Case Study Description of WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless?
This case discusses different players in the wireless Internet industry and asks readers to evaluate the likelihood that they will create and capture value.
Authors :: Roger Hallowell, Sherry Whitley, Rosina Giuliante, Jennifer Jacobs
Swot Analysis of "WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless?" written by Roger Hallowell, Sherry Whitley, Rosina Giuliante, Jennifer Jacobs includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Wireless Wwww facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Supply chain and Technology & Operations.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? 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, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, technology disruption, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion,
cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing energy prices, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless?
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Wireless Wwww, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Wireless Wwww 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 WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Wireless Wwww
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Technology & Operations field.
4. Making a Technology & Operations topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Wireless Wwww
Strengths WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Wireless Wwww in WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? Harvard Business Review case study are -
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Wireless Wwww in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Learning organization
- Wireless Wwww 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 Wireless Wwww is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Wireless Wwww 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.
Training and development
– Wireless Wwww has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Technology & Operations industry
– WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Wireless Wwww to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Technology & Operations industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Wireless Wwww to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Innovation driven organization
– Wireless Wwww is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Wireless Wwww 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.
High brand equity
– Wireless Wwww has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Wireless Wwww to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Wireless Wwww in the sector have low bargaining power. WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Wireless Wwww to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Wireless Wwww 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 WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Wireless Wwww has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Wireless Wwww 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.
Weaknesses WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? are -
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Wireless Wwww 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Wireless Wwww 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Wireless Wwww 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Wireless Wwww 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. Wireless Wwww 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? 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 Wireless Wwww 's lucrative customers.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Wireless Wwww, firm in the HBR case study WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Wireless Wwww 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 - WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? 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 WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless?, it seems that the employees of Wireless Wwww 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Wireless Wwww 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Roger Hallowell, Sherry Whitley, Rosina Giuliante, Jennifer Jacobs suggests that, Wireless Wwww 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? 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 WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Wireless Wwww is planning to shift buying processes online.
Opportunities WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? | 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 WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? are -
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Wireless Wwww 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 WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Wireless Wwww to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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. Wireless Wwww can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Wireless Wwww 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Wireless Wwww can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Wireless Wwww can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Technology & Operations 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Wireless Wwww in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Technology & Operations segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Wireless Wwww is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Wireless Wwww 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 Wireless Wwww to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Technology & Operations industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Wireless Wwww 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. Wireless Wwww 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Wireless Wwww 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Wireless Wwww 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 Technology & Operations segment.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Wireless Wwww can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Wireless Wwww operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Technology & Operations sector.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Wireless Wwww 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.
Threats WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? are -
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Wireless Wwww in the Technology & Operations industry. The Technology & Operations 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.
Capital market disruption
– During the Covid-19, Dow Jones has touched record high. The valuations of a number of companies are way beyond their existing business model potential. This can lead to capital market correction which can put a number of suppliers, collaborators, value chain partners in great financial difficulty. It will directly impact the business of Wireless Wwww.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Technology & Operations field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Wireless Wwww can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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 Wireless Wwww business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Wireless Wwww
– 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 Wireless Wwww.
Environmental challenges
– Wireless Wwww 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. Wireless Wwww can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Technology & Operations industry.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Wireless Wwww 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 WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? .
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless?, Wireless Wwww may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Technology & Operations .
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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Wireless Wwww 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.
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.
Regulatory challenges
– Wireless Wwww 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 Technology & Operations industry regulations.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Wireless Wwww 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? 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 WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? 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 WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? 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 WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? 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 WWWW--Who Will Win Wireless? 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 Wireless Wwww needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.