GFC Green Fields (GFC) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for GFC Green Fields (Israel)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , GFC Green Fields is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing commodity prices, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, wage bills are increasing, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing energy prices, technology disruption, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of GFC Green Fields

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that GFC Green Fields can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the GFC Green Fields, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which GFC Green Fields 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.

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SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix

SWOT analysis of GFC Green Fields can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of GFC Green Fields
2. Improving business portfolio management of GFC Green Fields
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Israel
4. Making a Biotechnology & Drugs sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of GFC Green Fields

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Strengths of GFC Green Fields | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of GFC Green Fields are -

Superior customer experience

– The customer experience strategy of GFC Green Fields in Biotechnology & Drugs industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.

High switching costs

– The high switching costs that GFC Green Fields 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.

Low bargaining power of suppliers

– Suppliers of GFC Green Fields in the Healthcare sector have low bargaining power. GFC Green Fields has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps GFC Green Fields to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.

Cross disciplinary teams

– Horizontal connected teams at the GFC Green Fields 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 lead change in Biotechnology & Drugs

– GFC Green Fields is one of the leading players in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry in Israel. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry in Israel but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled GFC Green Fields in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.

Diverse revenue streams

– GFC Green Fields is present in almost all the verticals within the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This has provided GFC Green Fields 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.

High brand equity

– GFC Green Fields has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled GFC Green Fields to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.

Innovation driven organization

– GFC Green Fields is one of the most innovative firm in Biotechnology & Drugs sector.

Organizational Resilience of GFC Green Fields

– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing GFC Green Fields does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.

Training and development

– GFC Green Fields has one of the best training and development program in Healthcare industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in – employees retention, in-house promotion, loyalty, new venture initiation, lack of conflict, and high level of both employees and customer engagement.

Highly skilled collaborators

– GFC Green Fields has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Biotechnology & Drugs industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of GFC Green Fields have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.

Strong track record of project management in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry

– GFC Green Fields is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.

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Weaknesses of GFC Green Fields | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of GFC Green Fields are -

High operating costs

– Compare to the competitors, GFC Green Fields has high operating costs in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract GFC Green Fields lucrative customers.

Lack of clear differentiation of GFC Green Fields products

– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, GFC Green Fields needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.

Workers concerns about automation

– As automation is fast increasing in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, GFC Green Fields 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.

Slow decision making process

– As mentioned earlier in the report, GFC Green Fields has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry over the last five years. GFC Green Fields 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.

Aligning sales with marketing

– From the outside it seems that GFC Green Fields needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at GFC Green Fields can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as GFC Green Fields is planning to shift buying processes online.

Capital Spending Reduction

– Even during the low interest decade, GFC Green Fields 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry using digital technology.

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 GFC Green Fields supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, GFC Green Fields is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left GFC Green Fields vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.

Skills based hiring in Biotechnology & Drugs industry

– The stress on hiring functional specialists at GFC Green Fields 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.

Products dominated business model

– Even though GFC Green Fields has some of the most successful models in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. GFC Green Fields should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.

Slow to harness new channels of communication

– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, GFC Green Fields is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help GFC Green Fields to provide better information regarding Biotechnology & Drugs products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.

Increasing silos among functional specialists

– The organizational structure of GFC Green Fields is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, but GFC Green Fields needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help GFC Green Fields to focus more on services in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.

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GFC Green Fields Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of GFC Green Fields are -

Redefining models of collaboration and team work

– As explained in the weaknesses section, GFC Green Fields is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. GFC Green Fields can utilize new technology in the field of Biotechnology & Drugs industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, 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, GFC Green Fields can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that GFC Green Fields operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Biotechnology & Drugs sector.

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for GFC Green Fields in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.

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. GFC Green Fields can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.

Leveraging digital technologies

– GFC Green Fields 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.

Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19

– consumer behavior has changed in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. GFC Green Fields 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. GFC Green Fields 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.

Using analytics as competitive advantage

– GFC Green Fields has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Biotechnology & Drugs sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled GFC Green Fields to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help GFC Green Fields to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.

Learning at scale

– Online learning technologies has now opened space for GFC Green Fields 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.

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 GFC Green Fields 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.

Better consumer reach

– The expansion of the 5G network will help GFC Green Fields to increase its market reach. GFC Green Fields 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.

Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains

– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, GFC Green Fields 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 GFC Green Fields to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.

Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities

– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for GFC Green Fields 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 GFC Green Fields to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.

Building a culture of innovation

– managers at GFC Green Fields 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry.

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Threats GFC Green Fields External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of GFC Green Fields are -

Increasing wage structure of GFC Green Fields

– 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 GFC Green Fields.

Stagnating economy with rate increase

– GFC Green Fields 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry.

Learning curve for new practices

– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, GFC Green Fields may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Biotechnology & Drugs sector.

Environmental challenges

– GFC Green Fields 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. GFC Green Fields can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry.

Easy access to finance

– Easy access to finance in Biotechnology & Drugs industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. GFC Green Fields can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.

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. GFC Green Fields needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.

Barriers of entry lowering

– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Biotechnology & Drugs industry are lowering. It can presents GFC Green Fields with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Biotechnology & Drugs sector.

Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution

– GFC Green Fields has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, GFC Green Fields needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Biotechnology & Drugs 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.

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. GFC Green Fields 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.

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.

Regulatory challenges

– GFC Green Fields 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry regulations.

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 GFC Green Fields.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of GFC Green Fields Template, Example

Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at GFC Green Fields 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 GFC Green Fields 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 GFC Green Fields 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 GFC Green Fields 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 GFC Green Fields needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.

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