HTC’s CEO has asked you to help him by preparing an analysis that addresses the following:

1. Identifies and analyzes the industry and competitive environment of the mobile phone industry based on information contained in the case: HTC Corp. in 2009 including key industry and environmental trends, competitive and structural characteristics of the mobile phone industry. 2. Your assessment of the key challenges HTC faces in trying to achieve a sustainable model and long-term success in the industry? 3. Your assessment of the competitive and strategic position of HTC Corp. at the time of the case information. 4. Your assessment/identification of any major changes in the competitive situation for HTC from the perspective of
The power to decide the recipient of the subsidy rested in the hands of the operator. For e.g. an unsubsidized phone might cost $300 but the strong subsidies of $100-150 made it easier for the consumers to buy products. But the operators made out this subsidy by selling phones on contracts. i.e. contract to use the same operator for Voice and Data usage on phone for 2-3 years.
Locked Networks of operators:
In the United States, the big four operators - Verizon, Sprint, AT&T and T-Mobile collectively owned more than 90% of the market. Their networks were locked, and hence they enjoyed a high bargaining power over the handset manufacturers. Here locked mean that the phones were so coded that, these phones could be used only with the parent operator who provided the subsidy.
Customer Loyalty:
In recent years, Apple has developed a strong customer loyalty. As a result of this the competitive rivalry has gone up and other firms are looking to develop stronger strategy to develop a stronger loyalty by designing innovative products at lower costs.
Also the firms are planning to create third party application (application developed by other developers) support to the mobile devices for free. E.g. The Android Market by Google.

4.) Negotiating power of Suppliers: LOW
High Number of Suppliers:
A slew number of suppliers in the market for software’s and hardware’s gives the suppliers very less power to negotiate with the phone