RTMA: A bridge to academia

The Routes to Market Association has long acted as a bridge between academia and industry.  In some cases, RTMA members have funded research. RTMA meetings also provide a forum that is regularly attended by academics eager to learn more about industry’s concerns. And several academics have addressed our meetings.

From the point of view of industry, academics can provide companies with new insights and with a way of testing and validating ideas.

So, the next time you are confronted with an issue with a lot of hard data, why not give the Routes to Market Association a call?

We will be happy to put you in touch with an academic who might be interested in getting involved.  Anderson says: "Academics are always hungry for new material and confidentiality is assured!"

IMP: An alternative view

Professor David Ford of Bath University reckons that the whole concept of channel management is just plain wrong. “Suppliers still perceive channels as a series of pipes to take their products and services.”

He adds: “Suppliers, particularly with industrial or IT products, still often feel they own their channels. They feel that their products are delivered by their channels. They also feel that they have real power over these channels."

Ford argues that this supplier-centric view of the world is entirely false and that you have to look at the wider world.

Indeed, he goes as far as to argue that all companies are essentially defined by their relationships with a network of others.  "Take RS Components, a big UK electronics components’ distributor famed for its next-day delivery service. Why does it exist?  I would argue that it exists precisely in order to stop its customers (who are bearded techies) from having to think about when they are going to get their product.  It is defined entirely by this function."
Or take Ericsson. "The way it has developed was entirely dependent on its relationship with Norwegian telecoms operator Telia.  All its products came out of this relationship.  Ericsson was defined by the Telia relationship."

And he suggests that products are radically changed by the channels that add services to them and deliver them to the end-customer. The product that leaves your intermediary for the customer is not the same product as the one you shipped him.

Ford argues that the big danger is that suppliers don’t understand that they are defined by relationships, and seek to use power they haven’t got.  This is why so many channel initiatives fail. 

And the really big danger?  That is when suppliers sucessfully wrest power from their intermediaries and dictate to their channels. Everything works fine for a while, but if the supplier has total power then everything depends upon his initiative. And the moment he makes a false step the entire network sinks like the Titanic.