| Report to the Management:A Strategic Analysis of Zipcar | | | Student ID Number: 0898244, 0889876 | 11/30/2011 |

Table of Contents 1.0) Abstract………………………………………………………………………...2 2.0) Introduction…………………………………………………………………….3 3.0) PESTEL Analysis…………………………………..……………..…………...4 4.0) Five Forces………...……………………………..…………….…..…………..6 5.0) Three Generic Strategies.……………………………..……………..…………8 6.0) Strategy Direction……………………………………………………...……..10 7.0) Value Chain Analysis…………………………………..……………………..11 8.0) SWOT Analysis…...….…………………………..……………………...…....13 9.0) Conclusion…………..………………………………………………………...15 10.0) Recommendations….…………………………………………………………15 11.0) Implementation Issues………………………………………………………...16 12.0) …show more content…

By offering incentives the government attempts support and encourage the adoption of electrical cars and plug-in. This can also benefit the image of Zipcar since they are supporting the choice of vehicles that would benefit the environment. In this way the government might have a political influence over Zipcar and their decision in choice of vehicles.
3.2) Economical influence
The economical part of PESTEL analysis highlights the effect of macroeconomic influences such as exchange rates, business cycles, differential economic growth rates around the world and tax changes (Johnsons, Whittington, & Scholes, 2011). Recently there has been a decrease in car sales due to the financial crisis (lovetoknow). As a result the demand for new cars has gone down dramatically, affecting the automobile industry by 23% decrease in sales (lovetoknow). People who can’t afford cars are more likely to use the services of car sharing company like Zipcar instead of buying cars.

3.3) Social Influence
Social influences include demographics and culture (Johnsons, Whittington, & Scholes, 2011). It shows how “changes in social trends” effect the company and demand for it’s services (oup). One of the major reasons for Zipcar’s success in the US is that people seem to be highly dependent on using cars as a source of transportation. Public transportation is not widely available in many parts of the country (hofstra students); even where it is available it can be