SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Indiabulls Integrated (India)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Indiabulls Integrated is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing household debt because of falling income levels, geopolitical disruptions, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing commodity prices, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%,
cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Indiabulls Integrated
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Indiabulls Integrated can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Indiabulls Integrated, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Indiabulls Integrated 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 Indiabulls Integrated can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Indiabulls Integrated
2. Improving business portfolio management of Indiabulls Integrated
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in India
4. Making a Retail (Grocery) sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Indiabulls Integrated
Strengths of Indiabulls Integrated | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Indiabulls Integrated are -
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Indiabulls Integrated has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Indiabulls Integrated staying ahead in the Retail (Grocery) industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Indiabulls Integrated has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Indiabulls Integrated 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Indiabulls Integrated is one of the most innovative firm in Retail (Grocery) sector.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Indiabulls Integrated 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.
Learning organization
- Indiabulls Integrated 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 Indiabulls Integrated is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Indiabulls Integrated emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Indiabulls Integrated is one of the leading players in the Retail (Grocery) industry in India. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in India. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Ability to lead change in Retail (Grocery)
– Indiabulls Integrated is one of the leading players in the Retail (Grocery) industry in India. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Retail (Grocery) industry in India but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Indiabulls Integrated in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Organizational Resilience of Indiabulls Integrated
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Indiabulls Integrated does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Indiabulls Integrated comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Retail (Grocery) 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Indiabulls Integrated 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Indiabulls Integrated in Retail (Grocery) industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Indiabulls Integrated has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Retail (Grocery) industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Indiabulls Integrated have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Weaknesses of Indiabulls Integrated | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Indiabulls Integrated are -
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Indiabulls Integrated needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Retail (Grocery) industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Indiabulls Integrated can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Indiabulls Integrated is planning to shift buying processes online.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of India, Indiabulls Integrated needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Indiabulls Integrated is one of the leading players in the Retail (Grocery) industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Retail (Grocery) industry in last five years.
Skills based hiring in Retail (Grocery) industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Indiabulls Integrated 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, Indiabulls Integrated is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Indiabulls Integrated to provide better information regarding Retail (Grocery) products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Indiabulls Integrated has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Retail (Grocery) industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Indiabulls Integrated, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Retail (Grocery) industry. 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Indiabulls Integrated 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Indiabulls Integrated 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 operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Indiabulls Integrated has high operating costs in the Retail (Grocery) industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Indiabulls Integrated lucrative customers.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Indiabulls Integrated is just above the Retail (Grocery) industry average. It needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
Indiabulls Integrated Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Indiabulls Integrated are -
Manufacturing automation
– Indiabulls Integrated can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Retail (Grocery) sector. 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Indiabulls Integrated 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Indiabulls Integrated is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Indiabulls Integrated can utilize new technology in the field of Retail (Grocery) industry 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 Indiabulls Integrated 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 Indiabulls Integrated 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. Indiabulls Integrated can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Retail (Grocery) industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Indiabulls Integrated 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. Indiabulls Integrated 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Indiabulls Integrated can develop new processes and procedures in Retail (Grocery) 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.
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 Indiabulls Integrated 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Indiabulls Integrated has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Retail (Grocery) sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Indiabulls Integrated to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Indiabulls Integrated 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, Indiabulls Integrated can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Indiabulls Integrated operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Retail (Grocery) sector.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Retail (Grocery) industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Indiabulls Integrated 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
– Indiabulls Integrated 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Indiabulls Integrated 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 Retail (Grocery) industry.
Threats Indiabulls Integrated External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Indiabulls Integrated are -
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Retail (Grocery) industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Indiabulls Integrated can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Indiabulls Integrated in Retail (Grocery) industry. The Retail (Grocery) 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.
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. Indiabulls Integrated needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Retail (Grocery) industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Increasing wage structure of Indiabulls Integrated
– 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 Indiabulls Integrated.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Indiabulls Integrated 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 Retail (Grocery) industry and other sectors.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Indiabulls Integrated is facing in Retail (Grocery) sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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 Indiabulls Integrated in the Retail (Grocery) sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Environmental challenges
– Indiabulls Integrated 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. Indiabulls Integrated can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Retail (Grocery) industry.
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.
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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Indiabulls Integrated has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Retail (Grocery) industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Indiabulls Integrated needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Retail (Grocery) 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 to Retail (Grocery) industry are lowering. It can presents Indiabulls Integrated with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Retail (Grocery) sector.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Indiabulls Integrated may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Retail (Grocery) sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Indiabulls Integrated Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Indiabulls Integrated 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 Indiabulls Integrated 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 Indiabulls Integrated 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 Indiabulls Integrated 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 Indiabulls Integrated needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
