ARTICLE: "As Its Brands Lag at Home, Unilever Makes a Risky Bet: CEO Shifts Resources To Poorer Countries; The Making of 'Cubitos,'" by Deborah Ball, Wall Street Journal, 22 March 2007, p. A1.
Great piece right out of the playbook of Prahalad.
This CEO isn't just talking China and India, but Africa and Latin America--the whole Gap.
Key line:
Unilever figures that 1.2 billion consumers will buy packaged goods for the first time by 2010--most of them in the developing world.
Each week 40k people in Asia use a washing machine for the first time.
As one section puts it, it's all about "getting there first."
Shrinking the Gap will be a private-sector-led affair. The roll of the military is to buy time, create stability and security, and help money flow.
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