Sustainable Global Enterprise

Mother 2 mother is an internationally acknowledged nonprofit organization with its headquarters at Cape Town, South Africa. It operates majorly in the sub-Saharan Africa with sites in over seven countries that include Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania and many more. An organization mentors mothers who are living with the virus, on how to live positively and let them in on how to curb mother to child transmission. This is a measure taken to reduce the number of infant mortalities due to the Human Immunodeficiency Virus. Its vision is a world in which babies are born without the deadly killer disease, AIDS and where mothers with AIDS to live long and equally healthy lives. Its mission is to eliminate pediatric cases of the viral infection in the Sub-Saharan countries. It aims at placing mentor mothers at all, if not most of the health centers in the Sub-Sahara Africa (m2m.org).

Mother to mother works hand in hand with many countries Health ministry, which is faced with so many social, environmental as well as technological issues. First, many Africans living in the Sub Sahara regions are unable to gain access to basic sanitation, sufficiently clean water, as well as nutrition. This is a major challenge for the health industries for many sub Saharan countries. There is a shortage of qualified medical personnel. This makes the few medical practitioners available overworked and this presents a challenge that leads to poor health status in the developing countries. There is also a limitation when it comes to financial issues. Many countries in Africa have access to limited sources of finance, and as a result, the healthcare system will be compromised. This is due to inadequate pooling of resources. Many African countries have poor infrastructure, which affect the distribution of drugs as well as their pricing. Geographic limitations is also a major setback because not all the areas are physically accessible, which hinders the functions played by the health ministries in African countries. Now with the emergence of terminal illnesses that take a large portions of the budgets, there is a drastic reduction in the healthcare funds and hence, the providence of compromised healthcare systems. Mother 2 Mother is a relevant company because since it is in such an industry with so many challenges, it has to formulate effective strategies and implement them in the best way feasible, as to see the attainment of the Organizations vision and mission (Hart, 2007).

The geographical placements are not so pleasant since it is in infrastructural underdeveloped countries, deep in the African continent. Various factors affect the company’s present position paying regard to sustainability. Such is the population growth that affects the demographic movements, wars, economic instabilities and resource depletion, epidemic outbreaks of communicable diseases like tuberculosis and Human Immunodeficiency Virus to factors that involve climate change. There is also a major problem with the technological advancement. This is where the medical drugs and equipment have to be the most recent in the market. This is a major setback because, putting into consideration the financial pooling issues, this will also be an uphill task since it entails money to replace drugs and equipment, which are usually at an all time high. This, also, is a major setback to the industry in which Mother-to-Mother operates within.  These factors have affected mother-2-mother in its sustainability in these dynamic and ever changing economic situations.  

The company’s core activities are contributed to the fact that prevention is better than cure, and hence, it is trying to work backwards and prevent the mother to child transmission unlike waiting for the baby to be born and start treating it for the viral infection. With the current rising cases of the epidemics spread, the company acts to try curb the rate at which the virus is spread.  This creates grounds for its services providence to the mothers who acknowledge the fact that they are infected. The company offers advice on how to live a better life even when infected with the disease and better still prevention of pediatric and infancy infections. Mother-to-Mother is not a small business enterprise developed company, started in two thousand and one but is in more than six hundred sites in Africa. Its vision is a world in which babies are born free of the human immunodeficiency virus and that their mothers live a good life as well. The company’s mission is to improve the general health status of the mothers who are living with the virus. Their goal is to prevent mother to child transmission, which will in turn reduce the cases of infant mortality due to maternal infections. It also acts in its full capacity to improve the physical and mental well being of the mothers unfortunate enough to have contracted the disease somewhere along the way. This majorly helps the mothers overcome such issues as stigma, and enables them to live with a positive attitude towards life and hence encourage productivity. This ensures that the mothers live an all round fulfilling life that is free of any form of stigma (Rainey, 2006).

Mother-to-mother uses creative destruction because it is breaking away from the all time known curative healthcare measures to creating new consumer goods, new methods or approaches to healthcare through curative measures, looking to serve new and unexploited markets deep in the African continent as well as creating new methods of drug transportation and production. This holds true to keep the capitalist market wheel rotating.  Mother-to-mother seeks to reduce the cost of accessing medical care, as well as enhancing its reputation through the innovation of new products services using clean technology. Mother to mother also, makes sure that the effects are felt by everyone in the community through ensuring that they reach to the very most interior markets that are still unexploited, better referred to as the base of pyramid. All these are aimed at increasing the shareholder worthwhile still making sure the communities derive the most benefits as possible from the healthcare system at an affordable cost. Taking into consideration all these strategies, I can say that Mother to mother has a sustainable value portfolio necessary for creating sustainable value (Harcourt, 1994).

Mother-to-mother also uses the creative destruction theory. Since we are currently living in an economically changing environment, due to reasons such as wars, rapid population growth, changes in economic worth of a country and many more factors as seen earlier on, there is always a fast pace of change in industries. This calls for the rapid innovation of new consumer goods, which Mother to mother offers in form of preventive instead of curative healthcare systems. This new product will help to ensure the companies sustainability while carrying out its roles in the society. It also calls for changes in the methodology of drug distribution and availability, to reach the unexploited markets in the yet to be uncovered portions of the society who are considered to be uncatered for. In addition, this strategy ensures sustainability by creating new modes of creating economic capital while preserving the natural resources. This good trend ensures maximum shareholder value and better services for the target markets (Lopez, 2007).  

Mother-to-mother also has social enterprise. It is a nonprofit making organization, whose primary role is to improve the current living conditions of human beings. Profit making is a secondary objective since it does not serve to increase the value of the shareholders in any way. Their major goals are social and environmental, but not to increase the value of the shareholders. Mother to mother uses this strategy to attain it is organizational goals.

Mother-2-mother has a range of innovations that match the need for their new target markets. Since the spread of diseases in Africa is higher, it provides a good target market for the modified services and processes offered by the company. This is where it steps in to offer its new products and services in terms of delivery and distribution. It brings new ideas that embrace the ever changing technology and keep up with its pace. The new markets are the areas hardest hit with diseases. The company also has great affiliations with other big companies who step in as sponsors and provide funding for the company’s activities. This is also strategic since it helps the company raise finance for its services providence. These companies include Hewlett-Packard, Pfizer, who provide financial assistance that enables the company to achieve its healthcare goals. These also strategic alliances help mother to mother in its daily activities. Mother 2 Mother also works hand in hand with the healthcare systems in the countries in which their presence is felt, who provide support to their initiatives to see the changes in the quality of healthcare given to a given target population. 

I would rate the company’s portfolio in sustainable value terms as perfect because it has reduced risk of child infection, as well as innovating healthcare services that considers technology and is meant for everybody, down to the societal riff raff and underserved. It also aims to improve the communities’ health care system, which will be enjoyed by the whole community, regardless of the ever-changing environment. This is a clean record and I would personally say that this is a good show. The company has social enterprise as illustrated when the company aims to find the underlying cause of the pyramid, and address the needs of their target markets and act accordingly (Ajami & Bear, 2007, p. 67)).

The company, though not very big now, hopes to go global with time and unearth new markets where they can offer their services and instill the required changes. It is faced with many challenges but is currently based in Africa in over six hundred centers. The company is culturally sensitive and that explains a representative in all units.

In conclusion, this case study on mother to mother has personally helped me gain an insight into the strategies employed by businesses and how they arrive at the decisions that affect the company. For a sustainable enterprise, innovation has to be an everyday thing to provide new solutions to old problems, and as well as increasing the economic capital and preserving the scarce natural resources available. These challenges are the fuels that pave the way for innovation and new product management for an enterprise to have sustainability. Through proper innovations, value creation is added to the stakeholder and the third parties to the triad, the customer or better yet, the target market. As the company attains its global plan, its mission and vision will be realized when the whole of the sub Saharan countries are efficiently covered in terms of Medical and healthcare system.