Ain Pharmaciez Inc (9627) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Retail (Drugs)
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Ain Pharmaciez Inc (Japan)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Ain Pharmaciez Inc is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, wage bills are increasing, technology disruption, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing commodity prices,
increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Ain Pharmaciez Inc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Ain Pharmaciez Inc can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Ain Pharmaciez Inc, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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 Ain Pharmaciez Inc can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Ain Pharmaciez Inc
2. Improving business portfolio management of Ain Pharmaciez Inc
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Japan
4. Making a Retail (Drugs) sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Ain Pharmaciez Inc
Strengths of Ain Pharmaciez Inc | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Ain Pharmaciez Inc are -
High brand equity
– Ain Pharmaciez Inc has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Ain Pharmaciez Inc to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Ain Pharmaciez Inc in the Services sector have low bargaining power. Ain Pharmaciez Inc has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Ain Pharmaciez Inc to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Ain Pharmaciez Inc in Retail (Drugs) industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Ain Pharmaciez Inc has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Ain Pharmaciez Inc staying ahead in the Retail (Drugs) industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Organizational Resilience of Ain Pharmaciez Inc
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Ain Pharmaciez Inc does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Training and development
– Ain Pharmaciez Inc has one of the best training and development program in Services 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Retail (Drugs) industry
– Ain Pharmaciez Inc is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Ain Pharmaciez Inc is one of the leading players in the Retail (Drugs) industry in Japan. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Japan. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Retail (Drugs) industry
– Ain Pharmaciez Inc has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Ain Pharmaciez Inc to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Retail (Drugs) industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Ain Pharmaciez Inc to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Analytics focus
– Ain Pharmaciez Inc is putting a lot of focus on utilizing the power of analytics in business decision making. This has put it among the leading players in the Retail (Drugs) industry. The technology infrastructure of Japan is also helping it to harness the power of analytics for – marketing optimization, demand forecasting, customer relationship management, inventory management, information sharing across the value chain etc.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Ain Pharmaciez Inc comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Retail (Drugs) 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.
Digital Transformation in Retail (Drugs) industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Ain Pharmaciez Inc digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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.
Weaknesses of Ain Pharmaciez Inc | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Ain Pharmaciez Inc are -
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Ain Pharmaciez Inc, in the dynamic environment of Retail (Drugs) industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Ain Pharmaciez Inc has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Ain Pharmaciez Inc is just above the Retail (Drugs) 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Ain Pharmaciez Inc, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Retail (Drugs) 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Ain Pharmaciez Inc has some of the most successful models in the Retail (Drugs) industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Ain Pharmaciez Inc should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Japan, Ain Pharmaciez Inc needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Lack of clear differentiation of Ain Pharmaciez Inc products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Ain Pharmaciez Inc needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Ain Pharmaciez Inc is one of the leading players in the Retail (Drugs) industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Retail (Drugs) industry in last five years.
Skills based hiring in Retail (Drugs) industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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, Ain Pharmaciez Inc is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Ain Pharmaciez Inc to provide better information regarding Retail (Drugs) products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Ain Pharmaciez Inc Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Ain Pharmaciez Inc are -
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Ain Pharmaciez Inc can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Ain Pharmaciez Inc is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Ain Pharmaciez Inc can utilize new technology in the field of Retail (Drugs) industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
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. Ain Pharmaciez Inc can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Loyalty marketing
– Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Ain Pharmaciez Inc in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Retail (Drugs) industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Ain Pharmaciez Inc has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Retail (Drugs) sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Ain Pharmaciez Inc to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Ain Pharmaciez Inc to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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 (Drugs) industry.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Ain Pharmaciez Inc has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Retail (Drugs) industry. This can help Ain Pharmaciez Inc to build a more holistic ecosystem for Ain Pharmaciez Inc products in the Retail (Drugs) industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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.
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 Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Ain Pharmaciez Inc can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Ain Pharmaciez Inc operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Retail (Drugs) sector.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Retail (Drugs) industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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. Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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 Ain Pharmaciez Inc to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Threats Ain Pharmaciez Inc External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Ain Pharmaciez Inc are -
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Retail (Drugs) industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Ain Pharmaciez Inc can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Environmental challenges
– Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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. Ain Pharmaciez Inc can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Retail (Drugs) industry.
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. Ain Pharmaciez Inc needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Retail (Drugs) industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Ain Pharmaciez Inc has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Retail (Drugs) industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Ain Pharmaciez Inc needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Retail (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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Retail (Drugs) industry are lowering. It can presents Ain Pharmaciez Inc with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Retail (Drugs) sector.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Ain Pharmaciez Inc in Retail (Drugs) industry. The Retail (Drugs) 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 dependence on third party suppliers
– Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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 Retail (Drugs) industry.
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 Ain Pharmaciez Inc business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, 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 Ain Pharmaciez Inc.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Ain Pharmaciez Inc is facing in Retail (Drugs) sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Ain Pharmaciez Inc
– 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 Ain Pharmaciez Inc.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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 Ain Pharmaciez Inc prominent markets.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Ain Pharmaciez Inc Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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 Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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 Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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 Ain Pharmaciez Inc 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 Ain Pharmaciez Inc needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.