SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Prolife Industries (India)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Prolife Industries is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing energy prices, technology disruption, increasing transportation and logistics costs, there is backlash against globalization, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%,
increasing household debt because of falling income levels, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Prolife Industries
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Prolife Industries can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Prolife Industries, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Prolife Industries 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 Prolife Industries can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Prolife Industries
2. Improving business portfolio management of Prolife Industries
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in India
4. Making a sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Prolife Industries
Strengths of Prolife Industries | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Prolife Industries are -
Innovation driven organization
– Prolife Industries is one of the most innovative firm in sector.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in industry
– Prolife Industries has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Prolife Industries to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Prolife Industries to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Prolife Industries in the sector have low bargaining power. Prolife Industries has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Prolife Industries to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Strong track record of project management in the industry
– Prolife Industries is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Prolife Industries has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Prolife Industries 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Prolife Industries 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Prolife Industries is one of the leading players in the 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.
Organizational Resilience of Prolife Industries
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Prolife Industries does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Prolife Industries has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Prolife Industries have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Prolife Industries 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Prolife Industries is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided Prolife Industries 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.
Learning organization
- Prolife Industries 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 Prolife Industries is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Prolife Industries emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Weaknesses of Prolife Industries | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Prolife Industries are -
Lack of clear differentiation of Prolife Industries products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Prolife Industries needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Prolife Industries has high operating costs in the industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Prolife Industries lucrative customers.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Prolife Industries, in the dynamic environment of industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Prolife Industries has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Prolife Industries 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Prolife Industries 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 at Prolife Industries can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Prolife Industries is planning to shift buying processes online.
High bargaining power of channel partners in industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in India, Prolife Industries 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Prolife Industries is one of the leading players in the industry, it 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Prolife Industries 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Prolife Industries 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.
Skills based hiring in industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Prolife Industries 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.
High dependence on Prolife Industries ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Prolife Industries still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Prolife Industries has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Prolife Industries Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Prolife Industries are -
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Prolife Industries in the industry. Now Prolife Industries can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Prolife Industries 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Prolife Industries 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
– Prolife Industries 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Prolife Industries 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 Prolife Industries to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Developing new processes and practices
– Prolife Industries can develop new processes and procedures in 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Prolife Industries can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Prolife Industries operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in sector.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Prolife Industries in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Prolife Industries 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Prolife Industries has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Prolife Industries to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Prolife Industries to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Prolife Industries 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. Prolife Industries 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Prolife Industries can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Prolife Industries 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.
Threats Prolife Industries External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Prolife Industries are -
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Prolife Industries is facing in sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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 Prolife Industries.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Prolife Industries 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 industry and other sectors.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Prolife Industries in industry. The 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Prolife Industries may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to industry are lowering. It can presents Prolife Industries with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Prolife Industries 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Prolife Industries 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 Prolife Industries prominent markets.
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.
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. Prolife Industries needs to understand the core reasons impacting the industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Prolife Industries business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Prolife Industries 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 industry.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Prolife Industries Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Prolife Industries 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 Prolife Industries 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 Prolife Industries 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 Prolife Industries 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 Prolife Industries needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.