I like companies that have their own character and the guts to stay true to their motto. Ever since you see the advertisement of Andy Lau "今時今日，咁野係唔夠既"， a lot of Hong Kong companies become one of those "customers are always right" companies. A good company should have the balls to do what they think is right and listen to reasonable opinions of their customers.
A good company should always stay true to its motto, be itself, even if the customers disagree. The relationship between company and customer should never be one sided, customers are often wrong. The company should lead its customers and educate them the greatness of their product, carefully.
Now let me tell you the companies that I like:
Blizzard: (Game software)The company that is famous for their EXTREMELY long product development time. It probably take more time to make a game that blizzard is satisfied with than to make a new drug for AIDS.
They have even scraped a project completely (SC: Ghost) because it is not "up to their standard". Most other game developers would have simply release it and get back whatever cash flow it can generate instead. It takes some courage to not release something you have developed for over 4 years.
Their reward is of course an extremely loyal fan base and a very very good word of the mouth.
Nintendo: (Game hardware & software)
Nintendo has pride in their products, they may have lost a decade to Sony Playstation, but they have never lost their pride. Their founding family insist that games should be enjoyed, games should be played by families and friends, games should be easy to play. That have costs them dearly, but they did not give up. Low quality graphics, no H-game, no violent, no zombies.... no everything that made Play Station so successful, but Nintendo stick to its own path, with only their pride to support them.
They invented super Nintendo, they invented the analogue control system (with the miserable console N64) , they invented a dual screen hand held game machine, they invented Wii.
They do not go for the male customers only, they do not target only the "core gamers", they do not add 10 buttons to the controller like Sony, they do not have beautiful graphics, they do not even support HD. (Hell, they still do not use disc in NDS!)
They make dog & pet rearing into a game, they make exercise and yoga into a game, they make pipe repair workers into world saving heroes that crush mushrooms with their ass.
Nintendo kick asses.
Microsoft: (PC software)This is the ultimate example of corporate leading its customer, you learn how to use window because you have to. Microsoft single handedly decide your whole computer experience, not the other way around. Yes they have bad products like Vista, but when you buy a new computer you are still stuck with it.
Stardocks: (Game software)A game developer who do not add copyright protection in its games, it even dare to make single player PC games in the 21st century which is TURN-based AND 2D. No other game companies even dare to do any one of the above. Their games are always highly rated by critics even though they do not seem to sell that well at first. It show you that you do not have to make those crappy games that everyone plays to succeed.
Their CEO is a real man who
defend his own ideals XD. (see link)
His post on the
case for no multiplayer. (see link)
Quote (wikipedia):
CEO Wardell has defined the
Gamer's Bill of Rights.
The game's CD contains no copy prevention and there is no requirement to have the disc loaded into the computer to play the game. Stardock's anti-piracy plan is that players must complete product activation with a valid serial number before they may receive any of the several game updates. Serial numbers can be used multiple times and the company owner, Brad Wardell, has stated that they are taking an approach based on the view that people who install the game illegally were unlikely to purchase it anyway.
Now that's a boss that you should work for.
Gainax: (Anime Production House)The perfect example of how you can be successful when you choose NOT to serve the mass market, but instead focus on making high quality product for a niche market. They are not called the "Otaku production house" for no reason.
It take balls to make an anime when the main character has perverted interests like: hiring maids to serve him at his mansion, make the maids wear different costumes everyday, install surveillance cameras everywhere and watch the girls private moments every night. And add the fact that the main character is only 14 years old with a lot of money to spend from dead parents and absolutely hate by everyone else in the show (rightly so). While I have only seen the description, I know this company have balls, as the market is so specialized that I have never known anyone who have seen it. (我的主人)
FCLC is another show where that can never hope to appeal to the mass market. While the main character is much more normal this time, his head is not. In this OVA, random things can simply come out from his head for no apparent reason nor order. Guitar, aliens and even a giant robot can come out from his tiny head. This anime is pure madness. Even the drawing style, color tones and storyline change randomly, it can be a love story between a primary school kid and his elder brother's girl friend (just this, can get a ban in TVB) now, the next 5 minutes it become a super robot war. In summary, Gainax have guts to produce artistic products that will never be popular. (This one I a more interested in)
That's all I can think of now, mainly in game industry, which I am most familiar with. I heard google is also an creative company that stick to its core values. I quite like their google labs, which is certainly not common in other companies.
