Planning at Bata

Abstract

How well multinationals will perform in the 1980s depends on what extent they utilize the technological, marketing and intellectual capabilities of the countries in which they operate. Such internationalization of management and the participation of foreign subsidiaries in manufacturing, marketing and product integration have marked the growth of the Toronto-based Bata Shoe Organization since its founding in Zlin, Czechoslovakia in 1894. Today Bata operates 190 plants in 100 countries, and its roughly 90,000 employees speak more than 140 languages and dialects. Last year the company sold over 300 million pairs of shoes, or one-third of all the shoes produced in the free world.