About the Company
Nike is a public company founded by Phil Knight and Bill Bowerman on 25 January 1964. This American MNC is engaged in the manufacturing, developing, designing, global marketing as well as sales of accessories, equipment, apparel, footwear, and services. It has its headquarter in the metropolitan area of Portland, which is in Oregon near Beaverton.
Nike’s Background
Bill Bowerman who was a track coach and played with shoe designs met Phil Knight, a miler in 1957 at the University of Oregon. With the motive to create American running shoes of high quality, both Bowerman and Knight in 1962 formed the firm “Blue Ribbon Sports”. In 1958 they started selling the Tiger shoes manufactured by the Japanese company Onitsuka Tiger. The running shoes were sold at track meets out of cars.
It was in 1972, the company changed its name to NIKE that was derived from the Victory Greek goddess. Carolyn Davidson, a graduate student was paid USD 35 for designing the “Swoosh” logo of NIKE. The business tie-up between Onitsuka and NIKE broke in the same year due to distribution rights disputes. NIKE went public in the year 1980.
Mission
Nike Inc.’s mission is to drive the innovation of products for athletes on a global scale. In chase of aiding performance, enhancing feel and perception, innovative products delivery to athletes, a huge number of ideas are tested.
Acquisitions made by NIKE
The company has made 8 investments and has spent over USD 305 Million on its first 7 acquisitions.
NIKE Products
Nike offers products for the 6 categories including training and sportswear, soccer/football, Jordan brand, NIKE Basketball, and Running. Kid’s products as well as recreational and athletic use products such as baseball, American football, wrestling, walking, volleyball, tennis, skateboarding, lacrosse, golf, cricket, and other outdoor activities are also marketed. They also manufacture footwear specifically for athletics but it is used widely for leisure and casual purpose also. A considerable emphasis is placed by the company on high-quality and innovative manufacturing & development of products.
Nike is famous mostly for its sneakers. The most famous & top-selling sneakers as of 2021 include:
- Nike Air Force 1
- Nike Air Yeezy 2
- Nike Air Yeezy
- Nike Air Huarache
- Nike Cortez
- Nike Air Jordan 1
- Tom Sachs x Nike Mars Yard
- Nike SB Dunk
- Nike Mag
- Nike Blazer
- Nike Dunk
- Nike Air Max 97
- Nike Air Max 95
- Nike Air Max 90
- Nike Air Max 1
NIKE Locations
As of May 2020, NIKE had over 1090 stores and around 530 factories in 45 countries including that in Albania, Algeria, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia, Herzegovina, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, China Mainland, Croatia, Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Egypt, Estonia, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Korea (Republic of), Kuwait, Latvia, Lebanon, Lithuania, Macao, Malaysia, Mexico, Moldova, Montenegro, Morocco, Netherlands, New Zealand, North Macedonia, Norway, Oman, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Romania, Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Singapore, Slovakia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Uzbekistan, and Uruguay.
Marketing Strategy
One of the reasons for NIKE’s success is its marketing strategy. They use endorsements of sports celebrities, emotional marketing, develop high-quality products, use the latest technologies in their business as well as acquire famous sports brands. It has established Its logo and brand through marketing. It spent USD 3.3 billion in advertising and marketing in 2016.
Sponsorships made by NIKE
To promote and advertise their products Nike has sponsored many athletes and some of the famous ones include Cristiano Ronaldo(Soccer), LeBron James (Basketball), Kevin Durant(BasketBall), Rafael Nadal(Tennis), Tiger Woods(golf), Russell Westbrook(Basketball), Carmelo Anthony(Basketball), Chris Paul(Basketball), Russell Wilson (American Football) and Giannis Antetokounmpo(Basketball). Nike is a major sponsor of the athletic programs at Penn State University. It has been sponsoring Kit’s to the Indian cricket team since 2005. In 2013, the company signed Rory McIlroy a 10-year sponsorship deal worth $250 million. Apart from that, there are many more sponsorships made by the firm.
Finances
The revenue of Nike was increased by 19% to USD 44.54 Billion for the fiscal year ending on 31 May 2021. The net income became USD 5.73 Billion which was USD 2.54 Billion last year. The gross margin was 44.9%, 15.46% is the operation margin, 12.86% is the net profit margin and the return on investment is 22.4%.
The total debt to equity ratio is 73,74% for the fiscal year ended on May 31, 2021. LT Debt to Equity is 73.73%, the current ratio is 2.72 and 2.01 is the quick ratio.
