Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Global Business
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind
Aurolab is the in-house producer of IOLs (required in cataract surgery) for the Aravind Eye Care System, a group of charity hospitals with the largest volume of eye surgery in the world. Aurolab's manufacturing capability and capacity had long exceeded the requirements of Aravind. With its impending move to a new, world-class facility, fundamental questions of strategic direction and mission fulfillment gained renewed attention among the organization's senior leaders.
Swot Analysis of "Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind" written by V. Kasturi Rangan includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Aurolab Aravind facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Technology and Global Business.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind casestudy better are - – wage bills are increasing, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, geopolitical disruptions, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic ,
increasing commodity prices, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Aurolab Aravind, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Aurolab Aravind 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 Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Aurolab Aravind
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 Aurolab Aravind
Strengths Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Aurolab Aravind in Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind Harvard Business Review case study are -
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind 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.
Strong track record of project management
– Aurolab Aravind is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Innovation driven organization
– Aurolab Aravind is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Aurolab Aravind 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Aurolab Aravind 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Aurolab Aravind is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Aurolab Aravind in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Aurolab Aravind 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 Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Learning organization
- Aurolab Aravind 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 Aurolab Aravind is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Aurolab Aravind in the sector have low bargaining power. Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Aurolab Aravind to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Analytics focus
– Aurolab Aravind 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 V. Kasturi Rangan 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Global Business industry
– Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Aurolab Aravind to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Global Business industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Aurolab Aravind to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Weaknesses Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind are -
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind 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 Aurolab Aravind has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High dependence on existing supply chain
– The disruption in the global supply chains because of the Covid-19 pandemic and blockage of the Suez Canal illustrated the fragile nature of Aurolab Aravind supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Aurolab Aravind vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Aurolab Aravind, firm in the HBR case study Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Need for greater diversity
– Aurolab Aravind 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, V. Kasturi Rangan suggests that, Aurolab Aravind 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.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Aurolab Aravind 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 Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Global Business 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Aurolab Aravind is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Global Business segment. Aurolab Aravind needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Aurolab Aravind to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind HBR case study mentions - Aurolab Aravind 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Aurolab Aravind 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. Aurolab Aravind 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 cash cycle compare to competitors
Aurolab Aravind has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Opportunities Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind | 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 Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind are -
Developing new processes and practices
– Aurolab Aravind can develop new processes and procedures in Global Business 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Aurolab Aravind 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Aurolab Aravind 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, Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Aurolab Aravind to increase its market reach. Aurolab Aravind 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Aurolab Aravind 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Aurolab Aravind 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 Aurolab Aravind to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Aurolab Aravind is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Aurolab Aravind 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Global Business industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Aurolab Aravind can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Loyalty marketing
– Aurolab Aravind 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Aurolab Aravind 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 Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Aurolab Aravind to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Aurolab Aravind can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Aurolab Aravind operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Global Business sector.
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 Aurolab Aravind 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.
Threats Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind are -
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. Aurolab Aravind needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Global Business industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Aurolab Aravind 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.
Environmental challenges
– Aurolab Aravind 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. Aurolab Aravind can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Global Business industry.
Increasing wage structure of Aurolab Aravind
– 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 Aurolab Aravind.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Aurolab Aravind 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 Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind .
Regulatory challenges
– Aurolab Aravind 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 Global Business industry regulations.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Aurolab Aravind 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Aurolab Aravind is facing in Global Business sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Aurolab Aravind 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind, Aurolab Aravind 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 .
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Aurolab Aravind with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind 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 Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind 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 Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind 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 Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind 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 Aurolab: Bringing First-World Technology to the Third-World Blind 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 Aurolab Aravind needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
