Sonite Products

At the beginning of the simulation, all rival firms market two Sonite brands. Sonite products have existed for several years and the market has grown quite consistently since the introduction of the first Sonite brand. It is now a well-established market, with several strong brands at different price points covering a wide range of needs. Analysts believe that the Sonite market will continue to grow over the next five years.

A Sonite is a complex piece of equipment made up of several components. Although they can be evaluated along more than fifty attributes, Sonite brands are primarily differentiated in terms of eight physical characteristics that are considered as the most important ones by industry experts. These characteristics are described below, and additional details are given in Figure 1.

• Processing Power. This characteristic measures the speed of the internal processor. High processing power is critical for applications using extensive graphics or doing a lot of calculations. It also drives the ability of the Sonite product to process multiple tasks simultaneously. Processing power is given in gigaflops (billions of floating point operations per second), a standard and respected measure that takes several factors into account: number of “cores”, internal memory size, frequency, etc.

• Display Size. This is the size of the screen (in inches). This characteristic drives the ability of the product to display higher quality images or videos, or to display more information to the user at a given time.

• Design Index. This characteristic does not relate to the product esthetic but to the type of raw materials used (wood, plastic, metal ...), to the number of components (all-in-one type versus multiple-component type), to the aspect of its various components (position, size …). Therefore, a product rated 8 on the design scale is not better or easier-to-use than one rated 4 on the same scale.

• Battery Life. This is the number of hours during which the Sonite product can operate without being connected to the main power.

• Recyclable materials. This is the percentage of recyclable materials used in the Sonite product. Recyclable materials in a Sonite durable product mean technical materials that can be reused to produce another durable good (for example, after materials are disassembled, the plastics are shredded, melted and then mixed with virgin plastics); it also includes more innovative materials that are biological ingredients that are at least non-toxic and possibly even beneficial and can be safely returned to the biosphere, such as biodegradable compostable materials (e.g. bioplastic made of polylactic acid such as starch). A high percentage of recyclable materials allows for reducing waste, in line with circular economy principles.

• Carbon footprint. This shows how much carbon dioxide emission (per kg of CO2e emissions) will be created during the production of the Sonite product. CO2e emissions (also called carbon or environmental footprint) are pollution stemming from the burning of fossil fuels (for instance when manufacturing a durable good) and are directly going into the atmosphere. The lower the carbon footprint is, the more environmental-friendly (sustainable) the product is.

• Durability. This characteristic is a rating (index) officially given to the product following external certification rules and relates to the life duration of the Sonite product. It mainly comes from the solidity and robustness of the materials used to manufacture the product. The more robust the material is, the longer the product life duration will be, in line with circular economy principles.

• Repairability. This characteristic is a rating (index) officially given to the product following the Markstrat government law on “repairability”. It relates to the possibility of repairing the Sonite product. More specifically, the rating depends on several criteria: availability of technical documentation about the product, possibility to disassemble the product, availability of spare parts and availability of advice for users in terms of product maintenance. The easier a Sonite product can be repaired, the higher is the repairability rating, in line with circular economy principles.

  It is important to understand that offering more of a certain characteristic is not necessarily better. For instance, high processing power processors may require a sophisticated cooling system that has an impact on weight, volume and noise. Consumers who do not need high power will certainly choose a less powerful Sonite that will be relatively small, light and quiet. Similarly, large screens (big display size) may be highly attractive to some users, but not to others because of their higher weight and heavier power consumption. Similar advantages and drawbacks exist for most characteristics: long duration batteries (battery life) are bulky and heavy; high durability may be attractive for some consumers but not to others because the material used are heavier; the use of biodegradable components (recyclable materials) will affect the product aesthetic, which may not be attractive for all consumers; a high level of repairability may not be attractive for consumers who like the idea of changing product more frequently etc.

  The base cost is also an important factor; this is the cost at which each unit will be produced, based on an initial production batch of 100,000 units. The base cost is decided jointly by the Marketing department – which is mainly concerned with margin and profitability – and by the R&D department – which is mainly concerned with product feasibility.

  Characteristic	Abbreviation	Measurement Unit	Range
  Processing Power	Power	Gigaflops (GFLOPS)	5 – 100
  Display Size	Display	Inches (“)	4 – 40
  Design	Design	Index	3 – 10
  Battery Life	Battery	Hours (H)	24 – 96
  Recyclable materials	Recyclable	Percentage (%)	0-80
  Carbon footprint	Carbon	Kilograms (kg)	5-50
  Durability	Durability	Rating	1-100
  Repairability	Repairability	Rating	1-100
  Base Unit Cost	Base Cost	$	25+

  Figure 1 – Sonite main physical characteristics