Case Study Description of Protecting Foreign Investors
Describes the emergence of several kinds of efforts to assure the safety of foreign investment in emerging markets: international arbitration, expanded official political risk insurance, credit from government agencies, and intervention by investors' home governments. Points out the roles of bilateral investment treaties and regional economic agreements in making arbitration accessible to an increasing number of foreign investors. Views the various arrangements as substitutes for a global agreement on foreign direct investment that would parallel the WTO for trade given that attempts to negotiate a comprehensive arrangement have so far failed. Also, presents several criticisms of the current system.
Swot Analysis of "Protecting Foreign Investors" written by Louis T. Wells Jr. includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Arbitration Foreign facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Protecting Foreign Investors case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Emerging markets, Global strategy, Government, Negotiations, Risk management and Global Business.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Protecting Foreign Investors casestudy better are - – increasing commodity prices, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing energy prices, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies,
supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Protecting Foreign Investors
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Protecting Foreign Investors case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Arbitration Foreign, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Arbitration Foreign 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 Protecting Foreign Investors can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Protecting Foreign Investors case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Arbitration Foreign
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 Arbitration Foreign
Strengths Protecting Foreign Investors | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Arbitration Foreign in Protecting Foreign Investors Harvard Business Review case study are -
Digital Transformation in Global Business segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Arbitration Foreign digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Arbitration Foreign 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.
Learning organization
- Arbitration Foreign 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 Arbitration Foreign is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Protecting Foreign Investors Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Innovation driven organization
– Arbitration Foreign is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Protecting Foreign Investors 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 Protecting Foreign Investors 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Arbitration Foreign 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 Protecting Foreign Investors - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Arbitration Foreign in the sector have low bargaining power. Protecting Foreign Investors has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Arbitration Foreign to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Training and development
– Arbitration Foreign has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Protecting Foreign Investors 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
– Arbitration Foreign 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 Protecting Foreign Investors HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Strong track record of project management
– Arbitration Foreign is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Arbitration Foreign 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 Arbitration Foreign 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Arbitration Foreign has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Arbitration Foreign 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 Protecting Foreign Investors | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Protecting Foreign Investors are -
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Arbitration Foreign 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Arbitration Foreign has not been able to do capital spending to the tune of the competition. This has resulted into fewer innovations and company facing stiff competition from both existing competitors and new entrants who are disrupting the industry using digital technology.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Arbitration Foreign 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. Arbitration Foreign 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Protecting Foreign Investors, in the dynamic environment Arbitration Foreign has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Arbitration Foreign has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Arbitration Foreign is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Global Business segment. Arbitration Foreign needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Arbitration Foreign to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Protecting Foreign Investors 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 Arbitration Foreign 's lucrative customers.
Need for greater diversity
– Arbitration Foreign 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 cash cycle compare to competitors
Arbitration Foreign 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Protecting Foreign Investors 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 Arbitration Foreign has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Protecting Foreign Investors, it seems that the employees of Arbitration Foreign 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Arbitration Foreign is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Protecting Foreign Investors can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Opportunities Protecting Foreign Investors | 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 Protecting Foreign Investors are -
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 Arbitration Foreign 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Arbitration Foreign 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 Arbitration Foreign to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
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. Arbitration Foreign 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 Arbitration Foreign 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Arbitration Foreign 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Arbitration Foreign 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 Global Business segment.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Arbitration Foreign 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Arbitration Foreign can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Arbitration Foreign has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Arbitration Foreign to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Protecting Foreign Investors case study. Arbitration Foreign can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, 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. Arbitration Foreign can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Arbitration Foreign 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.
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 Arbitration Foreign in the consumer business. Now Arbitration Foreign can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Manufacturing automation
– Arbitration Foreign 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 Protecting Foreign Investors External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Protecting Foreign Investors are -
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Arbitration Foreign has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Global Business industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Arbitration Foreign needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Global Business sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Arbitration Foreign with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Arbitration Foreign in the Global Business industry. The Global Business 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.
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.
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. Arbitration Foreign needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Global Business industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Environmental challenges
– Arbitration Foreign 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. Arbitration Foreign can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Global Business industry.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Arbitration Foreign 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.
Increasing wage structure of Arbitration Foreign
– 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 Arbitration Foreign.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Arbitration Foreign 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Protecting Foreign Investors, Arbitration Foreign 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 .
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Arbitration Foreign 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.
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 Arbitration Foreign business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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. Arbitration Foreign will face different problems in different parts of Europe. For example it will face inflationary pressures in UK, France, and Germany, balance sheet expansion and demand challenges in Southern European countries, and geopolitical instability in the Eastern Europe.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Protecting Foreign Investors 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 Protecting Foreign Investors 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 Protecting Foreign Investors 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 Protecting Foreign Investors 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 Protecting Foreign Investors 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 Arbitration Foreign needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.