Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Sales & Marketing
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers
The director of Edible Agro Products Limited (EAPL) was reviewing the production figures for Gujarat Til-2, a variety of white sesame that EAPL had introduced to West Bengal in 2008. He had hoped to bring about a revolution in sesame production with this superior new variety and to create higher value for West Bengal farmers and for EAPL. However, his plan had yet to achieve the outcomes he had anticipated. The year 2010 was the third consecutive year in which EAPL had received less than 20 per cent of the expected quantity of harvested produce. Should he quit sesame production and focus only on the oil trading business? Should EAPL change its communications policy/strategy for promoting the value of white sesame to farmers who are not formally educated? How should he address the growing concerns of the farmers? How can he prevent malpractice among vendors and farmers, such as selling the harvested produce to other traders at a higher price? Should he change the pricing policy? Atanu Adhikari is affiliated with Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode.
Swot Analysis of "Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers" written by Atanu Adhikari, Arna Das includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Eapl Sesame facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers casestudy better are - – technology disruption, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, geopolitical disruptions, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, there is backlash against globalization, increasing energy prices,
banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Eapl Sesame, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Eapl Sesame operates in.
According to Harvard Business Review, 75% of the managers use SWOT analysis for various purposes such as – evaluating current scenario, strategic planning, new venture feasibility, personal growth goals, new market entry, Go To market strategies, portfolio management and strategic trade-off assessment, organizational restructuring, etc.
SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix
SWOT analysis of Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Eapl Sesame
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Sales & Marketing field.
4. Making a Sales & Marketing topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Eapl Sesame
Strengths Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Eapl Sesame in Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers Harvard Business Review case study are -
Diverse revenue streams
– Eapl Sesame is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers case study a diverse revenue stream that has helped it to survive disruptions such as global pandemic in Covid-19, financial disruption of 2008, and supply chain disruption of 2021.
Learning organization
- Eapl Sesame is a learning organization. It has inculcated three key characters of learning organization in its processes and operations – exploration, creativity, and expansiveness. The work place at Eapl Sesame is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Eapl Sesame has built up over years in its products and services combo offer has resulted in high retention of customers, lower marketing costs, and greater ability of the firm to focus on its customers.
Analytics focus
– Eapl Sesame is putting a lot of focus on utilizing the power of analytics in business decision making. This has put it among the leading players in the industry. The technology infrastructure suggested by Atanu Adhikari, Arna Das can also help it to harness the power of analytics for – marketing optimization, demand forecasting, customer relationship management, inventory management, information sharing across the value chain etc.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Eapl Sesame is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers Harvard Business Review case study comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the industry, building diversified operations across different geographies so that disruption in one part of the world doesn’t impact the overall performance of the firm, and integrating the various business operations and processes through its digital transformation drive.
High brand equity
– Eapl Sesame has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Eapl Sesame to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Organizational Resilience of Eapl Sesame
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Eapl Sesame does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Eapl Sesame has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Eapl Sesame has effective processes in place that helps in exploring new product needs, doing quick pilot testing, and then launching the products quickly using its extensive distribution network.
Training and development
– Eapl Sesame has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers Harvard Business Review case study by analyzing – employees retention, in-house promotion, loyalty, new venture initiation, lack of conflict, and high level of both employees and customer engagement.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Eapl Sesame are driving operational speed, building greater agility, and keeping the organization nimble to compete with new competitors. It helps are organization to ideate new ideas, and execute them swiftly in the marketplace.
Innovation driven organization
– Eapl Sesame is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Weaknesses Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers are -
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers that the firm needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department in the case Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Eapl Sesame is planning to shift buying processes online.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Eapl Sesame needs to come up with a strategy to reduce the workers concern regarding automation. Without a clear strategy, it could lead to disruption and uncertainty within the organization.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Atanu Adhikari, Arna Das suggests that, Eapl Sesame is facing high bargaining power of the channel partners. So far it has not able to streamline the operations to reduce the bargaining power of the value chain partners in the industry.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Eapl Sesame has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the industry over the last five years. Eapl Sesame even though has strong showing on digital transformation primary two stages, it has struggled to capitalize the power of digital transformation in marketing efforts and new venture efforts.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Eapl Sesame has borrowed money from the capital market at higher rates. It needs to restructure the interest payment and costs so that it can compete better and improve profitability.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers, it seems that the employees of Eapl Sesame don’t have comprehensive understanding of the firm’s strategy. This is reflected in number of promotional campaigns over the last few years that had mixed messaging and competing priorities. Some of the strategic activities and services promoted in the promotional campaigns were not consistent with the organization’s strategy.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Eapl Sesame has created an environment where the organization is dominated by functional specialists rather than management generalist. This has resulted into product oriented approach rather than marketing oriented approach or consumers oriented approach.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers has high operating costs in the. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Eapl Sesame 's lucrative customers.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers HBR case study still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Eapl Sesame has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers, is just above the industry average. Eapl Sesame needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
Need for greater diversity
– Eapl Sesame has taken concrete steps on diversity, equity, and inclusion. But the efforts so far has resulted in limited success. It needs to expand the recruitment and selection process to hire more people from the minorities and underprivileged background.
Opportunities Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities highlighted in the Harvard Business Review case study Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers are -
Identify volunteer opportunities
– Covid-19 has impacted working population in two ways – it has led to people soul searching about their professional choices, resulting in mass resignation. Secondly it has encouraged people to do things that they are passionate about. This has opened opportunities for businesses to build volunteer oriented socially driven projects. Eapl Sesame can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Sales & Marketing industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Eapl Sesame can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Eapl Sesame can build a diversified supply chain model across various countries in - South East Asia, India, and other parts of the world. This reconfiguration of global supply chain can help, as suggested in case study, Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Eapl Sesame can still utilize the low interest rates to borrow money for capital investment. Secondly it can also use the increase of government spending in infrastructure projects to get new business.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Eapl Sesame to conduct training and development for its employees across the world. This will result in not only reducing the cost of training but also help employees in different part of the world to integrate with the headquarter work culture, ethos, and standards.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Eapl Sesame has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Eapl Sesame to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers case study. Eapl Sesame can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Sales & Marketing industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Eapl Sesame can take advantage of these changes in consumer behavior to build a far more efficient business model. For example consumer regular ordering of products can reduce both last mile delivery costs and market penetration costs. Eapl Sesame can further use this consumer data to build better customer loyalty, provide better products and service collection, and improve the value proposition in inflationary times.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Eapl Sesame can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Eapl Sesame has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in the sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled, as illustrated in the Harvard case study Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Eapl Sesame to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Reconfiguring business model
– The expansion of digital payment system, the bringing down of international transactions costs using Bitcoin and other blockchain based currencies, etc can help Eapl Sesame to reconfigure its entire business model. For example it can used blockchain based technologies to reduce piracy of its products in the big markets such as China. Secondly it can use the popularity of e-commerce in various developing markets to build a Direct to Customer business model rather than the current Channel Heavy distribution network.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Eapl Sesame can leverage digital technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning to automate the production process, customer analytics to get better insights into consumer behavior, realtime digital dashboards to get better sales tracking, logistics and transportation, product tracking, etc.
Buying journey improvements
– Eapl Sesame can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers suggest that firm can provide automated chats to help consumers solve their own problems, provide online suggestions to get maximum out of the products and services, and help consumers to build a community where they can interact with each other to develop new features and uses.
Loyalty marketing
– Eapl Sesame has focused on building a highly responsive customer relationship management platform. This platform is built on in-house data and driven by analytics and artificial intelligence. The customer analytics can help the organization to fine tune its loyalty marketing efforts, increase the wallet share of the organization, reduce wastage on mainstream advertising spending, build better pricing strategies using personalization, etc.
Threats Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers are -
Environmental challenges
– Eapl Sesame needs to have a robust strategy against the disruptions arising from climate change and energy requirements. EU has identified it as key priority area and spending 30% of its 880 billion Euros European post Covid-19 recovery funds on green technology. Eapl Sesame can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Sales & Marketing field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Eapl Sesame can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Eapl Sesame has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Sales & Marketing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Eapl Sesame needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Sales & Marketing sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
Technology disruption because of hacks, piracy etc
– The colonial pipeline illustrated, how vulnerable modern organization are to international hackers, miscreants, and disruptors. The cyber security interruption, data leaks, etc can seriously jeopardize the future growth of the organization.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Eapl Sesame can face downward pressure on margins from increasing competition from international players. The international players have stable revenue in their home market and can use those resources to penetrate prominent markets illustrated in HBR case study Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers .
Consumer confidence and its impact on Eapl Sesame demand
– There is a high probability of declining consumer confidence, given – high inflammation rate, rise of gig economy, lower job stability, increasing cost of living, higher interest rates, and aging demography. All the factors contribute to people saving higher rate of their income, resulting in lower consumer demand in the industry and other sectors.
Backlash against dominant players
– US Congress and other legislative arms of the government are getting tough on big business especially technology companies. The digital arm of Eapl Sesame business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Aging population
– As the populations of most advanced economies are aging, it will lead to high social security costs, higher savings among population, and lower demand for goods and services in the economy. The household savings in US, France, UK, Germany, and Japan are growing faster than predicted because of uncertainty caused by pandemic.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Eapl Sesame can face lack of demand in the market place because of Fed actions to reduce inflation. This can lead to sluggish growth in the economy, lower demands, lower investments, higher borrowing costs, and consolidation in the field.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Eapl Sesame high dependence on third party suppliers can disrupt its processes and delivery mechanism. For example -the current troubles of car makers because of chip shortage is because the chip companies started producing chips for electronic companies rather than car manufacturers.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Eapl Sesame in the Sales & Marketing industry. The Sales & Marketing industry is already at various protected from local competition in China, with the rise of trade war the protection levels may go up. This presents a clear threat of current business model in Chinese market.
Regulatory challenges
– Eapl Sesame needs to prepare for regulatory challenges as consumer protection groups and other pressure groups are vigorously advocating for more regulations on big business - to reduce inequality, to create a level playing field, to product data privacy and consumer privacy, to reduce the influence of big money on democratic institutions, etc. This can lead to significant changes in the Sales & Marketing industry regulations.
Instability in the European markets
– European Union markets are facing three big challenges post Covid – expanded balance sheets, Brexit related business disruption, and aggressive Russia looking to distract the existing security mechanism. Eapl Sesame will face different problems in different parts of Europe. For example it will face inflationary pressures in UK, France, and Germany, balance sheet expansion and demand challenges in Southern European countries, and geopolitical instability in the Eastern Europe.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers in the HBR case study Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers needs to zero down on the relative importance of each factor mentioned in the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants.
We can provide the relative importance to each factor by assigning relative weights. Weighted SWOT analysis process is a three stage process –
First stage for doing weighted SWOT analysis of the case study Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers is to rank the strengths and weaknesses of the organization. This will help you to assess the most important strengths and weaknesses of the firm and which one of the strengths and weaknesses mentioned in the initial lists are marginal and can be left out.
Second stage for conducting weighted SWOT analysis of the Harvard case study Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers is to give probabilities to the external strategic factors thus better understanding the opportunities and threats arising out of macro environment changes and developments.
Third stage of constructing weighted SWOT analysis of Edible Agro Products Limited: Creating Higher Value for Farmers is to provide strategic recommendations includes – joining likelihood of external strategic factors such as opportunities and threats to the internal strategic factors – strengths and weaknesses. You should start with external factors as they will provide the direction of the overall industry. Secondly by joining probabilities with internal strategic factors can help the company not only strategic fit but also the most probably strategic trade-off that Eapl Sesame needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
