Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Strategy & Execution
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A)
This case describes two shipping firms in the midst of a price war over the market for containerized shipping to and from a small Caribbean island. The situation is a classic duopoly. The case presents a table of contributions to both firms as a function of their prices. This table serves as a basis by which the class can explore the concepts of Nash equilibrium, price leadership, and prisoners' dilemma. See also ''Lesser Antilles Lines (B)'' and ''Lesser Antilles Lines (C).''
Swot Analysis of "Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A)" written by Phillip E. Pfeifer, James V. Gelly includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Antilles Lesser facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Competition, Competitive strategy, Diversity, International business, Pricing and Strategy & Execution.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) casestudy better are - – digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, technology disruption, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies,
talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Antilles Lesser, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Antilles Lesser 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 Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Antilles Lesser
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Strategy & Execution field.
4. Making a Strategy & Execution topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Antilles Lesser
Strengths Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Antilles Lesser in Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) Harvard Business Review case study are -
Ability to lead change in Strategy & Execution field
– Antilles Lesser is one of the leading players in its industry. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in its segment but also across the whole industry. The ability to lead change has enabled Antilles Lesser in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Antilles Lesser 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Antilles Lesser in the sector have low bargaining power. Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Antilles Lesser to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Antilles Lesser has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Antilles Lesser 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Antilles Lesser has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in, as mentioned in case study Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Antilles Lesser in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Antilles Lesser has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive segment. Secondly the value chain collaborators of the firm in Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Antilles Lesser is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Learning organization
- Antilles Lesser 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 Antilles Lesser is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Digital Transformation in Strategy & Execution segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Antilles Lesser digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Antilles Lesser has successfully integrated the four key components of digital transformation – digital integration in processes, digital integration in marketing and customer relationship management, digital integration into the value chain, and using technology to explore new products and market opportunities.
Innovation driven organization
– Antilles Lesser is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Weaknesses Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) are -
Lack of clear differentiation of Antilles Lesser products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Antilles Lesser needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Antilles Lesser 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. Antilles Lesser 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Antilles Lesser has some of the most successful products in the industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. firm in the HBR case study - Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A), it seems that the employees of Antilles Lesser 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 Antilles Lesser 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A), it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Strategy & Execution strategy. But it has very little resources allocation to manage the risks emerging from events such as natural disasters, climate change, melting of permafrost, tacking the rise of artificial intelligence, opportunities and threats emerging from commercialization of space etc.
Need for greater diversity
– Antilles Lesser 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) 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 Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Antilles Lesser is planning to shift buying processes online.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A), in the dynamic environment Antilles Lesser has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Antilles Lesser has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) 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 Antilles Lesser has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) HBR case study mentions - Antilles Lesser takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the industry in last five years.
Opportunities Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) | 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 Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) are -
Manufacturing automation
– Antilles Lesser can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Strategy & Execution segment. It can use CAD and 3D printing to build a quick prototype and pilot testing products. It can leverage automation using machine learning and artificial intelligence to do faster production at lowers costs, and it can leverage the growth in satellite and tracking technologies to improve inventory management, transportation, and shipping.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Antilles Lesser can make experimentation a productive activity and build a culture of innovation using approaches such as – mining transaction data, A/B testing of websites and selling platforms, engaging potential customers over various needs, and building on small ideas in the Strategy & Execution segment.
Loyalty marketing
– Antilles Lesser 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Antilles Lesser in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Strategy & Execution segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Antilles Lesser in the consumer business. Now Antilles Lesser can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Developing new processes and practices
– Antilles Lesser can develop new processes and procedures in Strategy & Execution industry using technology such as automation using artificial intelligence, real time transportation and products tracking, 3D modeling for concept development and new products pilot testing etc.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Antilles Lesser 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, Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A), to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Antilles Lesser to expand its talent hiring zone. According to McKinsey Global Institute, 20% of the high end workforce in fields such as finance, information technology, can continously work from remote local post Covid-19. This presents a really great opportunity for Antilles Lesser to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Antilles Lesser can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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. Antilles Lesser can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Antilles Lesser to increase its market reach. Antilles Lesser will be able to reach out to new customers. Secondly 5G will also provide technology framework to build new tools and products that can help more immersive consumer experience and faster consumer journey.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Antilles Lesser can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Antilles Lesser operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Strategy & Execution sector.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Antilles Lesser is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) case study suggests that firm can utilize new technology to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Threats Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) are -
Environmental challenges
– Antilles Lesser 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. Antilles Lesser can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Strategy & Execution industry.
High level of anxiety and lack of motivation
– the Great Resignation in United States is the sign of broader dissatisfaction among the workforce in United States. Antilles Lesser needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Strategy & Execution industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Antilles Lesser in the Strategy & Execution industry. The Strategy & Execution 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Antilles Lesser with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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. Antilles Lesser 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.
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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Strategy & Execution field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Antilles Lesser can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
New competition
– After the dotcom bust of 2001, financial crisis of 2008-09, the business formation in US economy had declined. But in 2020 alone, there are more than 1.5 million new business applications in United States. This can lead to greater competition for Antilles Lesser in the Strategy & Execution sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Regulatory challenges
– Antilles Lesser 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 Strategy & Execution industry regulations.
Increasing wage structure of Antilles Lesser
– Post Covid-19 there is a sharp increase in the wages especially in the jobs that require interaction with people. The increasing wages can put downward pressure on the margins of Antilles Lesser.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Antilles Lesser 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.
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 Antilles Lesser business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) 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 Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) 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 Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) 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 Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) 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 Lesser Antilles Lines: The Island of San Huberto (A) 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 Antilles Lesser needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.