Independent University, Bangladesh: Assignment On Zynga Inc. Case Study
Independent University, Bangladesh: Assignment On Zynga Inc. Case Study
Assignment
on
Zynga Inc. Case Study
Submitted to:
Submitted by:
Name ID
Imtiaz Ibna Imam 1730960
Lubaba Maisha 1720608
Nahin Morshed Bhuiyan 1710817
Yeasin Arafat Fahim 1721787
Abu Abrar Fahim 1610912
Saiful Islam 1631219
Md Rafid Rahman 1722156
Tasnim Islam 1721982
Ishtiaq Jamil Khan 1730421
Sajid Mizan 1731660
Letter of Transmittal
To,
Dear Ma’am,
With due respect, it is our privilege and honor to be your students and have this opportunity
to present the comprehensive report. While preparing the report, we have given our best
effort. This is a great pleasure and experience for us to submit to you a report on case study of
Zynga Inc. We hope that if we have any errors and lapse that may have entered in this report
will be considered with sympathy.
Therefore, we look forward for your kind consideration in this regard. We will be very
grateful if you accept our report and oblige thereby.
Yours Sincerely,
The Eliminators
Acknowledgement
At the very beginning we would like to express our deepest gratitude to Almighty God for
giving us the strength and the composure to finish the task within the scheduled time. We
would like to express our sincere gratitude to the instructor Ms. Kashfia Ameen for the
continuous support, for her patience, motivation, enthusiasm and immense knowledge. Her
guidance helped us all the time of planning and writing of this report. We could not have
imagined having a better advisor and mentor like her. We would also, like to express our
deepest appreciation to all those who provided us the possibility to complete this report.
Thank you.
Table of Contents
Letter of Transmittal...................................................................................................................i
Acknowledgement.....................................................................................................................ii
Executive Summary...................................................................................................................1
Company Overview...................................................................................................................2
Mission Statement..................................................................................................................2
Vision Statement....................................................................................................................3
STEEP Analysis.........................................................................................................................4
Sociocultural Factors..............................................................................................................4
Technological Factors............................................................................................................5
Economic Factors...................................................................................................................5
Environmental Factors............................................................................................................6
Political-legal forces...............................................................................................................7
SWOT Analysis.........................................................................................................................9
SFAS Matrix............................................................................................................................12
References................................................................................................................................17
Executive Summary
We have been assigned to design a new mission and vision statement, review the
organization's core values and objectives; do STEEP and SWOT analysis as well as industry
analysis and prepare a SFAS matrix on the case study of Zynga Inc.
Zynga was founded in April 2007, under the name of Presidio Media, as a California limited
liability company. Zynga Inc. Is the world's largest and biggest social game developer with
more than 290 million active users playing their games, which include leading their Facebook
games Farm Ville, City Ville, Frontier Ville, Zynga Poker and Mafia Wars, including others
as well. These games are available on a number of platforms aside from Facebook including
Myspace, Yahoo, Android, iPad and iPhone.
Our report consists of designing a new mission and vision statement, reviewing the
organization’s core values and objectives. The mission statement has been designed in a new
way, there was no vision statement for which we designed a new one. The STEEP analysis
has the sociocultural factors of culture, beliefs and lifestyle which greatly impact the effect of
a country. Technological focus on advancements like innovation, research, communication
and development. Economic factors consider before involving in commercial activity.
Environmental factors are the standards of environmental protection. The SWOT analysis has
the strengths evaluating the strong organizational structure and acquisition strategy.
Weaknesses include the financial position and the expenses incurred. Opportunities include
competition from rival companies and the e-commerce industry. Threats are foreign laws,
facing lawsuits in various markets, unauthorized third-party operation and numerous new
players. The SFAS matrix includes the external factor analysis summary of the opportunities
and threats and their rating and weighted score. While internal factor analysis consists a
summary of strengths and weaknesses and their rating and weighted score. Porter's 5 forces
are the threats of new entrants where the company needs to think how they can reduce cost
and lower price. The bargaining power of suppliers is getting the best quality at a reasonable
rate. Bargaining power of buyers, buying or purchasing the best offerings at a minimum rate.
Threat from substitute products could get threatened by the next best substitute available in
the market. Rivalry among the existing consumers could be tough and competitive.
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Company Overview
Zynga Inc.-was named after the late American Bulldog, former CEO of Mark Pincus, Zynga-
was established in San Francisco, California, United States and providing the world with
social video games since 2007. From the very beginning, this social game developing
company, with its mission to connect the world through games, is providing us with so many
exciting games including Zynga Poker, Farm Ville, Castle Ville, City Ville, Mafia Wars,
Empire & Allies and Scramble with Friends. [ CITATION Zyn \l 1033 ]
The company initially started developing social games on Facebook platform and gained
huge responses from there. With the passage of time, they expanded their business, had a
string of acquisitions and over 61 million people all over the world played their games at that
time in 2010. [ CITATION Zyn \l 1033 ]
Mission Statement
A mission statement is a short statement of why an organization exists, what its overall goal
is, identifying the goal of its operations: what kind of product or service it provides, its
primary customers or market, and its geographical region of operation.
Zynga’s mission was to “Connect the world through games”. With this mission, they had
achieved growth within a short span of time through their unique business model. However,
they could go for using a different mission. According to their target market, they could come
up with a different mission to attract its customers.
The new mission could be, “Entertain yourself and stay connected”. This means that the
consumers can entertain and relax themselves giving them a break from this stressed out life.
They can play the games with their friends, family and the people they may know and
through this they can stay in touch. They can keep connected with anyone from anywhere in
the world. With the help of modern technology and better fast Internet facilities, they can
play even on mobile devices.
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Vision Statement
A vision statement is a document that states the current and future objectives of an
organization. The vision statement is intended as a guide to help the organization make
decisions that align with its philosophy and declared set of goals.
Zynga being a social gaming did not have any vision statement. They might have not
regarded their vision statement as important as they focused on growth and expansion.
Therefore, keeping the new mission statement on mind, we came up with, “Live life to the
fullest and connected while getting the best gamer experience”.
This means that while you have time, and as life is short to be wasted, one can definitely try
or play the games. While a person lives, they can live life by connecting and playing games
with everyone, can get experience as a gamer as well.
Zynga’s objective was to connect people all over the world who play video games, making it
easier to play online games on social networking sites using different platforms and devices
such as phones, computers, tablets and other devices. In 2010, one of their games (Farm
Ville) had over 80 million players all over the world on Facebook platform. The moment
Facebook started touching the sky in the social networking industry, Zynga started to expand
their business as became a giant within a few years.
STEEP Analysis
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Sociocultural Factors
The people of a country, their norms, Culture, beliefs, lifestyle greatly impact the effect the
country and the environment of the company they work in. The economy also highly depends
on these factors. Zynga should always consider these factors as it will help the company to
understand its customer better and they will have a better approach at marketing their product
to them. The things to consider in sociocultural forces to consider could be:
Population: Zynga should consider the population of the country if want to expand their
business to the specific country or want to sell their product in the country like the age
distribution in the country or size of population or birth rate and life expectancy etc. For
example, Zynga is gaming company, if they want to sell their product in a country where the
rate of elderly people is more. They will not be able to make profit as the elderly people do
not play games.
Skill and education: Zynga are a company which is related to technology and to work or be
a potential customer of Zynga technological skill and knowledge is a must. Therefore, Zynga
should consider is aspect if they not they might suffer a loss. For Example, the company
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moves to a country where people are not technologically literate, the company will face
severe difficulty to find employees.
Interests and leisure activities: Zynga is based on people’s leisure activities. Therefore, the
populations interest in leisure activities impact the company. For example, countries where
people play games in their phone in their leisure time are idle for Zynga to target but
countries where the people are more into sports and physical activities in their leisure time
are not. [CITATION FFS \l 1033 ]
Technological Factors
In STEEP Analysis, technological aspect highly focuses on the technological advancements
which includes factors like innovation, communication, research and development etc.
[ CITATION Whe \l 1033 ]. In the case we have found that Zynga Inc. is all about technology.
Zynga changes their technological approach very frequently to compete in the market and to
follow the on-going trends. New applications development, cloud computing, increasing and
changing platforms etc. For example, in March 2011, Zynga launched a new platform,
Zynga.com where players were able play other third-party games which were not made by
Zynga along with Zynga created games. The third-party game developers were called
Platform Partners. For the future of Zynga Inc. They should consider the following points:
• Zynga should try to analyze the recent technological development made by their
competitors. Adapt to new changes and technological know-how.
• Zynga should consider the cost structure of the multimedia and graphics software industry.
• Zynga should try to understand the rate of technological diffusion which means to adopt the
pace of new technology across the given market.
• They should also consider the technological impact on product offering. Try to improve
technology and also make them easier to implement, remanufacture, design, assemble,
recycling etc.
Economic Factors
A country’s economy is a major factor to consider before involving in commercial activity. It
helps to determine the position the country hold in the world market. Demand, investment,
growth, inflation etc. can be determined by it. Zynga can use this factor to determine the
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country’s technological advancement, income per capita, customer spending etc. The forces
to consider in case of the economic factor are:
Type of economy: this will tell Zynga the type of economy or economic system the country
follows. Like market economy, mixed economy etc. This will help Zynga understand the
position the company will be in, in the country. The level at which the government will
intervene in the business activities can also be determined and this will either benefit the
company or harm in great measure.
Exchange rate stability: Zynga is a US based company therefore the currency the deal with
is dollar. It is the home country of the country. If the exchange rate of dollar in the host
country is not stabile the business might face lose or be in a very unstable condition.
Skill: The skill level of the economy is also a something that should be taken into
consideration while making a decision. The skill of the workforce in the host country in the
specific industry the company is in will play major role in the company’s advantage. For
example, if Zynga moves to country where the workforce is very efficient and skilled in the
Multimedia & Graphics Software industry then it will gain competitive advantages
Income: Zynga does not sell products essential or need based. Their product is completely
for entertainment purpose. The income of the population will determine whether the people
earns enough money to spend on entertainment and if they can then how much will they be
able to spend on their product.
Other: there are several other factors that also be taken into consideration like labor costs,
unemployment rate, inflation rate, interest rates. [CITATION FFS \l 1033 ]
Environmental Factors
Different industries hold different standards of environmental protection in their head
because the norm. This norm then dictates what every company should aim for, within the
least, to stop becoming the target of pressure groups and boycotts thanks to a scarcity of
environmental conscientiousness. an organization within the textile industry, as an example,
isn't expected to incur the identical level of pollution and environmental degradation as a
company. The new consumer, armed with the interest and also the knowledge it carries,
prefers to grant its business to companies it views as more ethical, particularly about the
environment within the wake of world warming.
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Before entering new markets or starting a replacement business in existing market Zynga
should carefully evaluate the environmental standards that are required to work in those
markets a number of the environmental factors that Zynga should consider beforehand are:
Weather
The current weather may significantly impact the flexibility of to manage the transportation
of both the resources and therefore the finished product. This, in turn, would affect the
delivery dates of the ultimate product within the case of, say, an unexpected monsoon.
Climate change would also render some products useless. as an example, within the case of
textiles, in countries where the winter has become very mild because of warming, warm
winter clothes have much less of a market.
Those companies that produce extremely large amounts of waste is also required by law to
manage their environmental habits. this might include pollution fines and quotas, which can
place a financial strain on
While relying, in any percentage, on renewable energy is also expensive, it often receives
support not only from the Govt. but also from its customer base, who is also willing to pay a
premium price for the products which will produce.
To preserve the future environment, companies should be concern about their carbon
emission and try be as much environment friendly as they can. Going green means to
preserve the existing tree and also try plant more of them for the betterment of the future
generation.
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Political-legal forces
Political and legal forces play a vital role in determining the factors that can impact Zynga
Inc.'s in the long term. Zynga Inc. is company that operates in Multimedia & Graphics
Software in multiple countries and faces different types of political environment and political
system risks of the country. Therefore, certain forces should be taken into consideration in
order to be sustainable in the long term.
• Political stability it is very important for a country to be politically stable in order for
its economy to run smoothly.
• Level of corruption in case of Zynga especially in Technology sector. A high level of
corruption will make it difficult for the company to operate.
• Intellectual property protection Zynga should consider the country laws in case of
copy write and intellectual property protection issues as the company’s products are
completely virtual therefore it is very easy to be copied by other competitors.
• Pricing regulations that should maintain while doing business in the particular
country.
• Taxation and incentives Zynga should consider the taxation and incentives provided
by the host country. It is very crucial to determine that whether the government of the
host country is trying to encourage or discourage the product. [CITATION FFS \l 1033 ]
• Wage the minimum wage of the host country and the wage for overtime
• Safety and privacy the company product should be safe for the consumer to use and
should not violate the privacy of the customers. In case of Zynga the game they offer
their customer should not promote violence or mental distortion to the prayers and
also the players personal that is provided to login or registered should not be
disclosed.
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SWOT Analysis
Strengths:
• Zynga has a strong organizational structure which encourages and rewards creativity
and was designed to motivate everyone to succeed in an environment where all
winners are rewarded. After Zynga acquires any new studios, they remain
independent in their day to day tasks which allows Zynga to set goals and give
freedoms to them achieve them any way that was possible. This allows Zynga to
come up with unique games which its users immediately like.
• Zynga Platform Partners which allows for different game developers to publish and
promote their games on Zynga’s platform, Zynga.com and also have partners for
mobile programs. This will allow Zynga to have more exposure on different platform
especially mobile which is a growing market and where every new gamer will play
games on in the future.
• Zynga’s acquisition strategy has led to the integration of highly talented and creative
employees from acquired companies.
• Internally built data centers have mitigated Zynga’s reliance on Amazon cloud for
sever spaces with its internal infrastructure. This has also allowed Zynga to create a
new platform called Zynga.com where other developers are able to build social
games.
• Zynga has started to develop games for the mobile platform for the future success of
the company. [ CITATION Fer1 \l 1033 ]
Weaknesses:
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• Over reliance on Facebook to get its consumers. The company had been relying too
much on Facebook to acquire new users rather than trying to attract consumers
elsewhere.
• Unauthorized third parties operated cheating programs that enabled players to exploit
Zynga games, this also scammed many players with fake offers for virtual goods.
Zynga was not able to stop this from happening.
• Zynga’s financial position has not been well in its initial years and also recently. It
had a loss of $22.1 Million, $52.8 Million and $404.3 Million in 2008, 2009 and 2011
respectively.
• Zynga’s total costs and expenses has increased nearly 65% to $777million in June
2012 from $472million in June 2011 resulting in Zynga’s stock price has also
decreased from $10 in its IPO to $3.05 in June 2012.
• Its cash balance had also reduced to $435 million as of June 2012 compared to $535
million as of June 2011. [ CITATION Fer1 \l 1033 ]
Opportunities:
• Zynga and its competitor used a mutual “Copying” strategy. If another developer
launches a game that create a positive impact, Zynga can launch a similar version of
its own. [ CITATION Fer1 \l 1033 ]
• There has been an increase in the number of internet users all over the world. This
means that there is an opportunity to expend their presence online; by using the
internet to interact with its customers.
• There has been a new trend and growth in sales of the e-commerce industry. This
means that a lot people are making purchases online. If Zynga can open online stores,
their revenues and profits would be higher.
• The latest version of Farm Ville was more exciting because it was released in 3D.
This can lead to a huge gaming revenue and cover up for more advertising revenue.
• Nowadays, people can’t think of a moment without social media and the number of
users are going up every single day. The three social media platforms; Facebook,
Twitter and Instagram, have shown the highest number of increases in monthly active
users. Zynga Inc. can use social media to promote their products, interact with
customers and collect feedback from them. [ CITATION Fer1 \l 1033 ]
Threats:
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• Reliance on Facebook is a big threat for Zynga. It is also aware that if its relationship
with Facebook deteriorate or if Facebook it elf become less popular with customers,
the company’s business would suffer and alternative would have to be created.
• There has been numerous new player that have entered in the market and are gaining
market share by gaining existing companies’ market share. This is a threat for Zynga
Inc. as it can lose its customers to these new entrants.
• Zynga was subject to federal, state, and foreign laws regarding privacy and protection
of players’ data.
• Unauthorized third parties operate cheating programs that enables players to exploit
Zynga games, play them in an automated way or obtain unfair advantages over
players who played fairly. Additionally, unauthorized parties try to scam players with
fake offers for virtual goods, disputing the virtual economy of Zynga games.
[ CITATION Fer1 \l 1033 ]
• The company can face lawsuits in various market given - different laws and
continuous fluctuations regarding product standard in those markets.
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SFAS Matrix
External Factor Analysis Summary (EFAS Table): Zynga
Weighted
External Factors Weight Rating score Comments
Opportunities
1. Relationship with competitors 0.15 3.9 0.59 Mutual copying strategy
2. Market penetration 0.15 4.2 0.63 Increased internet users
3. Growth in E-commerce More sales and more
industry 0.05 5.0 0.25 revenues
4. Entrance into 3D sector 0.05 2.1 0.11 Huge potential growth
5. Promotional strategy 0.10 1.5 0.15 Excessive use of social media
Threats
1. Dependency on Facebook 0.05 3.1 0.16 Less possibility
2. Strong competition 0.15 3.0 0.45 High threat of new entrants
3. Government regulations 0.15 1.5 0.23 Strictly regulated
4. Third party interference 0.10 2.1 0.21 Chances are high
5. Lawsuit 0.05 1.7 0.09 Substantial loss
Total Scores 1.00 2.85
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Strategic Factor Analysis Summary (SFAS) Matrix: Zynga
Weigh Ratin Weighte
Strategic Factors t g d score Duration Comments
Shor Intermediat Lon
t e g
Strong,
S1. Organizational Independent and
structure 0.10 4.6 0.46 x flexible
Exposure on
S2. Virtual different
platform 0.15 3.8 0.57 x x x platforms
Skilled and
S3. Virtual talented
integration 0.10 4.2 0.42 x employees
W2. System play Third party
protection 0.05 2 0.10 x x interruption
High debt,
W3. Financial decrease in stock
position 0.10 2.1 0.21 x x x price
O1. Relationship Mutual copying
with competitors 0.15 3.9 0.59 x x strategy
O2. Market Increased
penetration 0.15 4.2 0.63 x x x internet users
T2. Strong High threat of
competition 0.05 3.0 0.15 x x new entrants
T3. Government
regulations 0.10 1.5 0.15 x x x Strictly regulated
T4. Third party
interference 0.05 2.1 0.11 x x Chances are high
The weighted score here is 3.38, more than three which is above average (3.00). [ CITATION
Whe \l 1033 ]
Therefore, doing the SFAS matrix, we can conclude that Zynga’s environment is in a better
position and have the potential to grow and stay in the long run.
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Industry Analysis: Porter’s Five Forces Model
Porter’s approach to industry analysis, which is also known as porter’s five forces model (a
new force has been included, making it six) is used to conduct the task analysis. These forces
are: threat of new entrants, rivalry among existing firms, threat of substitute products or
services, bargaining power of buyers, bargaining power of suppliers, relative power of other
stakeholders. [ CITATION Whe \l 1033 ]
A high force often refers to a low profit which is a treat and a low force is referred to a high
profit which can be an opportunity for the firm to a particular industry. An industry analyst,
while doing the industry analysis using porter’s model rank these forces between high,
medium or low and finally comes to a conclusion about the external factors (opportunities
and threats) about the industry and firm. Zynga Inc. Managers can use Porter Five forces to
understand how the five forces makes profitability and they can develop new strategy for the
betterment of the company. Also, they can focus on long term profitability for the industry.
[ CITATION Whe \l 1033 ]
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Threats of New Entrants
Here the Multimedia & Graphics Software brings innovation such as -new ways of doing
things and pressure on the Zynga Inc. through lower pricing strategy, cost reducing and
providing new value propositions to the customers. They have to manage all these challenges
and build effective barriers for safeguard to its competitive edge. [ CITATION Fer \l 1033 ]
They can tackle them by building economics of scale so that it can be easier to lower the
fixed cost per unit. By Innovating new products and services which not only brings customers
to the fold but also gives old customer a reason to buy Zynga Inc.’s products at a time. And it
also helps to build capacities and spend money on research and development and are less
likely to enter a dynamic industry where the established players such as Zynga Inc. keeps on
defining the standards regularly. It reduces the profits for the new firms thus discourage new
players in the industry.
They can tackle them by building efficient supply chain with multiple suppliers and
experimenting with products designs using different materials so that if the prices of one raw
material increased then the company can shift to another.[ CITATION Fer \l 1033 ]
New products will be reduced the defection of existing customers to its competitors. They
build a large base of customers which will be very helpful in two ways for customers which
will help to reduce the bargaining power of the buyers plus it will provide an opportunity to
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the firms to rationalize its sales and production process and by innovating new products
rapidly to customers to seek discounts and offers on established products and keeps on
coming up with new products. [ CITATION Fer \l 1033 ]
• Developing good relationship with consumers. Maintaining customer data and proper
communication can make them know about new offers and features of a product or
service.
• Giving more attention to brand image and loyalty. Qualitative products and services
help a company in the long run. Also, helps to gain trust from consumers.
• Need to do proper research before producing for innovative products or services
which will as well satisfy consumer’s needs.
• By giving special offers like discounts, buy one get one offer, gifts, trail purchases
etc. It helps to create value for products.
How Zynga Inc. Can overcome Rivalry among the Existing Competitors
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• Highlighting the differences, the company has with the competitors and working on it
to strengthen the company culture.
References
Fern Fort. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://fernfortuniversity.com/term-
papers/porter5/analysis/4074-zynga-inc-.php
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