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After the successful launch of the consulting business, and the completion of the first major development milestone on the application development side, I was asked to take over the development of the nacent business in Europe. I was the main technical executive, responsible for delivering the product together with Arturo Colantuoni Sanvenero, the European head of marking.
It took me almost 4 months to come to a conclusion. I travel Europe with Arturo, visiting trade partners, and I spend a lot of time in Comerio, the European headquarter of Whirlpool. In the end, there was only one result: there was no business. The US-channel of the master-planned community did not exit yet in the target countries of Italy and the UK. As a result, the side of the communities was just starting to grow. With the substantial overhead attached to the US solution, there was no profit to be made in Europe. As a result, I recommended a different channel back to the GM. The result was a restructuring of the European business, with no product-technical team left, and only three people working on the retail launch. I had successfully ended my planned expatriation to Italy. I came back in touch with them in that launch, and we worked together very well (despite maybe the hard feelings they might have had). |
