipotle Mexican Grill until completing its divestment in October 2006. Until December 2003, it also owned Donatos Pizza. On August 27, 2007, McDonald's sold Boston Market to Sun Capital Partners. It also has a subsidiary, Redbox, which started in 2003 as 18-foot (5.5 m) wide automated convenience stores, but as of 2005, has focused on DVD rental machines.

Types of restaurants
Most standalone McDonald's restaurants offer both counter service and drive-through service, with indoor and sometimes outdoor seating. Drive-Thru, Auto-Mac, Pay and Drive, or McDrive as it is known in many countries, often has separate stations for placing, paying for, and picking up orders, though the latter two steps are frequently combined; it was first introduced in Arizona in 1975, following the lead of other fast-food chains. In some countries "McDrive" locations near highways offer no counter service or seating. In contrast, locations in high-density city neighborhoods often omit drive-through service. There are also a few locations, located mostly in downtown districts, that offer Walk-Thru service in place of Drive-Thru.
Specially themed restaurants also exist, such as the "Solid Gold McDonald's," a 1950s rock-and-roll themed restaurant. In Victoria, British Columbia, there is also a McDonald's with a 24 carat (100%) gold chandelier and similar light fixtures.
To accommodate the current trend for high quality coffee and the popularity coffeeshops in general, McDonald's introduced McCaf?s. The McCaf? concept is a caf?-style accompaniment to McDonald's restaurants. McCaf? is a concept of McDonald's Australia, starting with Melbourne in 1993. Today, most McDonald's in Australia have McCaf?s located within the existing McDonald's restaurant. In Tasmania there are McCaf?s in every store.
As of the end of 2003 there were over 600 McCaf?s worldwide.
Some locations are connected to BP gas stations/convenience stores, while others called McDonald's Express have limited seating and/or menu or may be located in a shopping mall. Other McDonald's are located in Wal-Mart stores. McStop is a location targeted at truckers and travelers which may have services found at truck stops.

Children's areas
Some McDonald's in suburban areas and certain cities feature large indoor or outdoor playgrounds, called "McDonald's PlayPlace" (if indoors) or "Playland" (outdoors). The first PlayPlace with the familiar crawl-tube design with ball pits and slides was introduced in 1987 in the USA, with many more being constructed soon after. Some PlayPlace playgrounds have been renovated into "R Gym" areas.
"R Gyms" are in-restaurant play area that features interactive game zones designed for children aged 4 to 12. Equipped with stationary bicycles attached to video games, dance pads, basketball hoops, monkey bars, an obstacle course, and other games which emphasize physical activity.
The "R Gym" features the Toddler Zone, an active play environment with age appropriate games that develop physical coordination and social skills; the Active Zone, designed for children aged four-to-eight that promotes physical fitness through fun play; the Sports Zone which features a series of sport oriented activities to promote aerobic exercise for children aged 9-to-12; the Parent Zone which features seating and provides a monitoring area for their children; and the Dining Area which allows families to eat.

Redesign
In 2006, McDonald's introduced its "Forever Young" brand by redesigning all of their restaurants, the first major redesign since the 1970s.
The new design will include the traditional McDonald's yellow and red colors, but the red will be muted to terra cotta, the yellow will turn golden for a more "sunny" look, and olive and sage green will be added. To warm up their look, the restaurants will have less plastic and more brick and wood, with modern hanging lights to produce a softer glow. Contemporary art or framed photographs will hang on the walls.
The exterior will have golden awnings and a "swish brow" instead of the traditional double-slanted mansard roof.
The new restaurants will feature areas:
The "linger" zone will offer armchairs, sofas, and Wi-Fi connections.
The "grab and go" zone will feature tall counters with bar stools for customers who eat alone; Plasma TVs will offer them news and weather reports.
The "flexible" zone will be targeted toward families and will have booths featuring fabric cushions with colorful patterns and flexible seating.
Different music will be targeted to each zone.

Business model
The McDonald's Corporation's business model is slightly different from that of most other fast-food chains. In addition to ordinary franchise fees, supplies, and percentage of sales, McDonald's also collects rent, partially linked to sales. As a condition of the franchise agreement, the Corporation owns the properties on which most McDonald's franchises are located. The UK business model is different, in that fewer than 30% of restaurants are franchised, with the majority under the ownership of the company. McDonald's trains its franchisees and others at Hamburger University in Oak Brook, Illinois.
According to Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlosser (2001), nearly one in eight workers in the U.S. have at some time been employed by McDonald's. (According to a news piece on Fox News this figure is one in ten). The book also states that McDonald's is the largest private operator of playgrounds in the U.S., as well as the single largest purchaser of beef, pork, potatoes, and apples. The selection of meats McDonald's uses varies with the culture of the host country.

Global impact
McDonald's has become emblematic of globalization, sometimes referred as the "McDonaldization" of society. The Economist magazine uses the "Big Mac Index": the comparison of a Big Mac's cost in various world currencies can be used to informally judge these currencies' purchasing power parity.
The EFTA countries are leading the Big Mac Index with the top 3 most expensive Big Mac's. Iceland has the most expensive Big Mac, followed by Norway and Switzerland.
The brand is known informally as "Mickey D's" (in the US and Canada), "Macky D's" (in the UK), "McDo" (in France, Quebec, the Philippines, and the Kansai region of Japan), "Maccer's" (in Ireland), "Macarrannis" (in Mexico), "Maccas" (in New Zealand and Australia), "Mackedonkan" or just "Donkan" (in Sweden) or "de Mac" (in the Netherlands).
Thomas Friedman once said that no country with a McDonald's had gone to war with another. However, the "Golden Arches Theory of Conflict Prevention" is not strictly true. Careful historians point to the 1989 United States invasion of Panama, NATO's bombing of Serbia in 1999, and the 2006 Lebanon War as exceptions.
Some observers have suggested that the company should be given credit for increasing the standard of service in markets that it enters. A group of anthropologists in a study entitled Golden Arches East (Stanford University Press, 1998, edited by James L. Watson) looked at the impact McDonald's had on East Asia, and Hong Kong in particular. When it opened in Hong Kong in 1975, McDonald's was the first restaurant to consistently offer clean restrooms, driving customers to demand the same of other restaurants and institutions. In East Asia in particular, McDonald's have become a symbol for the desire to embrace Western cultural norms. McDonald's have recently taken to partnering up with Sinopec, China's second largest oil company, in the People's Republic of China, as it begins to take advantage of China's growing use of personal vehicles by opening numerous drive-thru restaurants.
In addition to its effect on business standards, McDonald's has also been instrumental in changing local customs. By popularizing the idea of a quick restaurant meal, Watson's study suggests, McDonald's led to the easing or elimination of various taboos, such as eating while walking in Japan.[dubious - discuss]

Global locations

Criticism
Since the mid-1990s protest has often taken the form of an anti-globalization movement as documented in Naomi Klein's manifesto No Logo. McDonald's restaurants have been the targets of protests, peaceful and otherwise, by environmental, anti-globalization and animal rights activists. The company has used litigation in an effort to protect its business interests.
For example, in 1990, two British activists, David Morris and Helen Steel, distributed leaflets entitled What's wrong with McDonald's? on the streets of London. McDonald's wrote to Steel and Morris demanding they desist and apologize, and, when they refused, sued them for libel.
The trial lasted more than two years. The company's advertising techniques and business practices were scrutinized in the High Court of Justice in London and reported extensively in the press, who saw the case as a David and Goliath battle (under UK law, legal aid could not be granted for a defamation suit, so Steel and Morris did most of their own legal casework while McDonald's was represented by an extensive legal team).
In June 1997, the judge ruled in favor of McDonald's, awarding the company ?60,000 damages, which was later reduced to ?40,000 by the Court of Appeal. The amount was low because the judge ruled that some of the claims made by Morris and Steel had been proven, including that McDonald's exploited children in its advertising, was anti-trade union and indirectly exploited and caused suffering to animals. Steel and Morris announced they had no intention of ever paying, and the company later confirmed it would not be pursuing the money.
Steel and Morris later successfully challenged UK libel law in the European Court, arguing that it was an infringement of the right to free speech. The British Government was forced to re-write the legislation as a result. In 2005, a film by Ken Loach was made about the court case.
In 2001, Eric Schlosser's book Fast Food Nation included criticism of McDonald's' business practices. Among the critiques are allegations that McDonald's (along with other companies within the fast-food industry) uses its political influence to increase their own profits at the expense of people's health and the social conditions of its workers. The book also brings into question McDonald's advertisement techniques where it targets children. While the book does mention other fast-food chains, it focuses primarily on McDonald's.
In 2002, vegetarian groups, largely Hindu, successfully sued McDonald's for misrepresenting their French fries as vegetarian. Even after the discontinuation of frying the French fries in beef tallow in 1990, the French fries still had beef extract added to them. The French fries sold in the U.S. still contain beef and animal flavoring. McDonald's biscuits also contain beef flavoring along with animal flavoring.
Also in 2004, Morgan Spurlock's documentary film Super Size Me said that McDonald's food was contributing to the epidemic of obesity in society, and failing to provide nutritional information about its food for its customers. For 30 days Spurlock ate nothing but McDonald's (supersizing whenever asked). He ate everything on the menu at least once and continued to eat after he was full. At the same time he consciously attempted to get little or no exercise. By the end of the month he had gained 24.5 pounds (11.11 kg), was moody and had less interest in sex. Others have disputed Spurlock's claims (see below).
After the film was shown at the Sundance Film Festival, but before its cinematic release, McDonald's stated it was phasing out its Supersize meal option and would begin offering several healthier menu items, though no link to the film was cited in this decision. However, while the healthier menu items have appeared, the Supersize meal option still remains available at some locations. The company also began a practice of putting nutritional information for all menu items in light grey small print on the reverse of their tray liners. It is currently phasing in nutritional labeling in clear black print on the actual packaging of its food items.
Anthony Bourdain on his show, No Reservations, has criticised McDonald's among other fast-food restaurants for its culinary blandness.

Legal challenge over trans fats
In September 2002, McDonald's announced it was voluntarily reducing the trans fat content of its cooking oil by February 2003. Because of operational problems, the oil was not changed on time. In the ensuing lawsuits, plaintiffs claimed that McDonald's didn't do enough to inform the public that the oil was not changed.
The bantransfat.com website contains testimonials from people, one claims she thought the oil was low in trans fat, and she said, "that is why I have been eating there every week..."
In a settlement agreement, bantransfat.com said "While there is a difference of opinion regarding whether McDonald's gave effective notice to its customers that the oil was not changed, McDonald's deserves recognition and credit for having achieved a reduction in the trans fat levels ... and for working diligently over the last two years to test additional cooking oils." Nevertheless, bantransfat.com demanded monetary damages.
Settlement of the lawsuit brought by BanTransFats.com and one private party requires McDonald's spend up to $1.5 million to publish notices on the status of its trans fat initiative. McDonald's will also donate $7 million to the American Heart Association for public education about trans fat. The settlement also requires some money be paid directly to bantransfat.com.
The California Superior Court for Marin County has entered an order preliminarily approving the settlement.

Arguments in defense of McDonald's
Supporters of McDonald's point out that the company is successful because it meets the needs of customers and adapts to its customers wants.
In response to public pressure, McDonald's has sought to include more healthy choices in its menu and has introduced a new slogan to its recruitment posters: "Not bad for a McJob". (The word McJob, first attested in the mid-1980s and later popularized by Canadian novelist Douglas Coupland in his book Generation X, has become a buzz word for low-paid, unskilled work with few prospects or benefits and little security.) McDonald's disputes the idea that its restaurant jobs have no prospects, noting that its CEO, Jim Skinner, started working at the company as a regular restaurant employee, and that 20 of its top 50 managers began work as regular crew members. In 2007, the company launched an advertising campaign with the slogan "Would you like a career with that?" on Irish television, outlining that their jobs have many prospects.
In a bid to tap into growing consumer interest in the provenance of food, the fast-food chain recently switched its supply of both coffee beans and milk. UK chief executive Steve Easterbrook said: "British consumers are increasingly interested in the quality, sourcing and ethics of the food and drink they buy". McDonald's coffee is now brewed from beans taken from stocks that have been certified by the conservation group the Rainforest Alliance. Similarly, milk supplies used for its hot drinks and milkshakes have been switched to organic sources which could account for 5% of the UK's organic milk output.
In other cases, the firm has shown itself ready to adjust its business practices. When the public became concerned that product packaging was environmentally damaging, McDonald's started a joint project with Friends of the Earth to eliminate the use of polystyrene containers, in the United States, to reduce the amount of waste produced.
Throughout the McDonald's Restaurants v Morris & Steel trial, senior representatives of the firm said they were merely trying to protect its image from undue and unfounded attack. With regard to its numerous and often controversial copyright and trademark actions, McDonald's lawyers say they are simply protecting the company's intellectual property.
Super Size Me has been characterised as a non-scientific publicity stunt. The subject of the film consumes massive quantities of McDonald's food, to the point of being sickened by it. Eating on an hourly schedule and, as part of his rules, eating additional quantities each time a McDonald's worker says the word "supersize," the subject gains weight.
Following the release of the film Super Size Me, some people reported they had experienced no weight gain and suffered no ill effect by eating only at McDonald's for a month, but choosing menu items more judiciously and exercising frequently. Merab Morgan, a North Carolina woman, claimed a weight loss eating only McDonalds food. She claimed that the transparency of nutritional information made it easy to control her daily caloric intake, although others refute this claiming that some McDonalds outlets do not post nutritional information within easy reach of customers, if at all

Legal cases
McDonald's has been involved in a number of lawsuits and other legal cases, most of which involved trademark disputes. The company has threatened many food businesses with legal action unless they drop the Mc or Mac from their trading name. In one noteworthy case, McDonald's sued a Scottish caf? owner called McDonald, even though the business in question dated back over a century (Sheriff Court [Glasgow and Strathkelvin], 21 November 1952).
It has also filed numerous defamation suits. The McLibel case is probably the best known of these. McDonald's sued two Greenpeace activists for distributing pamphlets attacking its environmental, labor and health records. After the longest trial in UK legal history, McDonald's won a technical victory for showing that some allegations were untrue. But it was a massive public relations disaster since the judge also found that more than half of what was on the pamphlet was truthful.
McDonald's has defended itself in several cases involving workers' rights. In 2001 the company was fined ?12,400 by British magistrates for illegally employing and over-working child labor in one of its London restaurants. This is thought to be one of the largest fines imposed on a company for breaking laws relating to child working conditions (R v EWCA Crim 1094). In April 2007 in Perth, Western Australia, McDonald's pleaded guilty to five charges relating to the employment of children under 15 in one of its outlets and was fined AU$8,000.
Possibly the most infamous legal case involving McDonald's was the 1994 decision in The McDonald's Coffee Case.

Products
See also: McDonald's products (international)
McDonald's predominantly sells hamburgers, various types of chicken sandwiches and products, french fries, soft drinks, breakfasts, and desserts. In most markets, McDonald's offers salads and vegetarian items, wraps and other localized fare. This local deviation from the standard menu is a characteristic for which the chain is particularly known, and one which is employed either to abide by regional food taboos (such as the religious prohibition of beef consumption in India) or to make available foods with which the regional market is more familiar (such as the sale of McRice in Indonesia).

Advertising
McDonald's has for decades maintained an extensive advertising campaign. In addition to the usual media (television, radio, and newspaper), the company makes significant use of billboards and signage, sponsors sporting events from ranging from Little League to the Olympic Games, and makes coolers of orange drink with their logo available for local events of all kinds. Nonetheless, television has always played a central role in the company's advertising strategy.
To date, McDonald's has used 23 different slogans in United States advertising, as well as a few other slogans for select countries and regions. At times, it has run into trouble with its campaigns.

Children's advertising

Disney

The Walt Disney Company (NYSE: DIS) is the third largest media and entertainment corporation in the world, second is Time Warner and first is News Corporation. Founded on October 16, 1923 by brothers Walt and Roy Disney as a small animation studio, it has become one of the biggest Hollywood studios, and owner of eleven theme parks and several television networks, including the American Broadcasting Company (ABC).
Disney's corporate headquarters and primary production facilities are located in California at the Walt Disney Studios (Burbank).
The company is a component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. It had revenues of $34.3 billion in 2006.

Holdings

Studio entertainment
Until 1955, Disney's only business was motion picture production. Disney Studio Entertainment, often known as the Walt Disney Studios, includes Disney's movie and animation studios, record labels, and Broadway style stage shows.
Since 2002, it has been headed by chairman Dick Cook.
Walt Disney Motion Pictures Group: Disney's movie studio, which includes the Walt Disney Pictures, Touchstone Pictures, Hollywood Pictures, and Miramax labels
Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar Animation Studios: Disney's animation studios, which operate independently of each other
Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures: distributes and markets company's motion pictures in the United States
Walt Disney Motion Pictures International: distributes company's motion pictures internationally
Walt Disney Home Entertainment: distributes company's motion pictures to rental and retail markets
Walt Disney Records: releases original music and movie soundtracks under four labels
Walt Disney Theatrical Productions: produces Disney Broadway-style shows
Disney Live Family Entertainment: produces the Disney on Ice shows.
DisneyToon Studios

Media networks
Its Media Networks unit is centered around the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) television network, which it acquired through a merger with Capital Cities/ABC in 1996. Properties include:
Walt Disney Television
ABC Studios (formerly Touchstone Television)
ABC Entertainment
Disney-ABC Domestic Television (formerly Buena Vista Television)
ESPN
Walt Disney Internet Group
Disney also owns a group of cable networks including:
Disney Channel
ABC Family
Toon Disney
The ESPN group
SOAPnet
Disney also holds substantial interest in Lifetime (50%), A&E (37.5%), E! (40%, recently sold to Comcast), and Jetix Europe N.V. (74%). Disney also owns 25% of the GMTV company that operates the Breakfast Programmes on ITV, in the UK and 50% of Super RTL in Germany.
Through ABC, Disney also owns 10 local television stations, 2 local radio stations, and ESPN Radio, and Radio Disney. Although the ABC Radio Network was sold with other properties to Citadel Broadcasting, (which carries such radio personalities as Sean Hannity and Paul Harvey and distributes news bulletins by ABC News), Disney shareholders now own 57% of Citadel. Disney-ABC Domestic Television, which also is a part of the Media Networks unit, produces such syndicated television programs as Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, Live with Regis and Kelly, and At the Movies with Ebert & Roeper.
Disney also operates its own publishing company, Hyperion, and Walt Disney Internet Group (WDIG) through Media Networks. Hyperion has recently published books by comedian-author Steve Martin and bestselling author Mitch Albom. WDIG includes the Go.com web portal, Infoseek search engine which it purchased in 1998, and leading websites such as Disney.com, ESPN.com, ABCNews.com and Movies.com. In March 2007, it was reported that Disney is launching a new Web site, Disney Family http://newsmax.com/archives/articles/2007/3/13/75712.shtml, which is a one-stop site for parents.

Film and television library
The Walt Disney Company owns a small but substantial film and television library. In addition to the theatrical films and television shows produced by the Walt Disney label, Touchstone, Hollywood and Miramax; Disney owns the pre-2005 Dimension films library. After its purchase of ABC/Capital Cities, the company gained rights to most of its theatrical and television film library (including most of the Selznick International Pictures and Selmur Productions films) and a good mount of the Pre-Disney ABC television shows. While buying Jim Henson's Muppets Disney bought the rights the films starring the Muppets and the television show The Muppet Show from Columbia Pictures. Disney also bought individual films as well such as; the 1940 version of Swiss Family Robinson from RKO and the silent film version of Peter Pan previously released by Paramount Pictures.

Consumer products
Disney Consumer Products
Disney Store
Jim Henson's Muppets
Disney Interactive Studios

Disney parks
Disneyland Resort
Walt Disney World Resort
Disneyland Resort Paris
Hong Kong Disneyland
Walt Disney Imagineering
Tokyo Disney Resort
Disney Cruise Line

The Disney College Program
Disney maintains several programs for high school grads, current students and graduates, most notably the College Program and the International College Program. Students are trained to share world-class guestservice and hospitality. Part of the program are the colleges on Organizational Leadership and Marketing among others, which every student has in the week depending on the arrangement with their respective universities. Disney World Orlando Castmembers, as all park and resort personnel at Walt Disney World are called, are known worldwide for their high levels of dedication in getting the work done, discipline in doing the work right and showmanship to entertain at all times to all guests. Graduates of the College Program receive a Certificate of Completion and depending on the program time and college levels this would be a Ducktorate or Mousters. Former CP's have an advantage of being hired more easy and faster for trainee postions than those who do not have any experience at Disney. To a lesser degree, most of the former CP's are also known that their Castmember period was a life-altering experience and they as an individual have developed themselves to a person that is able to make better judgements, maintain and use a broad perspective, become an instinctive marketer, still remembers their accomplished level of guestservice and hospitality etcetera.

History

Founding and early success (1922-1966)
1923: Walt signed a contract with M.J. Winkler to produce a series of Alice Comedies - October 16 - the date used as the start of the Disney company. Originally know as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, with brothers Walt and Roy Disney, as equal partners.
1924: First Alice comedy, "Alice's Day at Sea", released.
1926: At Roy's suggestion, the company changed its name to the Walt Disney Studio shortly after moving into the new studio on Hyperion Avenue in the Silver Lake district.
1927: The Alice series ends; first Oswald the Lucky Rabbit cartoon.
1928: Walt loses the Oswald series contract; first Mickey Mouse cartoon, "Steamboat Willie", released at the Colony Theatre in New York, the first cartoon with sound on November 18.
1929: First Silly Symphony, "The Skeleton Dance". On December 16, the original partnership formed in 1923 is replaced by Walt Disney Productions, Ltd. Three other companies, Walt Disney Enterprises, Disney Film Recording Company, and Liled Realty and Investment Company, are also formed.
1930: First appearance of Pluto.
1932: First three-strip Technicolor short released: "Flowers and Trees"; first appearance of Goofy.
1934: First appearance of Donald Duck.
1937: Studio produces its first full-length feature film, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The film is also the first American animated feature film in history, and was the highest-grossing film of all time until 1939's Gone with the Wind.
1938: On September 29, Walt Disney Enterprises, Disney Film Recording Company, and Liled Realty and Investment Company are merged into Walt Disney Productions.
1940: Studio moves to the Burbank, California buildings where it is located to this day. Release of animated features Pinocchio, the first animated film to win both Best Original Score and Best Song Academy Awards, and Fantasia, the first film to be recorded in stereophonic sound ("Fantasound").
1941: A bitter animators' strike occurs; as the USA enters World War II, the studio begins making morale-boosting propaganda films for the government. Dumbo is released.
1942: Saludos Amigos marks the beginning of a series of low-budget "package" animated films that would continue until 1950. Bambi is also released, after a six-year production period.
1943: Saludos Amigos is released in the United States.
1944: The company is short on cash; a theatrical re-release of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs generates much-needed revenue and begins a reissue pattern for the animated feature films.
1945: For the first time, the studio hires live actors for a feature film (Song of the South).
1947: Sign First Independent Studio, The byrnest studio in Orlando which went bankrupt three years later.
1949: The studio begins production on its first all-live action feature, Treasure Island; the popular True-Life Adventures series begins.
1950: Cinderella is released, ending the series of "package" animated films and reviving Disney feature animation.
1951: Alice in Wonderland (1951 film) released.
1952: Walt Disney forms WED Enterprises on December 16 to design his theme park.
1953: Walt Disney forms Retlaw Enterprises on April 6 to control the rights to his name. It will later own and operate several attractions inside Disneyland, including the Monorail and the Disneyland Railroad. Peter Pan is released.
1954: The studio founds Buena Vista Distribution to distribute its feature films; beginning of the Disneyland TV program, which runs for decades under several different titles. Disney becomes one of the first American theatrical TV producers to show his recent films on television, although most of them are first shown in truncated versions to fit a one-hour time slot. Others are divided into two or more one-hour segments over several weeks, so that they can be shown on Disney's TV show.
1955: Disneyland Resort opens in Anaheim, California. Lady and the Tramp, the first widescreen animated film, is released
1957: Walt Disney Productions went public on November 12.
1959: Sleeping Beauty is released.
1961: One Hundred and One Dalmatians is released, the first feature-length animated film to use Xerography.
1963: The Sword and the Stone is released.
1964: Mary Poppins is released.
1966: Walt Disney dies of lung cancer.

After Walt's death (1967-1983)
1967: Construction begins on Walt Disney World Resort; the underlying governmental structure (see Reedy Creek Improvement District) is signed into law. The Jungle Book, the last animated film involved with Walt Disney himself, is released.
1970: The Aristocats is released.
1971: The Walt Disney World Resort opens in Orlando, Florida; Roy Oliver Disney dies; Donn Tatum becomes chairman and Card Walker becomes president.
1973: Robin Hood is released.
1976: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954 film) becomes the first movie made by the studio to be shown on TV complete in one evening, as opposed to the way the Disney films were divided into weekly segments on his television show.
1977: Roy Edward Disney, son of Roy and nephew of Walt, resigns from the company citing a decline in overall product quality and issues with management. The Rescuers is released.
1978: The studio licenses several minor titles to MCA Discovision for laserdisc release; only TV compilations of cartoons ever see the light of day through this deal.
1979: Don Bluth and a number of his allies leave the animation division; the studio releases its first PG-rated films, Take Down and The Black Hole.
1980: Tom Wilhite becomes head of the film division with the intent of modernizing studio product; a home video division is created.
1981: Plans for a cable network are announced. Dumbo hits the shelves for video retail, making it the first animated Disney feature available on video. The Fox and the Hound is released.
1982: Epcot (formerly EPCOT Center) opens at Walt Disney World Resort; Walt Disney's son-in-law Ron W. Miller succeeds Card Walker as CEO.
1983: As the anthology series is canceled, Disney Channel begins operation on US cable systems. Tom Wilhite resigns his post as head of the film division. Tokyo Disneyland opens in Japan.

Eisner era (1984-2005)
1984: Touchstone Films is created after the studio narrowly escapes a buyout attempt by Saul Steinberg, and releases its first film Splash. Roy Edward Disney and his business partner, Stanley Gold, remove Ron W. Miller as CEO and president, replacing him with Michael Eisner and Frank Wells. The Walt Disney Classics video collection starts up.
1985: The studio begins making cartoons for television beginning with Disney's Adventures of the Gummi Bears and The Wuzzles. The Black Cauldron, the studio's first PG-rated animated film, is a box-office failure, along with Return To Oz. The home video release of Pinocchio becomes a best-seller.
1986: The company's name is changed on February 6 from Walt Disney Productions to The Walt Disney Company. Disney's first R-rated film, Down and Out in Beverly Hills, is released under the Touchstone banner. The Great Mouse Detective is released.
1987: The company and the French government sign an agreement for the creation of the first Disney Resort in Europe: the Euro Disney project starts. The company opens up a Hall of Fame with Fred MacMurray as the first induction. Tough Guys Don't Dance is Disney's first thriller movie.
1988: Who Framed Roger Rabbit, a co-production of Disney's Touchstone Pictures and Steven Spielberg's Amblin Entertainment is released on June 22. Oliver and Company is released on November 18.
1989: Disney offers a deal to buy Jim Henson's Muppets and have the famed puppeteer work with Disney resources; Disney's Hollywood Studios (formerly Disney-MGM Studios) opens at Walt Disney World; The Little Mermaid sparks a Disney animation renaissance.
1990: Jim Henson's death sours the deal to buy his holdings; the anthology series is canceled for the second time. The Rescuers Down Under is released.
1991: Beauty and the Beast is released, becoming the only animated film nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture.
1992: The controversial Euro Disney Resort opens outside Paris. Aladdin is released.
1992: The Disney Company is granted permission for a National Hockey League expansion franchise. The team is named the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim to coincide with the release of The Mighty Ducks.
1993: Disney acquires independent film distributor Miramax Films; Winnie the Pooh merchandise outsells Mickey Mouse merchandise for the first time; the policy of periodic theatrical re-issues ends with this year's re-issue of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, but is augmented for video.
1994: Frank Wells is killed in a helicopter crash. Jeffrey Katzenberg resigns to co-found his own studio, DreamWorks SKG. Plans for Disney's America, a historical theme park in Haymarket, Virginia, are abruptly dropped. Euro Disneyland is renamed Disneyland Paris. The Classics video line is unofficially canceled and replaced with the Masterpiece Collection. The Lion King, the highest-grossing traditionally animated film in history.
1995: In October, the company hires Hollywood super agent Michael Ovitz to be president. Disney purchases DiC, and owned rights to shows, including dubbing of the first two seasons of Sailor Moon. The first computer-animated feature film, Toy Story, produced by Pixar Animation Studios, is released by Disney, and becomes the year's top-grossing film. Pocahontas is also released.
1996: The company takes on the Disney Enterprises name and acquires the Capital Cities/ABC group, renaming it ABC, Inc. To celebrate the pairing, ABC's first Super Soap Weekend is held at Walt Disney World. Disney makes deal with Tokuma Shoten for dubbing and releasing of Studio Ghibli films in the U.S. In December, Michael Ovitz, president of the company, leaves "by mutual consent". The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996 film) is released.
1997: The anthology series is revived again; the home video division releases its first DVDs. The Southern Baptist Convention votes to boycott The Walt Disney Company over opposition to the latter offering equal health and other benefits to gays and lesbians, as well as Disney allowing outside organizers to have "Gay and Lesbian Days" at Walt Disney World. Disney ignored the boycott, which failed and was withdrawn by the SBC on June 22, 2005. Hercules is released.
1998: Disney's Animal Kingdom opens at Walt Disney World. Kiki's Delivery Service, the first Studio Ghibli film under the Disney/Ghibli deal, is released on video. Disney Cruise Line sets sail with its first ship, the Disney Magic. Mulan is released. A Bug's Life is released as the second produced by Pixar Animation Studios.
2000: Fantasia 2000 is released to IMAX Theaters.
2000: Robert Iger becomes president. Disney-owned TV channels are pulled from Time Warner Cable briefly during a dispute over carriage fees. Disney begins its Gold Classic Collection and Platinum Edition DVD line, replacing their Classic and Masterpiece Collection series.
2001: Disney's California Adventure and Tokyo DisneySea open to the public; Disney begins releasing Walt Disney Treasures DVD box sets for the collector's market.
2001: Disney buys Fox Family for $3 billion in July, giving Disney programming and cable network reaching 81 million homes.
2001: Disney changes Fox Family to ABC Family.
2001: Fort Worth billionaire Sid Bass is forced to sell his Disney holdings due to a margin call caused partially by the stock market fall that followed the 9/11 attacks. The fact that Bass had bought his shares on margin was a shock when it was revealed. Losing Bass was a blow to Eisner; Bass was one of his major backers and had recruited Eisner to Disney.
2002: Walt Disney Studios open near Disneyland Paris (renamed Disneyland Park). The entire area is now called Disneyland Resort Paris. Disney finishes negotiations to acquire Saban Entertainment, owner of children's entertainment juggernaut Power Rangers. Subsidiary Miramax acquires the USA rights to the Pok?mon movies starting with the fourth movie.
2002: Disney releases the Academy Award nominated film Lilo & Stitch
2002: Disney teams up with famous video game company Squaresoft (later known as Square-Enix) to release their first ever role-playing game with various Disney characters, Kingdom Hearts. Disney releases Spirited Away in the U.S., which goes on to be the first anime to win an Oscar for Best Animated Film. Disney begins joint venture business with Sanrio for Sanrio's greeting cards.
2002: Disney's movie Treasure Planet is released in theaters.
2002: Disney shut downs Fox Kids in 2004 turns it into Jetix.
2003: Roy E. Disney resigns as the chairman of Feature Animation and from the board of directors, citing similar reasons to those that drove him off 26 years earlier; fellow director Stanley Gold resigns with him; they establish "SaveDisney" to apply public pressure to oust Michael Eisner. Pixar computer animated film Finding Nemo is released by Disney, becoming the highest-grossing animated film in history until 2004's DreamWorks film Shrek 2. Live-action film Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl is released, becoming the first film released under the Disney label with a PG-13 rating.
2004: Pixar ends distribution agreement with Disney. Disney would later buy Pixar. Home on the Range and The Incredibles are released.
2004: Comcast makes an unsuccessful hostile bid for the company. CEO Michael Eisner is replaced by George J. Mitchell as chairman of the board after a 43% vote of no confidence. Disney turns down distributing controversial documentary film Fahrenheit 9/11, which ends up making $100 million. On February 17, Disney buys the Muppets (excluding the Sesame Street characters).
2004: Disney creates Jetix the children's block that mainly consists of Fox Kids shows and original programming on ABC Family and Toon Disney.
2005: Jetix is distributed worldwide in Europe and Latin America in channels of their own rights.
2005: On July 8 Roy E. Disney rejoins the company as a consultant with the title of Director Emeritus.
2005: The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is released in the US.
2005: Disneyland celebrates its 50th anniversary on July 17. Hong Kong Disneyland officially opens on September 12.
2005: Kingdom Hearts II, the sequel to the game created when Disney teamed up with Square-Enix in 2002, is released.

Iger era (2005-Present)
2005: Bob Iger replaces Michael Eisner as CEO on October 1. Also on October 1, Miramax co-founders Bob Weinstein and Harvey Weinstein left the company to form their own studio.
2005: Jetix is added a companion channel Jetix Play exclusive to Europe.
2006: The Disney Channel Original Movie, High School Musical airs on January 20. It becomes the most successful movie at its time with 7.7 million viewers in its premiere broadcast in the U.S. Soundtrack was released on January 10, 2006 and was the best selling album of 2006, selling 6,469 copies in its first week and climbed to #1 on the Billboard album chart in early March and again in late March of 2006.
2006: On January 23, Disney announces a deal to purchase Pixar Animation Studios in an all-stock transaction worth $7.4 billion. The deal is finalized on May 5. In the process, former Pixar CEO, and current Apple Inc. CEO Steve Jobs, becomes the single largest individual Disney shareholder, holding 7% of outstanding shares. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest is released, breaking multiple box office records, including highest-grossing opening day and opening weekend. The film also becomes the third film in motion picture history to gross over US$1 billion, when unadjusted for inflation.
2006: Disney sets record for number of people to visit its parks. A record 112 million people visited Disney parks in 2006.
2006: Disney reacquires the rights to the Walt Disney-era Oswald the Lucky Rabbit films from NBC Universal.
2006: Disney releases the Cars computer animated movie by Pixar on June 9.
2006: On August, 31 ABC Family airs Jetix for the last time and Jetix is exclusive to Toon Disney.
2006: ABC Family makes Kyle XY the highest rated ABC Family Original Series to date.
2007: Disney released their first non-movie or TV show related media - Spectrobes, a video game for the Nintendo DS.
2007: The Walt Disney Company Partners With Club Penguin
2007: Disney announces plans to make The Princess and the Frog, which would be a new Disney Princess movie made in traditional 2-D animation.
2007: The Disney Channel Original Movie, High School Musical 2 airs on August 17. The film set a new basic cable record upon its premiere, with a total of 17.24 million viewers tuning in, almost 10 million more than the debut of High School Musical. This made it the highest-rated basic cable broadcast of all time.
2007: Disney releases its first animated musical since Tarzan called Enchanted in November. It uses a mixture of traditional animation and live action, and is the first Disney box office film employing 2-d animation since Pooh's Heffalump Movie.
2007: In November Disney shuts down Disney Adventures Magazine for unknown reasons
2007: ABC Family premieres Slacker Cats, the first cartoon on ABC Family since the Fox Family era.
2007: Producer, Frank Marshall revives development of the Roger Rabbit sequel.
2008: Walt Disney and Yash Raj Films announce the first ever India-US made film, Roadside Romeo, which will be Bollywoods first animation film using the latest computer animations with Walt Disney in India.
2008: 'Disney MGM Studios' is changed to 'Disney's Hollywood Studios'

Senior Executive Management
Robert Iger (President and CEO)
Roy E. Disney (Consultant and Director)
Thomas O. Staggs (Senior Executive Vice President and CFO)
Alan N. Braverman (Senior Executive Vice President, General Counsel)
John Lasseter (Chief Creative Officer of Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar Animation Studios)
Zenia Mucha (Executive Vice President, Corporate Communications)

Current board of directors
Susan Arnold
John Bryson
John S. Chen
Judith Estrin
Robert Iger (CEO)
Steve Jobs
Fred Langhammer
Aylwin Lewis
Monica Lozano
Robert Matschullat
John E. Pepper, Jr. (Chairman)
Orin C. Smith
Roy E. Disney (non-Voting Director Emeritus)

Current division heads
Walt Disney International - Andy Bird
Walt Disney Parks and Resorts - Jay Rasulo
Walt Disney Imagineering - Bruce Vaughn
Walt Disney Creative Entertainment - Anne Hamburger
Walt Disney Studios - Dick Cook (Studio Chairman)
Walt Disney Animation Studios - Ed Catmull
Pixar Animation Studios - Ed Catmull
Buena Vista Music Group - Bob Cavallo
Walt Disney Motion Pictures Group - Oren Aviv
Walt Disney Theatrical - Thomas Schumacher
Disney Consumer Products - Andy Mooney
Disney Media Networks
Disney-ABC Television Group - Anne Sweeney, co-chair of Media Networks
ESPN - George Bodenheimer, co-chair of Media Networks

Chairmen of the Board
1945-1960: Walt Disney
1945-1971: Roy O. Disney (Co-Chair 1945-1960)
1971-1980: Donn Tatum
1980-1983: Card Walker
1983-1984: Raymond Watson
1984-2004: Michael Eisner
2004-2006: George J. Mitchell
2007-present: John E. Pepper, Jr.

Vice Chairman of the Board
1984-2003: Roy E. Disney
1999-2000: Sanford Litvack (Co-Vice Chair)

CEOs
1968-1971: Roy O. Disney
1971-1976: Donn Tatum
1976-1983: Card Walker
1983-1984: Ron W. Miller
1984-2005: Michael Eisner
2005-present: Robert Iger

COOs
The formal position of Chief Operating Officer was not created until Wells and Eisner came in with Eisner taking the titles of Chairman and CEO and Wells, President and COO.
1984-1994: Frank Wells
1995-1998: Michael Ovitz
1999-2000: Sanford Litvack (acting COO)
2000-present: Robert Iger

Criticism
Disney has on several occasions prompted action from religious groups such as the Catholic League, due to insensitive broadcasting, and the release of films which the league and others found very insulting to certain religions. Disney has in the past faced boycotts from baptist groups, "Assemblies of God", and catholic groups. (boycott 1;boycott 2;boycott 3)
The worldwide commercial success of the Disney brand is viewed by some as detrimental to cultural diversity (see Disneyfication).
Disney is one among several American companies lobbying for harsher enforcement of intellectual property around the world and continued copyright term extensions, posing a perceived threat to the existence of the public domain; see Copyright Term Extension Act.
Disney has been accused of human rights violations regarding the working conditions in factories that produce their merchandise.
Disney has been criticized by animal welfare groups for its import, use and frequent deaths of wild animals at its Animal Kingdom theme park as well as for using purebred dogs in movies such as 101 Dalmatians, which these groups claim leads to creating an artificial demand for these purebred dogs many of whom are later abandoned or surrendered to shelters or rescue groups. In 2007, Snow Buddies, a Disney movie being filmed in Vancouver, Canada, had dozens of animals fall sick and several die from parvovirus. The supplier, a New York breeder, admitted to shipping the dogs under the minimum age specified by federal law and was charged with forging health certificates to facilitate their shipment to Canada.
Bart a fictional character from the The Simpsons has described Disney as an "evil corporation" in the recent The Simpsons movie.

Allegation of subliminal messages
In 1995, Anna Rouge brought the allegation of the letters S-E-X written in the dust within The Lion King to the attention of a conservative anti-abortion group known as the American Life League (ALL). ALL spokesperson Tracey Casale weighed in on the issue and said "the message in The Lion King ... it is not fun." ALL made these allegations public, which led to an article by the Associated Press. ALL eventually led a protest of The Walt Disney Company, demanding that the offending movies be removed from both rental and store shelves, and the movies should then be fixed to exclude any messages that exist in them. ALL also demanded a formal and public apology form the Disney. Eugene Emery of the Skeptical Enquirer, called this media attention the "subliminal silly season", lampooning the whole idea and stating:
"the subliminal message issue is not going away as long as reporters and editors don't do their homework and are willing to let their own and the public's primal fear of magical messages override good editorial judgment."
This, however, was later proved as a mistake. Special Effects department that worked on the sequence claimed that the letters written in the dust were actually "S.F.X". This was meant to be a sort of a signature from the department and the controversy that followed was entirely unintentional.

Mercedes-Benz

Mercedes-Benz is a German brand of luxury and high-performance automobiles, buses, coaches, and trucks owned by Daimler AG. Mercedes-Benz has, over the years, introduced many of the technological and safety features that have become common in modern vehicles. (see Innovations section).

Origin of logo and brand
Established in 1871, Benz & Cie. was the most important of several companies founded by Karl Benz. The Benz patent motor wagon was ahead of its times; by 1886, Benz had the first four-stroke engine. Karl Benz is credited as the inventor of the first "true" automobile since Daimler's vehicle was a horse carriage adapted with an engine, whereas the 1886 Benz automobile had a chassis designed from scratch.
Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft-(DMG) was founded by Gottlieb Daimler and his partner Wilhelm Maybach in 1890. Daimler died in 1900 and Maybach left DMG in 1907. By then, Benz & Cie. and DMG were rivals. In 1924, owing to economic necessity after World War I, they entered into an "Agreement of Mutual Interest" valid until the year 2000. This initial agreement still allowed each company to manufacture and sell their products under their original brand names. After the official merger in June 28, 1926, the firm became known as Daimler-Benz.
The hyphenated brand name Mercedes-Benz was established after that merger. The brand name Daimler had been licensed for use on other automobiles in France and the United Kingdom, and was therefore not available to Daimler-Benz. Instead, the name of its seminal Mercedes model designed by Maybach over twenty years before was chosen for the DMG portion of the new brand. ("Mercedes" had been painted on a DMG vehicle used in races by a man in honor of his daughter, and became the formal name of a DMG model in 1902, see below.) Thus, Mercedes-Benz became the brand name applied to the models of one of the new firm. Because of its eponymous tie to Karl Benz and his early vehicles, Mercedes-Benz is also the name of the world's oldest continuously produced automobile line.
As part of the 1926 merger, a new logo was created that would include a symbol for each and integrate the names of the two former companies. A three-pointed star had been designed by Gottlieb Daimler, to show the ability of his motors for land, air, and sea use. This star first appeared on a DMG model in 1909, so it was chosen for the new logo. The traditional laurel wreath symbol used by Karl Benz was added along with his name to complete the new logo. The logo with a plain ring, as seen today, was not used until 1937.
In 1998, Daimler-Benz and Chrysler agreed to combine their businesses - promoted as the "merger of equals" - and the new entity was named DaimlerChrysler AG. However, this was actually when Daimler-Benz bought out Chrysler.
On May 14, 2007, the separation of Daimler AG and Chrysler LLC was announced. Selling Chrysler has been seen as a positive move for Daimler by its shareholders, who hope that the separation will allow Daimler's car brand Mercedes-Benz to be free to do what it does best without having the distractions of its heavily unprofitable U.S. partner Chrysler. However, Daimler retains a 20 per cent minority stake in Chrysler.

Origin of design
The origins of the Daimler-Benz company founded through a merger in 1926 date back to the mid-1880s, when Gottlieb Daimler (1834-1900) working with Wilhelm Maybach (1846-1929), and Karl Benz (1844-1929) independently invented the internal combustion engine-powered automobile, in southwestern Germany. Although they were merely sixty miles apart, these pioneers were unaware of each other's early work.
Karl Benz had his shop in Mannheim where he invented "the world's first true automobile powered by an internal combustion engine" in 1885. It had three wheels. He was granted a patent for his vehicle dated January 29, 1886, for what he called the "Benz Patent Motorwagen." Among many inventions, Benz patented his first engine in 1879, a high-speed single-cylinder four-stroke engine of his own design which he included in his "integral" design for the Motorwagen patent application.
In 1885, Gottlieb Daimler and design partner Wilhelm Maybach, working in Cannstatt, Stuttgart, were granted a patent dated August 29, 1885 for what is generally recognized as the prototype of the modern gas engine, that they named the "grandfather clock engine."
On March 8, 1886, Daimler purchased a stagecoach made by Wilhelm Wimpff & Sohn and he and Maybach adapted it to hold this engine, thereby creating a four-wheeled carriage propelled by an engine, as many had before them. The only distinction about this carriage was that it carried an internal combustion engine. None of many similar attempts to adapt carts, boats, or carriages, in many countries, were propelled by this type of engine. On the official history pages of the Mercedes-Benz Internet site it is referred to as "a carriage - without a drawbar but with the conventional drawbar steering. A carriage without horses..." Daimler and Maybach later purposely built, from scratch, the first four-stroke engine powered automobile with four wheels in 1889. They founded Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft, DMG, in 1890 and sold their first automobile in 1892.
Stationary engines were his major business and he invented many improvements to them and their application, but Karl Benz continued to refine his Motorwagen through several models and sold his first automobile in 1888. He built his first four-wheeled model in 1891. Benz & Cie, the company started by the inventor, became not only the world's first, but also largest manufacturer of automobiles by 1900.
In 1899, DMG automobiles built at Untert?rkheim (a city district of Stuttgart) were raced successfully by Emil Jellinek (1853-1918), an automobile enthusiast and dealer. He had the name of his daughter, Mercedes, painted on the automobiles for good luck. Wanting faster race cars, it was Jellinek who spurred the development of the seminal 1902 DMG model that would be the first of the DMG Mercedes series, bearing the name of his daughter.
After suggesting some design specifications, he promised to purchase thirty-six of the new DMG model if Maybach would name the new 35 hp (26 kW) engine contained in it, the Daimler-Mercedes engine. A contract of five hundred and fifty thousand marks was made for these new models. Within weeks he contracted for thirty-six of another DMG model with 8 hp (6.0 kW) engines. He was granted an exclusive concession to sell the new DMG automobiles in Austria-Hungary, France, Belgium, and USA.
That new model later would be named "Mercedes 35 hp" (in 1902) and it was a very important advance in automobile design. The contract called for delivery of the first automobile to Jellinek in the Fall, but it did not reach him until December 22, 1900. He became obsessed with the name Mercedes and even had his name changed to Jellinek-Mercedes. Jellinek was invited to sit on the DMG board of directors, which he did from 1901 until 1909, when he retired from automotive activities in favor of diplomatic appointments.
The name change also was helpful in preventing legal troubles, because after the death of Daimler, DMG had sold exclusive rights to the name, Daimler, and technical concepts to companies abroad. As a result, luxury automobiles branded Daimler were, and still are, built in England. A fire that gutted the old Steinway piano factory in New York, which had been converted to produce the new Mercedes models, cut short the dream of American production.
The rival companies of Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft (DMG) and Benz & Cie. started to cooperate in 1924, due to necessity arising from a troubled German economy after World War I, and finally merged in 1926 to become Daimler-Benz AG, which produced Mercedes-Benz automobiles and trucks. The merger agreement established that the two companies were required to remain together until 2000. While focusing on land vehicles, Mercedes-Benz also built engines to power boats and airplanes (military and civil), and even Zeppelins. Karl Benz died in 1929.
Although the brand is most famous for limousine models, a significant number of notable sports cars have also been produced. For example, the early supercharged SSK developed by Ferdinand Porsche.
Another distinctive model was the iconic 300SL Gullwing of 1954; that was suggested by Max Hoffman, explicitly for the USA market, and introduced at the New York Automobile Show.
Mercedes-Benz has also produced higher volume, less expensive cars. Interestingly, the prototypes of the Volkswagen were built and tested in Stuttgart, in cooperation with Porsche. Before that, Mercedes-Benz had a similar rear-engined, yet rather unsuccessful, small car, the 130 H. In recent years Mercedes have produced the A-Class, relatively inexpensive compared to its other models. Also the Smart brand of city cars has been part of the Mercedes-Benz Group since 1994.
Since its inception, Mercedes-Benz had a reputation for quality and durability. Increased focus on costs and volume, and the increased complexity in modern automobile electronics led to falling quality in the late 1990s and early 2000s. By 2005, Mercedes temporarily returned to the industry average for initial quality (if the "complexity" variable was ignored), according to J.D. Power. In J.D. Power's Initial Quality Study for the first quarter of 2007, Mercedes showed dramatic improvement by climbing to 4th place, surpassing quality leader Toyota and earning several awards for its models.

Motorsport
Main Article Mercedes-Benz in motorsport.
The two companies which were merged to form the Mercedes-Benz brand in 1926 had both already enjoyed success in the new sport of motor racing throughout their separate histories- both had entries in the very first automobile race Paris to Rouen 1894. This has continued, and throughout its long history, the company has been involved in a range of motorsport activities, including sportscar racing and rallying. On several occasions Mercedes-Benz has withdrawn completely from motorsport for a significant period, notably in the late 1930s and after the 1955 Le Mans disaster, where a Mercedes-Benz 300SLR collided with another car and killed more than eighty spectators. Although there was some activity in the inteverning years, it was not until the late 1980s that Mercedes-Benz returned to front line competition, returning to LeMans and sportscar racing with Sauber.
This long absence inspired by the disaster is understandable considering that Mercedes-Benz is viewed by many to be the world's safety leader due to their dominant contribution to automotive safety as well as licensing their safety innovations for use by their competitors, placing family safety above profit and competitive advantage.
The 1990s saw Mercedes-Benz purchase engine builder Ilmor, and campaign cars at the famed Indy 500 race under the USAC/CART rules, eventually winning that race with Al Unser, Jr. at the wheel. The 90's also saw the return of Mercedes-Benz to GT racing, and the Mercedes-Benz CLK GTR, which took the company to new heights (both figuratively) by dominating the FIA's GT1 class and (literally) by notably taking flight at the end of a long straight at La Sarthe.
Mercedes-Benz is currently active in three forms of motorsport, Formula Three, DTM and Formula One. In Formula One, the company part owns Team McLaren and has supplied the team with engines since 1995. This partnership has brought great success, including back to back Drivers Championships for Mika H?kkinen in 1998 and 1999 and a Constructors championship in 1998. The collaboration with McLaren has been extended into the production of roadgoing cars such as the Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren.

Business alliances

Studebaker-Packard Corporation
In 1958 Mercedes-Benz entered into a distribution agreement with the Studebaker-Packard Corporation of South Bend, Indiana (USA), makers of Studebaker and Packard brand automobiles. Under the deal, Studebaker would allow Mercedes-Benz access to their U.S. dealer network, handle shipments of vehicles to those dealers, and in return receive compensation for each car sold. Studebaker also was permitted to use the German automaker's name in its advertisements, which stressed Studebaker's quality over quantity.
When Studebaker entered into informal discussions with Franco-American automaker Facel Vega about offering their Facel Vega Excellence model in the United States, Mercedes-Benz objected to the proposal. Studebaker, which needed Mercedes-Benz distribution payments to help stem heavy losses, dropped further action on the plan.
Mercedes-Benz maintained an office within the Studebaker works in South Bend from 1958 to 1963 when Studebaker's U.S. operations ceased. Many U.S Studebaker dealers converted to Mercedes-Benz dealerships at that time. When Studebaker closed its Canadian operation and left the automobile business in 1966, remaining Studebaker dealers had the option to convert their dealerships to Mercedes-Benz dealership agreements.

Production
Besides its native Germany, Mercedes-Benz are also manufactured or assembled in:
Argentina (Buses, Trucks and the van Sprinter. the first factory of Mercedes-Benz outside of Germany)
Austria (G-Class)
Brazil
China
Egypt
Bosnia and Herzegovina
India
Indonesia
Malaysia
Mexico
Nigeria
South Africa
South Korea (Mercedes-branded Musso and MB100 models manufactured by SsangYong Motor Company)
Thailand
Turkey
United Kingdom (The SLR supercar is built here at the McLaren Technology Centre in Woking).
USA

Purchasing
Mercedes-Benz automobiles are available at dealerships in over 130 countries and their work fleet (trucks and commercial vehicles) are available from a select group of dealers worldwide as well as the factory-direct. As with several European brand automobiles, Mercedes has offered a European delivery option for purchasing of a Mercedes Benz automobile.

Models

Passenger cars
See also: List of Mercedes-Benz cars
The following passenger vehicles were in production in 2007:
Significant car models produced
See also: List of Mercedes-Benz cars
McLaren cars
Mercedes-Benz has also produced a supercar with McLaren Cars, an extension of the collaboration by which Mercedes engines are used by the Team McLaren-Mercedes Formula One racing team, which is part owned by Mercedes. Many anticipate there to be a range of McLaren--Mercedes supercars produced in Woking (McLaren's manufacturing headquarters). The 2003 Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren has a carbon-fiber body with a 5.5l V8 supercharged engine. This is the same block as featured in other Mercedes-Benz automobiles, such as the SL55 AMG and the CLS55 AMG, it has however been tweaked to give 460 kW and 780nm of torque. The SLR has a maximum speed of 334km/h and costs approximately US$500,000.
The most recent new joint-venture model, expected to reach production, is the mid-engine P8 supercar. Based around a unique carbon fiber monocoque, manufactured by McLaren, the P8 was originally predicted to receive the new naturally aspirated 6.3L V8 from Mercedes-AMG, but insiders now say that the engine will be modified for the car and will probably be twin- turbocharged to produce in excess of 600 bhp (450 kW). The car is still in development, but likely to reach production to go on sale in early 2008, and have a price tag less than that of the SLR.
Car nomenclature
In 1994 (starting with the 1994 models), the traditional nomenclature of Mercedes-Benz vehicles changed. Since the early days of the company the name would be in the form of 500E where the engine displacement made up the first three numbers and the last letter(s) represented the type of engine and/or chassis; for example: "E" for fuel injection ("Einspritzung" in German), "D" for Diesel, "L" for long wheelbase etc.
In 1994, this was altered so that the prefix reflected the model ("class", German "Klasse", in Mercedes-Benz terminology) and a number the displacement. The suffix was retained in some cases, for example "L" for long wheelbase, and "CDI" for Diesel (CDI = Common rail Direct Injection). Thus, the 500E in the example above became the E500 ("E-Klasse", 5 liters displacement). It should also be noted that while in the past the model number generally accurately reflected the actual engine displacement, this is currently not always the case - for example the E200 CDI and E220 CDI actually both have a 2.2 liter displacement, and the C240 actually has a 2.6 litre engine. Also, there is a huge difference in power (and price) between some cars with the same engine number, such as C55 and SL55.
Concept Models
Mercedes-Benz C111-III - sports car with tail fin
Mercedes-Benz Auto 2000 - 4 door sedan
Mercedes-Benz NAFA - microcar
Mercedes-Benz C112 - sportcar and mule
Mercedes-Benz F 100 - Car introducted in 1991
Mercedes-Benz F 200 Imagination - 2 door coupe introduced in 1996 Paris Motor Show
Mercedes-Benz F 300 Life Jet - 3-wheel Car/Motorcycle unveiled in 1997 Frankfurt Motor Show
Vario Research Car - One car, four vehicles Photo of Four in One car
1999 Mercedes-Benz Vision SLR - Prototype of Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren, unveiled in 1999 North American International Auto Show
Mercedes-Benz Vision SLA - convertible version of Vision SLR, unveiled in 2000 North American International Auto Show
Mercedes-Benz F 400 Carving - A 2-seat roadster unveiled in 2002 Tokyo Motor Show
Mercedes Benz F 500 Mind - 4-door fastback sedan unveiled in 2003 Tokyo Motor Show
Mercedes-Benz F 600 HYGENIUS - compact fuel cell car, unveiled in 2005 Tokyo Motor Show
Mercedes-Benz Bionic - Car unveiled in 2005 DaimlerChrysler Innovation Symposium in Washington, modelled after boxfish
Mercedes-Benz Ocean Drive - a 4-door convertible based on the S600
Mercedes-Benz F 700 - Large luxury saloon featuring the small capacity / high output DiesOtto engine, unveiled at the 2007 Frankfurt Motor Show.

Buses
Mercedes-Benz also produces buses, mainly for Europe and Asia. The first factory to be built outside of Germany after WWII was in Argentina. It originally built Truck-Buses, named Colectivo in Buenos Aires, Argentina (1950-1987), but now builds buses.

Vans
Mercedes-Benz produces a range of vans. The current range consists of
Mercedes-Benz Vito - Light Van based on the Viano MPV with loaded weight of approx 1 tonne
Mercedes-Benz Sprinter - Mid-sized van with loaded weights of 2 to 6 tonne (produced as a Dodge in USA and Canada with the name Freightliner Sprinter. A joint venture.)
Sprinter 414 416CDI ambulance
Sprinter 316CDI light ambulance
Mercedes-Benz Vario - Heavy van with similar load to a light truck (7.5 tonne)
Previous models include
Mercedes-Benz TN or T1 - Mid Sized van predecessor to the sprinter
Mercedes-Benz T2 - Heavy Van
All other previous models on the German wikipedia

Trucks
Mercedes-Benz is the world's largest manufacturer of trucks.
The current range consists of
Mercedes-Benz Atego - Light truck from 7 to 16t
Mercedes-Benz Axor - Mid-sized truck from 18 to 26t in rigid and articulated
Mercedes-Benz Actros - Heavy duty rigid and premium articulated - 18 to 50t
Mercedes-Benz Econic - Low floor version of the Axor for refuse and specialist applications
Mercedes-Benz Unimog - For special purpose applications and transport across extreme terrain
1828L (F581) Mobile Casualty Treatment Centre
1517L Mobile Casualty Treatment Centre

Hybrid vehicles
At the 2007 Frankfurt motor show, Mercedes-Benz showed seven hybrid models, including the F700 concept car which combined hybrid drive with the innovative DiesOtto engine.

Tuners
Mercedes-Benz automobiles are very popular among performance-oriented buyers, and several companies have become tuners/modifiers of these cars, adding even more performance and luxury to the brand.
AMG is Mercedes-Benz's performance-tuning division, specializing in high-performance versions of most Mercedes-Benz cars. AMG engines are hand-built and the completed engine receives a tag with the signature of the engineer who built it. AMG has been fully-owned by Mercedes-Benz since 1999.

Other Tuners
Brabus
Lorinser
Carlsson
Kleemann
RENNtech
Kicherer

Robot Cars
In the 1980s Mercedes built the world's first robot car, together with the team of Professor Ernst Dickmanns at Bundeswehr Universit?t M?nchen. Partially encouraged by Dickmanns' success, in 1987 the European Union's EUREKA programme initiated the Prometheus project on autonomous vehicles, funded to the tune of nearly 800 million Euros. A culmination point was achieved in 1995, when Dickmanns? re-engineered autonomous S-Class Mercedes took a long trip from Munich in Bavaria to Copenhagen in Denmark and back. On highways the robot achieved speeds exceeding 175 kilometres per hour (roughly 110 miles per hour; there is no general speed limit on the German Autobahn). The car's abilities left a big impression on many observers, and heavily influenced robot car research and funding decisions world-wide.

Bicycles
Mercedes-Benz Accessories GmbH introduced 3 new bicycles in 2005, named Automatic Bike, Fitness Bike, Mountain Bike. The bikes are sold in Australia, Germany, Russia.
List of bicycles:
Mercedes-Benz Automatic Bike
Mercedes-Benz Carbon Bike
Mercedes-Benz Fitness Bike
Mercedes-Benz Hybrid Bike
Mercedes-Benz Mountain Bike
Mercedes-Benz Street Bike

Innovations
The "Safety cage" or "Safety cell" construction with front and rear crumple zones was first developed by Mercedes-Benz in 1951..
Anti-lock brakes (ABS), traction control and airbags in the European market, were all Mercedes-Benz innovations. These technologies were introduced in 1978, 1986 and 1980 respectively.
In September 2003, Mercedes-Benz introduced the world's first 7-speed automatic transmission called '7G-TRONIC'.
Mercedes-Benz was the first to introduce pre-tensioners to seat belts on the 1981 S-Class. In the event of a crash, a pre-tensioner will tighten the belt almost instantaneously, preventing the passenger from jerking forward in a crash.
Stability control, brake assist (Press Release) , and many other types of safety equipment were all developed, tested, and implemented into passenger cars-first-by Mercedes-Benz. Mercedes-Benz has not made a large fuss about its innovations and has even licensed them for use by competitors-in the name of improving automobile and passenger safety.
The most powerful naturally aspirated eight cylinder engine in the world is the Mercedes-AMG, 6208cc M156 V8 engine. It is the first engine in the world to combine large displacement with the high-revving concept, allowing it to produce around 20 percent more torque than comparable naturally aspirated engines in this performance class. The V8 engine will be badged '63 AMG' and will replace the '55 AMG' M113 engine in most models (exceptions include the SL55 and G55 AMG which will retain the M113 engine). The M156 engine can produce up to 525 bhp (391 kW), and although some models using this engine do have this output (like the S63 and CL63 AMGs) specific output varies slightly across other models in the range.
The (W211) E320 CDI which has a (VTG) turbocharged, 3.0L V6 common rail diesel engine, set three new world endurance records. It covering 100,000 miles (the equivalent of four times round the Earth) in a record time with an astonishing average speed of 224.823 km/h (140 mph). Three identical cars did the endurance run (one set above record) and the other two cars set world records for time taken to cover 100,000 km and 50,000 miles (80,000 km) respectively. After all three cars had completed the run their combined distance of 300,000 miles (480,000 km) is one-and-a-quarter times the distance from Earth to the moon (all records were FIA approved).
Mercedes-Benz's PRE-SAFE uses radar to detect an imminent crash and prepares the car's safety systems to respond optimally. It can also calculates the optimal breaking force required to avoid an accident and makes it available for when the driver depresses the brake pedal. Occupants are also prepared by tightening the seatbelt, closing the sunroof and windows, and moving the seats into the optimal position. Volvo has a similar system in place on its larger models.
Mercedes Benz is in the process of pioneering a fatigue-detection system that warns the driver when they are displaying signs of micro-sleep (when the eyes stay closed for slightly longer than a natural blinking action). The system will use a variety of data including the individual driving style, the duration of the journey, the time of day and the current traffic situation. Fatigue mostly sets in gradually. Volvo has a system in production which detects when the driver is falling asleep or is not concentrating on the road.
The fastest (production) automatic road car in the world is the Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren at 334 km/h (208 mph). The car was co-developed by DaimlerChrysler and McLaren Cars. The fastest street-legal saloon car in the world is the Mercedes-Benz BRABUS (tuned) W211 'E V12' - based on the E-Class saloon.
Mercedes-Benz unveiled its DiesOtto engine concept at the 2007 Frankfurt auto show. The new engine could give the responsiveness of a 3.5-litre V6 petrol engine with the frugality of a tiny diesel-burner. The DiesOtto is, at heart, a 1.8-litre four-cylinder petrol engine with twin sequential turbochargers and direct injection. Mercedes engineers have incorporated both the conventional Otto cycle and a sparkless, diesel-style combustion. On start-up, the engine runs in standard petrol mode, with spark plugs igniting petrol injected directly into the cylinder. But once the engine is warm and cruising, it switches to a more efficient 'diesel mode', raising the compression ratio and deactivating the spark plugs. Because it runs on petrol, the DiesOtto boasts lower emissions than an equivalent diesel engine.