Case Study Description of Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge
This is an MIT Sloan Management Review article. Despite India's economic growth and potential, developing a successful strategy for the country remains one of the most complex challenges for foreign multinationals. This challenge is rooted in the hard realities of global scale and costs. Most foreign executives have found it difficult to make money in India with their existing product portfolios at the scale of operations dictated by local demand. In addition, India has not provided foreign direct investment incentives anywhere near those of neighboring China. However, U.S. management consulting firm A.T. Kearney estimated in 2014 that India's share of global trade would be approximately five times greater by 2025 -and at that point would represent 6% of all global trade. Given that growth projection, waiting for a target income segment to reach the break-even level or waiting for greater government incentives to materialize is not the right strategy. Indeed, the authors observe, many foreign multinationals have increased their focus on India. However, they add, many foreign executives are frustrated that they cannot replicate the same strategies in India that led to success in China. One reason is the local high-income segment, which constitutes the initial target market for most foreign companies, is relatively small in India compared with China. This often causes foreign executives to refrain from investing in more extensive value-chain activities in India and delay committing to local manufacturing. Based on their research, the authors present a framework for foreign multinationals for a successful first-time entry into India or for upgrading an existing operation in India that has not been very effective. This approach involves simultaneously taking advantage of local sourcing, manufacturing, and marketing activities in conjunction with local adaptation of global products to generate mutually reinforcing advantages. Foreign manufacturers in India, the authors argue, can use both globally focused assets to improve local sales and locally developed capabilities to deliver more cost-effective solutions for global markets. This combination enables companies to reach across all of India's income segments, while at the same time developing a springboard for global exports.
Authors :: Haritha Saranga, Ram Mudambi, Andreas Schotter
Swot Analysis of "Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge" written by Haritha Saranga, Ram Mudambi, Andreas Schotter includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Foreign India facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Supply chain and Global Business.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge casestudy better are - – digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, there is backlash against globalization, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, wage bills are increasing, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies,
increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing transportation and logistics costs, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Foreign India, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Foreign India 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 Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Foreign India
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Global Business field.
4. Making a Global Business topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Foreign India
Strengths Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Foreign India in Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge Harvard Business Review case study are -
Innovation driven organization
– Foreign India is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Foreign India has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Foreign India 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Foreign India in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
High brand equity
– Foreign India has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Foreign India to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Diverse revenue streams
– Foreign India is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Foreign India is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Global Business industry
– Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Foreign India to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Global Business industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Foreign India to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Organizational Resilience of Foreign India
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Foreign India does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Foreign India in the sector have low bargaining power. Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Foreign India to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Training and development
– Foreign India has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Foreign India 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 Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Analytics focus
– Foreign India 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 Haritha Saranga, Ram Mudambi, Andreas Schotter 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.
Weaknesses Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge are -
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Foreign India 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
– Foreign India 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Foreign India is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Global Business segment. Foreign India needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Foreign India to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Foreign India 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Foreign India is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Haritha Saranga, Ram Mudambi, Andreas Schotter suggests that, Foreign India 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge 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 Foreign India has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge 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 Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Foreign India is planning to shift buying processes online.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge HBR case study mentions - Foreign India 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Foreign India, firm in the HBR case study Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge, in the dynamic environment Foreign India has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Foreign India has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Opportunities Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge | 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 Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge are -
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Foreign India 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 Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Foreign India to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Foreign India to increase its market reach. Foreign India 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Foreign India can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Foreign India is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge 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 Foreign India 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 Foreign India to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Foreign India has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Foreign India to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge case study. Foreign India 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 Global Business industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Foreign India 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. Foreign India 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Foreign India 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, Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Foreign India 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.
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. Foreign India can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Foreign India in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Global Business segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Foreign India can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Manufacturing automation
– Foreign India can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Global Business 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.
Threats Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge are -
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Foreign India 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 Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge .
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 Foreign India.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Global Business field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Foreign India can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Foreign India 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.
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. Foreign India needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Global Business industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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. Foreign India 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge, Foreign India may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Global Business .
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 Foreign India business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Foreign India
– 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 Foreign India.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Foreign India 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.
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.
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 Foreign India in the Global Business sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge 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 Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge 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 Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge 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 Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge 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 Mastering the Make-in-India Challenge 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 Foreign India needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.