Mitsui & Co. Ltd. is one of the largest Japanese conglomerate company, trades internationally in a wide range of goods and services. Its SBU includes energy, machine, chemicals, food, textile, logistics, finance, and some others. The company was started in 1876 by Masuda Takashi in Tokyo, Japan. The main products of the company are food and beverages, and different industrial products mainly. The company provides services in financial service, real estate retailing, shipping and logistics, etc. The main subsidiaries of the company are; Mitsui & Co. Steel Ltd., Regency Steel Asia Pte Ltd., Bangkok Coil Center Co., Ltd., Shanghai Bao-Mit Steel Distribution Co., Ltd., Siam Yamato Steel Co., Ltd. Mitsui Iron Ore Development Pty. Ltd., Mitsui Iron Ore Corporation Pty. Ltd., Toyota Chile S.A., Veloce Logistica SA, P.T. Bussan Auto Finance, P.T. Bussan Auto Finance, Tran system Logistics International Pvt.Ltd., Mitsui Iron Ore Development Pty. Ltd. and many others. [2]
Tatsuo Yasunaga is the CEO of this company. The current stock price of a company is 1,968 JPY as per 10-Dec, 3:00 pm GMT +9. [3] Approximately 47000 employees are working in this company. [4] It is a group of 279 companies. The annual revenue of the company is 4.9 trillion Yen as per the annual report of 2018. [1]
Threats of New Entrants
One of the most common barriers to entry in every industry is startup cost. Similarly, it is one of the biggest barriers to new entrants in this industry. As corporations are a group of different companies, so different technology, different suppliers and different rules and regulations by the government are also part of barriers in this industry. Different corporations are creating a competitive edge for them, by merger strategy and creating barriers for new entrants. Product differentiation and brand identification is also another aspect which needs to keep in mind by new entrants. As there are a large number of companies under one shelter, so the operating cost is high in this industry. Therefore, all of these factors show that threats of new entrant is low in this industry.
Threats of Substitute
As there is a lot of diversification in products. One company dealing in services also doing the manufacturing of different products. Due to related diversification, there is a moderate level of threats of substitute exists in the market, where this company is doing business. Similarly, small businesses also competing against them in the market. The most common substitutes in the market for Mitsui are Sony, Ito-Yokado, Sagami Railway, Tokyo Broadcasting System, Kanebo (Kao Corporation), Oriental Land, Toyota Group, etc.
Bargaining Power of Buyers
These corporations are large groups consists of different companies. Each business unit has a large number of customers. Mostly they had done vertical integration to create a competitive edge in the market. Business operations are business to business and business to customer. In this scenario, the buyer as an individual does not has bargaining power as switching cost doesn’t affect most of the SBU’s because buyers do not represent a large portion of the sale of the company.
Bargaining Power of Suppliers
Conglomerate organization holds different businesses and most of the businesses are different and produce different products. Therefore, each business needs different raw materials for which business has to deal with multiple suppliers. The company is large and dealing with multiple suppliers, it shows that there is a moderate level of bargaining power held by suppliers. So to avoid such bargaining, most of the companies use vertical integration. They can do it due to brand name, large business influence, large operations and large capital available for use.
Competitive Rivalry
There are several corporations doing business in this industry. Well established corporations are influencing different small businesses due to their size. These companies acquire small companies or merge them into their group to be more influential in the market. Similarly, they become able to increase their business and market share in a specific industry. Therefore, all of these factors show that their competitive rivalry exists in this industry.
References
1 Statista, 2018, [online], Available at: https://www.statista.com/statistics/794438/mitsui-revenue/
2 Mitsui, 2019, about us, [online], Available at: https://www.mitsui.com/jp/en/index.html
3 Financial Times, 2019, Equities, [online], Available at: https://markets.ft.com/data/equities/tearsheet/summary?s=8031:TYO
4 Statista, 2018, Number of employees working for Mitsui & Co., Ltd. from 2009 to 2018, [online], Available at: https://www.statista.com/statistics/794911/mitsui-employee-numbers/