UK's Policy on Electronics Ban: Attractiveness and Competitiveness

This study analyzes the attractiveness and competitiveness of the UK's Policy on Electronics Ban. The ban was imposed to reduce terror activities using electronic gadgets in commercial aviation. The study uses concepts like core competence model, strategic success model, Porter's Five Forces Model, and Ansoff Growth Matrix to analyze the policy.

Running head: UK’S POLICY ON ELECTRONICS BAN
UK's Policy on Electronics Ban
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1UK’S POLICY ON ELECTRONICS BAN
The chosen policy for this assignment is the “UK’s Policy on Electronics Ban” (Gov.uk
2018). The policy had first been imposed by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA)
after it consulted with relevant agencies and departments. Later on, it was joined by the UK
government in a hunt to nullify the effect of terror attacks (Mail Online 2018). Policy as
according to Ritchie and Crouch (2011) is a set of rules that promote attractiveness to a firm or
a place and thereby, helps to enhance its competitiveness. This particular study is purposefully
based on understanding the attractiveness and the competitiveness of the chosen policy.
Policy, as defined by the authors Ritchie and Crouch (2011), is a resource that a firm or
a place can utilize to enhance its attractiveness which is necessary to maximize the number of
customers. Moreover, such thing actually assists in enhancing the competitiveness of the chosen
firm or place. In the light of the mentioned concept, this can be understood that the chosen policy
needs to enhance its attractiveness for both the domestic and the foreign travelers. This may
impact the various airlines and the airports including the British Airways, Virgin Atlantic and
others (Ustaömer, Durmaz and Lei 2015). The chosen policy when analyzed from the
perspective of Ritchie and Crouch (2011) looks attractive to some extent. Passengers may
develop a dual feeling into them. They at some point of time may feel that their journey is
secured because electronic gadgets may also cost life as it happened with the battery explosion
cases of Samsung Note series phones (Shamsi, Ali and Kazmi 2017).
The central idea behind the ban imposed on the electronics goods, was to reduce the
terror attacks which have been found as using various new technologies to destroy commercial
aviation. The policy had jointly been followed by the United States after UK government had
announced the ban on selective UK-bound flights. The ban had a vision to reduce the terror
attacks which have been increasing especially with the commercial aviation. The mission was to

2UK’S POLICY ON ELECTRONICS BAN
destroy the incrementing terror activities associated in the past with the various electronic goods.
The policy was imposed with an aim to reduce the terror activities which was entering with the
help of commercial aviations. It has certain objectives such as the follows:
 To reduce terror activities which had been using the airlines to spread the terror
 To ban the electronic gadgets from being carried while during an airline trip
 To restrict the misuse of electronic gadgets by the terrorists
The policy was set with few priorities attached to it like restricting only the electronic gadgets
except the Smartphone, imposing ban on selective airports only and in few UK-bound flights.
The attractiveness and the competitiveness with the implemented policy can also be
analyzed form the fact presented by Hamel (1994) which states that the ‘core competence
model’ can help a policy become successful in its set objectives. Core competency in the light of
the model can be defined as a set of strategies which are unique to a specific organization or a
place and are difficult for others to imitate it. Core competency in regards to the ban policy is the
use of utmost technologies that can make it a successful venture, deploying the trained
professionals. Such professionals can perform their task with perfection and communicate with
the customers to make them feel realize the importance of imposing the policy (Rayna and
Striukova 2016).
The policy may be potential in impact if it implemented appropriately in the target
system. The competitiveness of the policy can be analyzed in the light of preaching governed by
Poon (1993) in its model known as a strategic success model. Poon (1993) governs four very
important points like putting the customer first, applying innovative thoughts, acquiring a
leadership quality and improving the value chain operation. The first point is for giving the

3UK’S POLICY ON ELECTRONICS BAN
customer the preference; however, the ban imposed on the UK airport governing body is less
friendly to customers in some regards. Business travelers do have to travel quite frequently to the
different parts of the world. It is necessary for them to carry their belongings like laptops, tablets
and the other gadgets. However, under the policy, they cannot carry the various kinds of
technological gadgets except the Smartphone in some selected route. They may be aware of the
reason behind the ban; however, they might face a challenge in communicating with the clients
and doing the needful works which are not possible from a phone. In this regard, the policy
because of any reason has preferred customers over the security which is acknowledging from
one aspect but troublesome from another.
The ban is being imposed for selected routes like the flights coming from Turkey, Jordan,
Lebanon, Tunisia, Egypt and Saudi Arabia (BBC News 2018). This means that 14 airlines
including Easyjet, British Airways, and Monarch will all be affected by the ban. It is
purposefully targeted to reduce the terrorist attacks (BBC News 2018). The second factor of the
strategic success model which is the quality leadership can only be justified if it is able to
reduce the terrorist activities in the mentioned routes.
It can be termed as a kind of innovation from a perspective that it restricts the access to
evil acts by limiting the carrying of electronic gadgets. However, phones are still allowed which
still can be threatening as the terrorist can access to their group through phones. A complete
disconnection or probably a robust approach to identify the terrorist group was indeed required
(Martin-Domingo and Martín 2016).
The value chain operation needs to be effective in course to provide a cooperative hand
to the implemented policy. The implementation requires a sharp inspection of belongings that

4UK’S POLICY ON ELECTRONICS BAN
customer carry (Elliott and Radford 2015). This requires the gadget detecting machines and the
human resources as well. The policy is being needed to publicize to help passengers know the
policy and understand the reasons behind it. This can be done by publishing articles on websites
(Elliott and Radford 2015). Additionally, the ground level staffs needs to be trained on the added
tasks, so that; they could perform their task with an utmost perfection. The required training
process and the needful machines will require sufficient investments (Elliott and Radford 2015).
Another important concept was being presented by Kay (1993) who had stated that
competitive advantage is attained based on distinctive capabilities which are unique in nature.
This helps to attain a sustained performance which is very important for a policy to be
successful. Moreover, the author Kay (1993) has further highlighted the importance of Porter’s
Five Forces Model in regards to attaining a competitive advantage. As according to the authors
Ritchie and Crouch (2011) competitiveness are related with the attractiveness, which can be
attained in the chosen case provided that if it conducts a regular external business environment
analysis based on the porter's model. As stated earlier, the ban imposed on the electronic gadgets
may influence the business of various airline companies. This means that an external business
environment analysis can be important in this case.
Industry rivalry in regards to airports can be measured by various factors like the traffic
congestion within the airports, its accessibility to the residential areas and others. Congestion
within the airport may increase probably for two reasons like the overlapping delay of flights and
increment number of flights. Flights delay cases have been quite significant in UK airports. This
is due to the fact that Virgin Atlantic which is one of the UK airlines has shown its keen interest
in implementing the disruption policy (Martin 2016). On the other hand, there are a good number
of airports in the UK which are at just an hour travel from one airport to another (Budd, Ison and

5UK’S POLICY ON ELECTRONICS BAN
Budd 2016). This simply means that airports are situated in closed locations and hence, the
rivalry will be high.
The threat of entrants is pretty low as airports in the UK are based on just a one hour of
surface travel from one another (Budd, Ison and Budd 2016). Substitutes in regards to airports
are the other way of transport such as the railway and surface transport. However, all another
mean of transport can only be used for is to the local places. The international roaming can only
be done by the airlines. Hence, the threat of substitutes is also low (Farhadi 2015). Bargaining
power of suppliers is high in regards to the UK airports. This is because the few suppliers like
Boeing and Airbus supply the aircraft and other vendors take care of the ground handling,
fuelling, catering, commercial facilities, police, customs checks, immigration and fuelling
(Farhadi 2015). The bargaining power of buyers is high. The success of the ban relies much on
the passengers. Their cooperation is important for the success.
The attractiveness and the competitiveness of the policy can also be understood from the
fact supported by Ritchie and Crouch (2003) on the competitive strategies. A policy as
understood by Ritchie and Crouch can be termed competitive if it is able to surpass the
challenge of external environmental factors. Such factors can be governed with terms like
political, economic, social, technological, environmental and legal. The policy is expected to
receive a political trauma as it will certainly limit the general habits of the travelers (Üçler and
Martin-Domingo 2015). The policy can probably impact the financial performance of airports
and the airline companies. There may be few drops in the traveling and the passengers might try
to skip away from it until it is bearable to them. They might certainly prefer finding the solutions
by being at the home (Üçler and Martin-Domingo 2015).

6UK’S POLICY ON ELECTRONICS BAN
The policy is expected to influence the social aspect of passengers. Few passengers prefer
traveling for giving them few moments of happiness. Such people might feel this bad and may
feel forced to follow the implemented policy. The policy is certain to receive mixed reviews of
travelers who travel between the target routes (Chen, Batchuluun and Batnasan 2015). The
policy depends a lot on the use of few advanced technologies which could support it by
providing a flawless detection of gadgets in the passenger’s belongings. The policy can indeed
be justified if it has the capability to track the illegal activities under the policy (Chen,
Batchuluun and Batnasan 2015).
Legal proceedings have a large impact on the policy’s effectiveness. The ban on carrying
the electronic gadgets in few of the selected routes has been imposed. Now, the success relies
heavily on the surveillance activities which will perform under the guidance of UK government's
legal policies (Chen, Batchuluun and Batnasan 2015).

7UK’S POLICY ON ELECTRONICS BAN
Figure 1: Ansoff Matrix
(Source: Yin 2016)
From the Ansoff Growth Matrix, it can be concluded that the ban which has been imposed on
few selected UK-bound routes is in the ‘product development’ quadrant of it. It is a new product
or a service which is limited in particular to the UK and USA airports (BBC News 2018). It is an
introduction of a new service which will be effective in the existing UK airports for the few
selected UK-bound airline services.
To conclude, the ban on the electronics in the UK airports may face some challenges in
the form of an uncertain consumer behavior. The policy is poised to be tested from the
perspective of passengers. Their heartiest cooperation in the form of obeying the ban policies and
not restricting their trip is of high regards. Additionally, the success also depends on the various

8UK’S POLICY ON ELECTRONICS BAN
sources which are required for implementing the policy like the physical, human and the
financial resources.

9UK’S POLICY ON ELECTRONICS BAN
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