KENYA LOVES US, but Pakistan hates us . . . India? Loves us . . . Jordan? Hates us . . . Mexico? Loves us . . . Egypt? Hates us . . . France, after the messy breakup, has moved back in . . . And Muslims abroad aren't inviting us to brunch anytime soon . . . If Americans still wonder what the world thinks of Old Glory, check out recent congressional testimony by Andrew Korhut, president of the Pew Research Center . . . ("Restoring America's Reputation in the World.") . . . Researchers for the Pew Global Attitudes Project interviewed 200,000 people in 57 countries . . . That's a humongous sampling . . . Our image sank after the invasion of Iraq, and it bounced back in Europe when President Obama moved into the White House . . . We need to fix our country's reputation, our global brand, real fast . . . Far too much is at stake.
THE GLOBAL APPEAL of hip hop culture and commerce shows no signs of slowing. Born on the streets of New York, today the symbols and stylings of hip hop and rap music may have been watered down for the mainstream (corporate ads, Disney Channel shows, even TV shows for pre-schoolers). But the music and lifestyle still are a driving force for social and political change around the world, according to Jeff Chang, a cultural writer and author of Can't Stop Won't Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation. His article in Foreign Policy ("It's a Hip Hop World") sums it up well:
"IT'S CLEAR THAT hip-hop culture has become one of the most far-reaching arts movements of the past three decades . . . Today, the message of hip-hop is even transcending borders. From xi ha in China to "hip-life" in Ghana, hip-hop is a lingua franca that binds young people all around the world . . . It is the foundation for global dance competitions, the meeting ground for local progressive activism, even the subject of study at Harvard and the London School of Economics . . . .
"HIP-HOP IS also a serious business. More than 59 million rap albums were sold in the United States alone last year . . . It sells an estimated $10 billion worth of trend-setting luxury and consumer goods every year . . . This 'urban aspirational lifestyle' market is expected to continue to grow. According to a 2006 report by business research company Packaged Facts, the potential purchasing power . . . in the United States alone is worth $780 billion."
Jan Chipchase is the principal researcher and "cultural anthropologist" at telecom titan Nokia who jets around the globe, studying how communities and consumers use mobil tech devices. Raise your hands if you want that job. Chipchase writes a fascinating blog called FuturePerfect, and he spoke recently at the International CESconsumer electronics show in Las Vegas with Nokia CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo,who pitched Nokia's global business and mobile devices spanning the world -- especially in poorer countries lacking Internet infrastructures, and where most people cannot afford personal computers. Farmers, shopkeepers and others rely heavily on basic cellphones, smart phones, e-mail, texting and other services that middle-class consumers in the West take for granted. Here's a video and transcript of Kallasvuo's keynote.
Also, courtesy of Slideshare, see a report below by Chipchase on the future of mobile devices and mobile banking in emerging countries ("Mobile phone practices & The Design of Mobile Money Services for Emerging Markets"). Nokia and Silicon Valley startup Obopay recently launched Nokia Money, a new mobile payment service for Third World consumers without bank accounts, or who may live long distances from banks.
For those who still hold old stereotypes of gays partying in the streets, you may be shocked to hear that most are dull as dishwater, just like the rest of us middle-class drones. Market researchers and the U.S. Census have found in recent years that gays and lesbians -- surprise! -- also live in the suburbs, which means they spend weekends cruising the aisles at Target and Home Depot. According to Community Marketing, a San Francisco-based research firm, about half of the gay and lesbian consumers they've surveyed own single-family homes, and half live with their partners or spouses. They're steady wage earners with average household incomes of $86,000 a year, and more than 60% of lesbians own dogs or cats. Can't get more Middle America than that. At the same time, gay consumers represent a wide range of interests and cannot be easily categorized, notes David Paisley, senior research director at Community Marketing.
Global businesses might be happy to hear that 83% of U.S. gay and lesbian consumers surveyed hold valid passports -- a percentage far higher than the U.S. average of 34% of Americans over 18 years old, according to the just-released "14th Annual Gay and Lesbian Tourism Report" by Community Marketing. About 63% of gay and lesbian consumers surveyed said they used their passports for international travel last year. Their favorite destinations: Canada (Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver), England, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Mexico (Puerto Vallarta and Cancun) and Puerto Rico.
They also love to spend on brands that cater to the gay marketplace. In the dawn of the modern gay political movement in San Francisco and New York 40 years ago, red-blooded American companies shunned the controversy surrounding gays. Now, hundreds of reputable companies have no problem selling to gay consumers, who make up a $700 billion market, according to Witeck-Combs Communications in Washington D.C. Among the favorite brands of gays, according to Community Marketing's research: W Hotels, Kimpton Hotels, Hilton, Marriott, American Airlines, Southwest, Delta and others. The gay wedding market -- all that hotel and travel spending – also brings hundreds of millions of sales and tax dollars into governments and economies, according to the UCLA School of Law's Williams Institute.
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, U.S.A. -- The future of the global auto industry may have finally arrived. Let's hope so, as film shots of melting glaciers keep re-playing in our heads. Japanese automaker Nissan recently launched the Leaf, its jazzy new all-electric car, at baseball's Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, the first city in a 22-city tour of the U.S.A. and Canada. The new car is a part of Nissan's herculean goal to make affordable, all-electric vehicles for the global mass market.
Carlos Ghosn, CEO of Nissan and the alliance, said the Leaf will cost about the same as similar-sized Nissan cars, with consumers paying 1% to 2% more to lease the Leaf's lithium-ion battery. The new car, which may go on sale in late 2010, has a driving range of 100 miles and must be rejuiced at charging stations or at the owners' garage at home. So far, Nissan has signed early deals worldwide with 33 local governments and energy firms to build electric-vehicle infrastructures for recharging. The most recent deal was announced Friday with NRG Energy's Reliant Energy in Houston, the heart of the U.S. oil and energy industry. Meanwhile, the Renault-Nissan Alliance, a 10-year-old partnership of the French and Japanese automakers, has launched "zero-emission vehicle initiatives" in Japan, Europe, Mexico, China and Israel.
No wallflower, Ghosn boldly predicts that electric cars will make up 10% of global sales by 2020. He believes that U.S. consumers will buying enough electric vehicles to surpass President Obama's goal of 1 million plug-in vehicles by 2015. Nissan isn't alone in the market for climate-friendly vehicles, facing competition from Toyota and Honda hybrids, General Motor's Chevrolet Volt and several electric carmakers in China.
Don't bet against Ghosn, though. Critics scoffed when he took over the Renault-Nissan Alliance. But the cross-cultural Ghosn -- a Lebanese native who grew up in Brazil and France and who speaks five languages -- got the cross-border companies to work together and turn around then-ailing Nissan. Now, as the global auto market grows in emerging markets, the Alliance works closely with Dongfeng Motor Co. in China, Bajaj Autoin India and Russia's largest automaker, AvtoVAZ. Ghosn said that auto executives and government leaders in those countries favored the Alliance over other foreign automakers because of the long-lasting ties between Renault and Nissan. "They said we were not a merger or acquisition," Ghosn said, "but a real partnership between two companies."
The night before the Leaf debuted in the U.S.A., Ghosn spoke with CoolGlobalBiz.com in his hotel suite in Beverly Hills. The globe-trotting CEO and business diplomat had just flown in from Shanghai and New Delhi, where he attended theWorld Economic Forumwith other corporate leaders. Brief excerpts from our interview (more later):
On the strengths and dangers of cultural diversity: "If it is not managed, it can be a weakness. I've seen many examples where wars and fights are started because people of different values and cultures are not able to manage their diversity. On the contrary, when it's managed, it can be a strength. A country like Brazil, where you have so many people of different origins coming togtether, little by little has built itself into a powerhouse."
On business diversity: "When you're addressing a market, and this market is made up of people with a certain diversity, it's important that your company reflects this diversity. If you want to understand what products and services people want, you need people in the company who understand the market and can make those decisions. A company like Nissan or Renault sells products in all markets of the world, and the people buying the products are men and women, young and old, different religions, different values."
On the Alliance and the Leaf: "There are so many ways to look at the benefits of the Alliance. You can do projects that, if you were not together, you could not do. I don't think Renault alone or Nissan alone could have developed the battery and the electric car. But working together, with the scale they have, they were capable of developing both."
On cross-border partnerships: "When you are mixing people from different backgrounds and different companies, you're doing it in a way which is passionate, (while also) respecting the identity of the companies. You have to do it steadily, patiently. You need the right speed, you have to accelerate or decelerate . . . The most important thing is that you are lasting. You know very well that (most) acquisitions end up collapsing, most mergers end up being dissolved. We are the only partnership in our industry that has lasted more than 10 years, and we are still growing and developing."
