Since Stephen Case became the CEO of America Online in 1992, the company has emerged as one of the top Internet providers in the United States. The direction of the company was set by his vision of what an Internet provider should offer the consumer. They set out to aggressively market their new product through brand awareness and market penetration. At the time the top two Internet providers, CompuServe and Prodigy, captured almost 75 percent of the market.
             To recognize the magnitude of the accomplishment in becoming the market leader, we would like to assess the performance of the CEO. Steve Case led the company with his distinctive vision, which is to have the Internet to become an everyday routine. He felt that people would want to get not only news, and information from the Internet, but also to shop, invest, watch movies etc. We believe that he has performed well in convincing his employees and top executives of the company to follow through with his dream. Furthermore, he was able to persuade venture capitalists to invest with the company when many of his critics would say that it could not happen. Additionally, he did an outstanding job in marketing the product. It seems as though that Case did everything well to create a solid company, however, there is an aspect that shows sub par performance. That is the financial aspect of the company. In 1995, America Online had revenues of over $1billion, yet were not making any positive income.
             Strategically, AOL realized the need to ally itself with companies to establish symbiotic relationship. Such companies include 1-800 Flower, J-Crew, E-Trade, Budget Rent a Car, CBS etc. Their first strategic move was cutting the Internet subscription price substantially to compete with Prodigy and CompuServe. They also were mass mailing the discs and offered free trial. In 1996, they offered flat pricing, which increased the customer base by 1.2million in the last quarter o...