SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for B&C Speakers (Italy)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , B&C Speakers is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, technology disruption, wage bills are increasing, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, geopolitical disruptions,
customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing energy prices, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that B&C Speakers can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the B&C Speakers, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which B&C Speakers 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 B&C Speakers can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of B&C Speakers
2. Improving business portfolio management of B&C Speakers
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Italy
4. Making a Audio & Video Equipment sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of B&C Speakers
Strengths of B&C Speakers | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of B&C Speakers are -
Ability to recruit top talent
– B&C Speakers is one of the leading players in the Audio & Video Equipment industry in Italy. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Italy. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– B&C Speakers has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – B&C Speakers staying ahead in the Audio & Video Equipment industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Diverse revenue streams
– B&C Speakers is present in almost all the verticals within the Audio & Video Equipment industry. This has provided B&C Speakers 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
- B&C Speakers 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 B&C Speakers is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at B&C Speakers emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
High brand equity
– B&C Speakers has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled B&C Speakers to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Ability to lead change in Audio & Video Equipment
– B&C Speakers is one of the leading players in the Audio & Video Equipment industry in Italy. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Audio & Video Equipment industry in Italy but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled B&C Speakers in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Digital Transformation in Audio & Video Equipment industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For B&C Speakers digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. B&C Speakers 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– B&C Speakers has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Audio & Video Equipment industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of B&C Speakers have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Training and development
– B&C Speakers has one of the best training and development program in Consumer Cyclical 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of B&C Speakers in the Consumer Cyclical sector have low bargaining power. B&C Speakers has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps B&C Speakers to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the B&C Speakers 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of B&C Speakers comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Audio & Video Equipment 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.
Weaknesses of B&C Speakers | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of B&C Speakers are -
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of B&C Speakers is just above the Audio & Video Equipment 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at B&C Speakers, in the dynamic environment of Audio & Video Equipment industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. B&C Speakers has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
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 B&C Speakers supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, B&C Speakers is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left B&C Speakers vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, B&C Speakers is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help B&C Speakers to provide better information regarding Audio & Video Equipment products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High dependence on B&C Speakers ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of B&C Speakers still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Audio & Video Equipment industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though B&C Speakers has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Need for greater diversity
– B&C Speakers 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.
Skills based hiring in Audio & Video Equipment industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at B&C Speakers 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of B&C Speakers products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, B&C Speakers needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Products dominated business model
– Even though B&C Speakers has some of the most successful models in the Audio & Video Equipment industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. B&C Speakers should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As B&C Speakers is one of the leading players in the Audio & Video Equipment industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Audio & Video Equipment industry in last five years.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Audio & Video Equipment industry, B&C Speakers 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.
B&C Speakers Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of B&C Speakers are -
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, B&C Speakers can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that B&C Speakers operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Audio & Video Equipment sector.
Loyalty marketing
– B&C Speakers 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at B&C Speakers 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 Audio & Video Equipment industry.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects B&C Speakers can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, B&C Speakers 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help B&C Speakers to increase its market reach. B&C Speakers 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for B&C Speakers 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 B&C Speakers to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Manufacturing automation
– B&C Speakers can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Audio & Video Equipment 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Audio & Video Equipment industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. B&C Speakers 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. B&C Speakers 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
– B&C Speakers can develop new processes and procedures in Audio & Video Equipment 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for B&C Speakers in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Audio & Video Equipment 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. B&C Speakers can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– B&C Speakers has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Audio & Video Equipment sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled B&C Speakers to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help B&C Speakers to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Threats B&C Speakers External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of B&C Speakers are -
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, B&C Speakers 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 B&C Speakers prominent markets.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Audio & Video Equipment industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. B&C Speakers can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Audio & Video Equipment industry are lowering. It can presents B&C Speakers with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Audio & Video Equipment sector.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that B&C Speakers is facing in Audio & Video Equipment sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– B&C Speakers has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Audio & Video Equipment industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, B&C Speakers needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Audio & Video Equipment 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.
Regulatory challenges
– B&C Speakers 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 Audio & Video Equipment industry regulations.
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 B&C Speakers in the Audio & Video Equipment sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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 B&C Speakers.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for B&C Speakers in Audio & Video Equipment industry. The Audio & Video Equipment 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. B&C Speakers needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Audio & Video Equipment 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 B&C Speakers business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Environmental challenges
– B&C Speakers 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. B&C Speakers can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Audio & Video Equipment industry.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, B&C Speakers may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Audio & Video Equipment sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of B&C Speakers Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at B&C Speakers 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 B&C Speakers 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 B&C Speakers 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 B&C Speakers 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 B&C Speakers needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.