[General Topics] quicksite:
THIS MESSAGE is about: HTC Corporation Lacks Global Managerial Cohesion

NOTE: THOSE WITH TWITTER 140 ATTENTION SPANS, SKIP AHEAD.

From what I've read here I have a few comments and observations:

1) I don't know the org chart of HTC as a global corporation, and how spread out they have become in their primary functional areas of R&D, product design, programming & UI development, localization & carrier customization, parts & sourcing, manufacturing & assembly, packaging, wharehousing & distribution, customer support, warranty support, sales & marketing, international branding, regional branding.

2) I say this from the perspective of knowing, for example, that Apple has divisions in France, Germany, Spain, Ireland, Africa, Greece, all over the world -- and they are, to the best of my knowledge, almost independently run and operated from Apple America... with Presidents and corporate structures, and often completely separate warranty handling processes from country to country.

3) So too I have experience first hand how HTC has, in its growth spurt, been experiencing regional differences in operational quality -- and I would add - competence. For example: When the original unlocked HTC Desire (GSM) was being sold in April of 2010 in UK and Europe and India, many many people had pre-orders PAID FOR and theye were in queue for these orders to be shipped to them initially end of March 2010, then date pushed to beginning of April 2010... But then something very shifty occurred:

At this time last year the HTC Desire (first version) was such a hugely in demand phone, that HTC'd supply chain did not have enough inventory in the supply chain to feed all the demand. And HTC made a very terrible decision. In order to kiss-ass and satisfy T-Mobile UK, whose walk-in customers were asking for this phone left and right, but yet T-Mobile UK was OUT OF STOCK, HTC authorized the huge (i mean gigantic) diversion of the shipment of phones wharehoused and being trucked in for fulfillment of UNLOCKED PRE-ORDERS which had been paid for as early as February and March -- to be re-routed and trucked in to T-Mobile UK stores... In so doing, they pushed vague messages to major distributors in UK like Clove and handtec, who had thousands of customers so excited to get their unlocked phones finally -- describing some uncontrollable delay that would cause another 2 weeks before the unlocked phones would be shipped.

Customers and distributors figured this out very fast, collectively, and HTC should have paid a price for this in terrible PR, but they managed to skate by because they did push out the unlocked inventory one week later rather than 2 -- and even though in total they were one month later than promised, customers were so thrilled by the phones and their workmanship that the storm went away.

4) But what this speaks to is managerial operational dysfunction at HTC, in at least some regional operations -- and Europe is a HUGE primary region for HTC customers and has been since at least 2003, around the time these forums started with the very first HTC smartphone, the XDA (for those of you who never knew how and why these forums were named XDA)

Let me now state for clarity: I LOVE HTC phones. For me, the product design is gorgeous, and has been leading the industry for years, since 2003... And I am on my 5th HTC smartphone in a row in 7 years time. So I "come in praise of HTC", not to spite it. HTC CHINA, where the magic happens, clearly has known what they're doing for years. MY QUESTION IS: as they have grown, and inevitably have needed to open more and more regional offices in other countries, how well have all these operations been integrated into one corporate culture with a unified operational code? MY ANSWER: NOT VERY WELL AT ALL.

I think that last year's really quite successful "YOU" branding campaign for HTC -- its first ever -- had two purposes. The first was obvious: To present to the world, and to consumers, its NAME and face -- which had long been buried as the unnamed brand behind T-Mobile's and other carrier's phones... And with the meteoric resurgence of Motorola and their droid franchise of phones, HTC -- a king of smartphones -- was suddenly dwarfed and marginalized. To stay alive they had to become known to consumers, not just carriers. That was their primary aim.

However, I would argue that purpose #2 was to provide a unifying glue for the international string of operations that comprised "HTC" in all the affiliate countries. I think the very fact that we see these abberations speaks to elements of autonomy which were vestages of a company run not as a consumer brand company but as regional distribution hubs only -- and that all of this has abruptly changed --- and thus the "YOU

campaign and "quietly brilliant" would bring unified branding -- and brand discipline -- to all of these perhaps semi-rogue operations, tightening them up into a singular culture worlwide, with a consistent brand experience wherever consumers went, but also wherever managers went too.

5) Further supporting the wild aberrations in quality control of how HTC operates/ doesn't operate as a uniform company in all regions of the world (IT DOESN'T -- AND THAT'S WHAT SPEAKS LOUD AND CLEAR IN THIS THREAD), I just went through 3 months of battling with HTC AMERICA's Warranty Division over their initial refusal to honor their warranty obligations on my HTC Desire -- while it was still under ONE YEAR old -- and with my phone having a TWO-YEAR warranty. I accused them, correctly so, of not honoring their UK Warranties (where I purchased the phone). They insisted they do. I said "No, you don't. You don't even know the TERM of the warranty"

"All HTC products have a 1 year warranty"

"No, you're wrong, and clueless about your own corporation. I am reading the warranty right now, and I have the worldwide care pamphlet here as well which I am going to PDF and send you -- which is ridiculus because YOU should have it or go to your own company's website and download it from the web -- if you know how... It says very clearly it;s a TWO YEAR WARRANTY --"

"Well we've never seen that"

"Well have you ever considered that warranties can vary region to region?"

** I was speaking to the senior level executive at HTC AMERICA at their corporate headquarters at Bellevue Washington -- they don't even know how their own global company works.

I have detailed this fully in another thread (you can search for it), but I never followed up the final chapter of it. It's a waste of time. I have a summary statement after dealing with all if these entities within HTC America: Warranty Repairs in Stafford Texas, Warranty Escalations in Indianapolas, Supervisor and head of the Warranty Escalations Department in Indianapolis, who was appalled by the behavior in Texas and fast-tracked my repair, but also with senior executive level corporate customer complaints for HTC America in Bellevue Washington, who also assured me the problem would be handled, apologizing for the handling.

It was nevertheless flubbed yet again, with HTC Corporate failing to send the actual email authorization to HTC Escalations in Indianapolis, who had to give Stafford Texas the go ahead to perform the work (which is all completely absurd to begin with because it was under warranty and this was a defective USB port which was widely reported and easily googled "HTC DESIRE microUSB port"). Thus, an already delayed under-waranty repair was delayed just sitting there in what was supposed to be a top-escalated state, first-in-queue fix and fed-ex back, instead gathering dust for over a week until I called to see what was going on.

I couldn't believe how many cross-checks could be fouled up, and yet they were. Finally, that day, the device was repaired and I was told it was in labeling to be fed exed out that same day, as it had been pre-approved for OVERNIGHT delivery. I was so excited to go to my service bureau next day to get the device. But it didn't arrive. nor the next day, or the next, or next or next or next or next or next. But 7 days later I get the FED EX GROUND shipment, despite Head of Warranty Operations Escalations Department in Indianapolis (a really nice, and really competent person who was on the short end of the stick of OTHER people's F*ups, including Bellevue's, and Stafford, Texas). She was so embarrassed. On the phone at the end of our call she said "I have good news, here is your Overnight FedEx tracking # they've just sent me"

But Texas Warranty center, in a final act of total clutziness, entered Fed Ex ground.

6) I apologize for the long message, but to me it is a different way of approaching the problem cited in this thread:

From what it sounds like, the problem is isolated to Korea and the way it was advertised there offcially in HTC stores, on websites, in TV ads. And, based on what others are saying, it seems to be an aberrartion from the norm - where it was NOT advertised that way elsewhere.

CONCLUSIONS: I am sorry to say that I agree with other person that you will not get an apology because it would be a legal admission of wrongdoing; and that is a legal liability that would immediately make them in breech of so many things -- there is no way they are going to voluntarily put themselves in that position.

This is why they will lie to you and then chnage their ads. It is despicable and deplorable. But in this case -- and I know this is a horrible thing to hear -- you have only a few choices: a) you will not get what you want, that is unless you want to devote your life to this for the principle of it, and allocate about $100,000 minimum in legal costs to bring about litigation for false advertisement or fraud or deception IN KOREA. I strongly advise you not do this. b) you do as you have said you will do: punish with your pocketbook, and refuse to buy their products anymore. And given you are an opinion leader, you take down the business that would come from colleagues of yours, ripping it away from HTC.

NOTE: I understand that what this LACKS is moral satisfaction: When someone smugly tells you "if you don't like it, you can sue us", you want to smack them in the face for such arrogance and disrespect for a customer. And I know exactly how it feels. You want them to FEEL the loss of your business.

Well, look, they may not. They probably won't.

But thus is what I told the honcho at Corporate at HTC, expecially after the 3rd and 4th screwup:

So, I just want to say that despite the flood of product models HTC has every quarter -- and despite the fact that I still love their phones, I am getting a bad taste in my mouth. And HTC China better wake up -- they better get a handle on their international operation, because they don't have a handle on it right now, that is for certain.

One last comment: Blow off the jerks who come onto these threads and scold you with "you shoulda done your homework". I've been at these forums now a good # of years -- a lot of the people who've been here longer have left, they've moved on since the site changed hands. But this type is very familiar. Whether on this forum or any tech forum. They're a breed of know it alls you;d like to just squash with your shoe like a cockroach. They add no value. They're just around to **** on other people - and they generally take great delight in it. Do your best to ignore them. They usually can't stand me -- and believe me the feeling is mutual.

/quicksite