Management Insights

摘要

Proprietary component manufacturers (PCMs) are often the sole source for critical ingredients used in assembling many consumer products. For example, Intel is a PCM that provides central processing units to personal computer manufacturers such as Dell and HP. By contrast, Sony may sell Trinitron-based monitors in the end-product market while simultaneously supplying the Trinitron tubes to an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) like Toshiba that competes against Sony to sell monitors to end consumers. Furthermore, a PCM such as Bose may choose not to supply its proprietary components or technology to other OEMs, but instead builds and markets its own products (e.g., speakers) to the end consumers. In these examples, the PCM plays the role of a component supplier, dual distributor, or monopoly producer, respectively.