One part of the business model that I stress more than most commentators is distribution strategy. This is probably because I came from the retail industry and partly because distribution and logistics are not taught much in business schools. Apple's iPhone experience in China illustrates the importance of distribution.
Apple is the worldwide leader in smartphones in every major market except China. There they are way behind the market leader--Samsung. Samsung has a 16.8 percentage point lead in market share and their lead is increasing, according to this story in Bloomberg. Part of Apple's problem is that they have not secured a distribution agreement with the largest Chinese cell carrier--China Mobile. The fact that the iPhone does not support the protocol for China Mobile's network is part of the reason, but one could ask who designs a product that does not work in the largest distribution network, 633 million subscribers, in the world.
Image credit: Wikipedia
