Business in Action, Global Edition

Book Preface

Major Changes and Improvements in This Edition
Here are the major changes in the Eighth Edition of Business in Action:

• Five new chapter-opening vignettes with chapter-ending case studies:
Chapter 2: The forecasting challenges faced by Apple when the company was planning the launch of
its iPhone 6 models
Chapter 3: Cisco’s successful merger-and-acquisition process, defying the odds when it comes to
buying other companies
Chapter 8: The Mexican building-materials giant Cemex’s innovative use of custom collaboration
platform to help its global workforce solve pressing business challenges
Chapter 11: Zappos’ unconventional strategies for finding and attracting unconventional
employees
Chapter 16: GoPro’s smart use of social media to build awareness of and demand for its rugged
action cameras
• More than three dozen new review, analysis, and application questions and student
projects
• Fourteen all-new exhibits and 45 updated or redesigned exhibits, further expanding
Business in Action’s unmatched selection of value-added instructional visuals
• Coverage of the revolution in mobile connectivity and the many ways mobile is
reshaping business
• New or substantially revised sections include
The Technological Environment (Chapter 1), highlighting the disruptive effects of mobile
communication and connectivity
The Trans-Pacific Partnership (PTT) (Chapter 2), highlighting the controversy surrounding this
major new trade agreement
Legal Differences in the Global Business Environment (Chapter 2), updating the European
taxation controversy that has forced Google, Amazon, Starbucks, and other U.S. companies to
change their business practices
Blueprint for an Effective Business Plan (Chapter 6), adding a discussion of the contrary view
about the value of conventional business plans and the use of canvases instead
Social Networks and Virtual Communities (Chapter 8), adding an overview of Zappos’s reliance
on social networking to keep its growing workforce connected
Gamifying for Healthy Competition (Chapter 10), describing how companies are using game
principles to motivate employees
Gender (Chapter 11, in Dimensions of Workforce Diversity), updating the discussion of
gender pay imbalance and uncovering the major issues behind the often-quoted statistics about
women earning only 70 percent of what men earn
Test Marketing (Chapter 14), expanding the coverage with the new phenomenon of crowdsourced
test marketing and crowdfunding as a way to identify potential hit products
Packaging (Chapter 14), broadening the discussion of how packaging decisions are often a
tug-of-war between competing economic and environmental concerns
The Outlook for Wholesaling (Chapter 15), adding discussion of how e-commerce technologies
let companies such as Amazon jump into traditional wholesaling and distribution channels because
some incumbent players were too slow to adapt
The Outlook for Retailing (Chapter 15), expanding the discussion points of overcapacity, the
emergence of mobile commerce, the growth of multichannel retailing, and data security and
privacy concerns stemming from personalized marketing efforts
Physical Distribution and Logistics (Chapter 15), using Amazon’s new same-day delivery service
and experimentation with delivery drones to highlight the importance of competitive physical
distribution in the marketing mix.
Public Relations (Chapter 16), explaining how social media have upended the traditional practice
of public relations