台灣軟體公司國際化成長與策略之研究

Abstract

軟體產業，雖然具有低物料成本、低進入障礙、複製成本低等特質，但是，軟體產品的全球競爭卻明顯地呈現大者恆大的現象，對於母國市場與資源皆有限的軟體公司而言，其若欲利用國際市場需求量持續成長，尤其是建立國際性品牌知名度，往往是個艱鉅的策略挑戰，而這正是許多台灣軟體產品廠商普遍所面臨的困境。環顧台灣軟體產業產值約莫只有硬體產業產值的十分之一，如何能夠提高軟體產業的競爭力，甚至利用硬體產業現有的國際競爭地位，誠屬重要的研究問題。 本研究擬針對開發軟體產品為主的台灣廠商，如何能夠突破有限國內市場與資源的限制，而在國際市場建構競爭優勢、達成企業成長為核心議題，分別從企業成長相關學理導引思考架構，從而以一個典型的台灣軟體產品個案公司為背景，提出一套可行的國際成長策略。 首先，本研究認為軟體體產品的國際化成長機會比嵌入式軟體高，而大市場品牌行銷的子公司管理是國際化的主要挑戰，而問題的根本在於台灣總部的行銷能耐往往不足，從而降低了海外子公司的價值創造，以及台灣總部與海外子公司的無效率運作。根據能耐基礎成長理論，本研究提出「三階段能耐發展」，以做為台灣軟體公司軟體產品品牌行銷國際化成長策略的解決方案；分別是：第一階段：發展台灣總部的產品能耐；(2)第二階段：發展品牌行銷與經營模式綜效的能耐；(3)第三階段：發展深耕品牌行銷的能耐。 此一三階段成長策略的意義：在概念上，應用能耐基礎成長的觀念性架構，到台灣總部與海外子公司的組織學習；利用所累積與建構的能耐，延伸到下一階段組織成長所需要的助力，並繼續建構出新的能耐來持續成長；在方法上，運用不同軟體經營模式與相互之間配搭的綜效，在公司三個不同的發展階段中，作為能不斷開發新業務的補給線，來開拓公司新事業業務的成長，並落實品牌的經營；在策略分析工具上，則可利用母公司經營合適矩陣圖來分析多事業模式的績效。 綜合言之，來自小市場的台灣軟體公司，在人力、財力、與管理經驗都不足的情況下，要建立在大市場的品牌知名度，需要建構高涉入國際化經營管理的能耐，而此一能耐的建構對台灣軟體公司是一件急不得的基礎工程，必須按部就班的學習與成長，也必須是公司經營階層經常自我檢視的重要工作。

Software business is characterized by low physical production cost, low replication cost, and low barriers to entry. Moreover, due to the existence of positive network externality, software products tend to falling into winner-take-all scenario in the global competition. These characteristics exert critical challenges to contenders based in a small home market, like Taiwan. Constrained by small home market and limited resource supports, even with competitive products, software companies are very difficult if not impossible to become a global winner. In general, there are two issues faced by a typical software company based in Taiwan: how to build a brand in leading markets, and how to manage the internationalization and growth strategy to sustain market development. The primary purpose of this research is to suggest a feasible strategic planning framework for a brand-name software company based in Taiwan to compete in global markets. This research will firstly present an industry analysis of software industry and then discuss how to capture global market opportunities based on locally developed advantages. First of all, we argue that software product business has greater potential for international growth than embedded software. Second, the headquarter capabilities of managing subsidiaries ion leading markets is key to internationalization success for a software company. Third, to better capture the root course of the managerial tensions between headquarter and subsidiaries, competence-based growth perspective is suggested. We therefore propose a “three-stage competence development” model, which includes (1) stage 1: developing the world-class product competences in a Taiwan headquarter, (2) stage 2: developing competence of brand marketing and synergies among business models, (3) stage 3: developing competence of brand marketing in depth. Conceptually, this model highlights the need of employing competence-based growing framework to guide resource allocation to create synergies among various different business models developed in three stages. Finally, we also suggest the usefulness of employing Parenting-Fit matrix to performance evaluation of multiple software business models. Implications of our research results to both Taiwan software companies and the government are also discussed