"Designing Work OrganizationsProject ReportOn InMobiSubmitted by: INDEXTopic No. Contents Page1. Brief Overview of InMobi 1-22. Culture and Philosophy 2-33. Growth stage (Organizational Life-Cycle) 3-44. Structure 4-55. Revenue Model 6-76. 7-8An Example of InMobi’s Products – Miip7. References 8 BRIEF OVERVIEW OF InMobiInMobi is a performance based mobile ad network, based in Bangalore and the founders claim to betoday the world's largest and most powerful independent mobile advertising platform. NaveenTewari, CEO of InMobi is competing with the likes of google, Apple and Microsoft for the mobile adspace. It was recognized by MIT Technology Review as one of the ‘50 Disruptive Companies of 2013’.Work: Mobile AdvertisingCustomer& Suppliers? Customers- Advertisers? Suppliers- App developersEvolution of InMobi1. Present: Inmobi App analytics in progress.2. 2008-2012 : Released InMObi Ad Tracker and acquired companies Metflow solutions, MMTGLabs, Overlay Media.3. 2008: Diverted to mobile advertising and rebranded as InMobi.4. 2007: Started as SMS-based search platform and initially named mKhoj.What triggered the idea?InMobi was started as MKhoj in 2007 with Mumbai Angels backing it. CEO and founder, NaveenTiwari realized that the mobile industry was on the verge of an explosion and saw this as a greatopportunity. They began with reverse market strategy. The business model used SMS based searchto solve local information problem and worked on SMS based monetization as revenue. But this didnot work out and they decided to move to mobile advertising. In this, they took a challenging path,instead of entering the crowded markets of America and Europe, they targeted emerging markets inAsia and Africa.FundingTill date, InMobi has received 6 rounds of funding with 6 investors. Major investors are SoftbankCapital, Kleiner Perkins Caufield& Byers, Sharpelo Ventures, Plaris Partners, Mumbai Angels andTenenbaum Capital Partners. InMobi received $220.6 million funded by Mumbai Angels. In July2010, it received 20 million funding from Kleiner Perkins Caufield& Byers. In September 2011, itreceived a $200 million funding from Softbank. In 2014, it got an additional $5 million in fundingfrom Softbank. Challenges faced? Category change: One of the biggest challenges that InMobi faced was at the time when itstarted as a SMS based search platform. But after seeing the situation that time when SMSbased search platform was not enough.Hence, They had to move to another sphere, whichwas mobile advertising.? International expansion: The management found it tough to run a global operation with 25offices, keeping one culture, one system and clear communication with everyone. ? Competitors: InMobi had to keep pace with its competitors and prove itself to be no less.Competitors like Google and Facebook Ads.? Fast changing technology: At present, although it has become very successful, but it has tomaintain the pace of innovation and technology that wants to incorporate video and media. ? Broad diversity and culture: It is spread in 125 countries presently. Hence, anotherchallenge faced is the diversities of all these markets. It needs to understand the need anddemand that varies from place to place. Just entering the market does not give any results; ithas to understand its customers and partners that what and how much value they canprovideInMOBI CULTURE AND PHILOSPHYTo start with InMobi culture let’s first see the company’s hidden elements of cultural analysis likemission and vision.They call it as “Our Purpose”, enabling consumers and businesses make smarter decisions bybuilding the deepest understanding of people across the world.Values states about Thinking Big, Being Entrepreneurial, Being Passionate, Fanatically Driven, BeingProud, Being Positive, Taking Ownership, Being Accountable, Freedom with Responsibility &Integrity. As they say:? “We don’t let anything stop us from setting bigger goals. At InMobi, we dare to dream big.”? “If we see an opportunity, we chase it. If we see a problem, we fix it. That’s how it has beenand always will be.”? “We got the right people doing the right work and even though we are oceans and desertapart, we know we are sailing in one direction.”? “Culture is the key to organizational success.”- Naveen Tiwari (CEO)? “Money doesn’t keep people. Of the factors that (retain people) money is the onlymeasurable one. Culture keeps people.”- Naveen Tiwari (CEO)? YaWiO- AtInMobi we believe in nurturing a culture that enables people to become more ofwho they truly are. We see culture like the wind – it’s the presence that can’t be directlyseen, but it can be felt very strongly.Philosophy: “Live life to the fullest at work and away from work” and ‘Live. Laugh. Leap.’1. Freedom to Ideate & Execute your ideas: Company gives huge freedom to their employees.Employees do not have to apply for leave and the travel expenses policy is very easy andwithout any long paper involved. They treat their employees not like a resources to be managed, they treat them as if they are humans and humans like to be free. 2. Sense of Accountability and Ownership: Everyone has their say, even if that is autocraticbut everyone speaks out and put his point forward. Employees can enroll themselves in anyproject they are interested in. “we need to make employees want to do meaningful work forus.” There are multiple projects and things to do on cutting edge technologies. They havesomething called “Hack day”, on that day you can present your idea to the concernedpeople. 3. Trusting people onboard: Company trust people and believe that they won’t misuse thefreedom given to them. Their cultural belief says that having trust in your employeesenhances the performance.4. Perks and Compensation: No strict timings, dress code and free meals. Weekly physician’svisit and timely appreciation related to work. These are the some of the motivational factorsforthe employee.5. Clan : Internal focus and high flexibility towards the external change in environment.6. Core Values: Trust , commitment, Ethics7. Driving Force: Growth, Innovation and competition.8. Recruitment Process: They had tough recruitment process. The process of intake upto 2 to10 days depending upon the position one applies. They have multiples rounds oftechnical,HR and director round. There is no formal orientation for new recruits.9. Knowledge Management: They organize several session and gathering to share theirknowledge and ideas. Hack Day- It is organized quarterly where people do presentations oftheir ideas. Twiki- It’s a page maintained by employees like Wikipedia which gives theknowledge about any thing from any person to any concepts. Tech-Connect- Employeesshare their knowledge every Friday .10. Focus on Internal Growth: Naveen Tiwari, CEO stated that the biggest reason for employeesleaving companies was because they did not see growth. TO solve this problem theyintroduced ‘internal hiring’ and ‘bridge assignments’. This helps employees to explore andtry out new things. And another huge advantage of this new techniques that the company isincreasing the cross-learning that happens in the process.11. Resource Organization: They have most of their employees working in Technical coredepartment.Growth stage (Organizational Life-Cycle)Current stage: Collectivity stageProvision: Clear direction Crisis: Need for delegation or Autonomy crisisCurrently InMobi is in the collectivity stage.? Strong leadership is already have been achieved and organization has clear goals anddirection? Departments are established along with little hierarchy of authority.? There are still few formal and informal control and communications. ? Slowly organization is moving towards Formalization stage. Lower level mangers workingdirectly under top level creating autonomy crisis for them. Middle managers are introducesin certain departments for better coordination without direct supervision from the top.STRUCTURE OF InMobiCEO VPVP Brand VP productPerformance VP strategy VP marketing VP Sales VP Operations VP Finance VP Tech VP NA VP JAPAC VP EMEA Business management Business 1. Flat structure: InMobi has a hybrid, flat structure. It is a mixture of Functional & Divisionalstructure. At the topmost position is the CEO of the company. The whole organization isthen divided into various functions such as technology, operations, finance, marketing andmany others. These divisions are self-contained and functions that are important to eachproduct are decentralized to these units.VP Tech Program Operations Engg Director Engg Director Engg DirectorManager Director product 1 product 2 product 3Program ManagerDirector program manager program manager Other program1 and their team 2 and their team managers 2. Organic: InMobi has organic type organization where there is no hierarchy. There is properand open horizontal communication and information sharing. Collaborative teamworkpersists. There are quite few rules. Employees have a lot of freedom and ownership.Disruptive HR practices prevail. This organization emphasizes collaborative teamwork ratherthan hierarchy. This structure is suited to fast change in unstable environment3. Structural Dimensions: Formalization is low as there are no written procedures, codes ofconduct, job descriptions, regulations and policy manuals. Specialization is low. There is notmuch and strict division of roles, i.e., employees perform a wide range of tasks in their jobs.There is not low hierarchy of authority, so there is wide span of control. Low centralizationand high professionalism.4. Vertical Information Sharing: There is not much vertical information sharing as there is nohierarchy prevalent. No formal rules and regulations are regulated.5. Horizontal Information Sharing: Product managers provide horizontal integration amongthe various divisions and act as the full-time integrators in the organization. There is highcommunication and coordination across organizational departments. This helps in achievingunity of effort and objectives. But there are no cross-functional teams.6. International Presence: InMobi is increasing its international expansion. It has a centralizedproduct development at Bangalore. It minimizes customization and has a decentralizedmarketing and sales strategy across the globe.7. Distribution of Employees: They have most of their employees working in Technical coredepartment. REVENUE OF InMobiIn the advertising space there are two kinds of players:1) Those who are creating content for others to use (be it games in play store, blogs fromdifferent blog spaces, etc.). This creation is sometimes paid, which is not much of a marketand mostly free and sometimes the basic version is free and you pay for the upgradedversion. The largest market is of free apps and blogs (user does not pay anything todownload, watch them). So to generate revenue from these apps, brands, developers andpublishers use different techniques (using ads before you watch a YouTube video, playinggames, etc.).2) Then on the other side are advertisers who pay for these ads (The firms who have toincrease their visibility to the public at large. As a creator of the app, blog you can either go to different firms and sell your space (not easy) orgo to a mobile ad network firm which finds the potential advertiser firm for you for a share ofyour revenue generated from the ad space you own). Also the advertisers have to do a lot ofresearch for finding the target market. To reduce this they can also tie up with mobile adnetwork to decrease cost of advertising and be assured that your ad will reach the audience youare targeting.InMobi is this Mobile ad network that helps the seller meets the buyer much like an onlinemarketplace for mobile ads. More than half of the digital ad spending in 2016 would be mobileaccording to eMobile and reach a total of $100 billion.It taps into 800 million mobile users every month in 165 countries. It got revenues of $20 million in2009, to $200 million in 2013 and is looking forward to generate one billion dollars in 2016. Themargins are a whopping forty percent, twice more than any other form of advertising. Acquisitions:? InMobi has been active in this as well acquiring a total of three firms in the past five years.? August 2011, InMobi announced the acquisition of HTML5 rich media platform Sprout.? July 2012, InMobi announced the acquisition of MMTG Labs makers of AppBistro andAppGalleries. ? July 2012, InMobi announced the acquisition of UK-based firm Metaflow Solutions. Funding:InMobi has received a total of $215.6 million in series of Angel, and a series of A, B and C and a debtfunding of $100 mn is September 2015. Funding Round Investors Date AmountAngel Funding Mumbai Angels August 2006 $500,000 "