Atlas Mara Ltd (ATMA) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Consumer Financial Services
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Atlas Mara Ltd (United Kingdom)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Atlas Mara Ltd is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – technology disruption, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, wage bills are increasing, increasing transportation and logistics costs, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, geopolitical disruptions, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%,
digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Atlas Mara Ltd can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Atlas Mara Ltd, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Atlas Mara Ltd 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 Atlas Mara Ltd can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Atlas Mara Ltd
2. Improving business portfolio management of Atlas Mara Ltd
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United Kingdom
4. Making a Consumer Financial Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Atlas Mara Ltd
Strengths of Atlas Mara Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Atlas Mara Ltd are -
Training and development
– Atlas Mara Ltd has one of the best training and development program in Financial 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Atlas Mara Ltd has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Atlas Mara Ltd 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.
Digital Transformation in Consumer Financial Services industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Atlas Mara Ltd digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Atlas Mara Ltd 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Atlas Mara Ltd is one of the leading players in the Consumer Financial Services industry in United Kingdom. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in United Kingdom. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Organizational Resilience of Atlas Mara Ltd
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Atlas Mara Ltd does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Atlas Mara Ltd 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Atlas Mara Ltd in the Financial sector have low bargaining power. Atlas Mara Ltd has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Atlas Mara Ltd to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Atlas Mara Ltd has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Atlas Mara Ltd staying ahead in the Consumer Financial Services industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Atlas Mara Ltd has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Consumer Financial Services industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Atlas Mara Ltd have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Innovation driven organization
– Atlas Mara Ltd is one of the most innovative firm in Consumer Financial Services sector.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Atlas Mara Ltd 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
– Atlas Mara Ltd is present in almost all the verticals within the Consumer Financial Services industry. This has provided Atlas Mara Ltd 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.
Weaknesses of Atlas Mara Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Atlas Mara Ltd are -
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Atlas Mara Ltd has high operating costs in the Consumer Financial Services industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Atlas Mara Ltd lucrative customers.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Atlas Mara Ltd 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.
High dependence on Atlas Mara Ltd ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Atlas Mara Ltd still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Consumer Financial Services industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Atlas Mara Ltd has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Atlas Mara Ltd needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Consumer Financial Services industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Atlas Mara Ltd can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Atlas Mara Ltd is planning to shift buying processes online.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Atlas Mara Ltd, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Consumer Financial Services 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Atlas Mara Ltd is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Consumer Financial Services industry, but Atlas Mara Ltd needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Atlas Mara Ltd to focus more on services in the Consumer Financial Services industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Atlas Mara Ltd has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Consumer Financial Services industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Atlas Mara Ltd, in the dynamic environment of Consumer Financial Services industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Atlas Mara Ltd has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Skills based hiring in Consumer Financial Services industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Atlas Mara Ltd 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Atlas Mara Ltd is just above the Consumer Financial Services 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Atlas Mara Ltd products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Atlas Mara Ltd needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Atlas Mara Ltd Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Atlas Mara Ltd are -
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Atlas Mara Ltd in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Consumer Financial Services industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Atlas Mara Ltd has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Consumer Financial Services industry. This can help Atlas Mara Ltd to build a more holistic ecosystem for Atlas Mara Ltd products in the Consumer Financial Services industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, 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 Atlas Mara Ltd 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Atlas Mara Ltd can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Consumer Financial Services industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. It can provide automated chats to help consumers solve their own problems, provide online suggestions to get maximum out of the products and services, and help consumers to build a community where they can interact with each other to develop new features and uses.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Atlas Mara Ltd 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 Atlas Mara Ltd to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Atlas Mara Ltd 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Atlas Mara Ltd 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Atlas Mara Ltd is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Atlas Mara Ltd can utilize new technology in the field of Consumer Financial Services industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Developing new processes and practices
– Atlas Mara Ltd can develop new processes and procedures in Consumer Financial Services 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Atlas Mara Ltd 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 Consumer Financial Services industry.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Atlas Mara Ltd 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, Atlas Mara Ltd 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Atlas Mara Ltd can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Consumer Financial Services 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.
Threats Atlas Mara Ltd External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Atlas Mara Ltd are -
Environmental challenges
– Atlas Mara Ltd 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. Atlas Mara Ltd can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Consumer Financial Services industry.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Consumer Financial Services industry are lowering. It can presents Atlas Mara Ltd with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Consumer Financial Services sector.
Regulatory challenges
– Atlas Mara Ltd 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 Consumer Financial Services industry regulations.
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. Atlas Mara Ltd 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Atlas Mara Ltd 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 Consumer Financial Services industry and other sectors.
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. Atlas Mara Ltd needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Consumer Financial Services industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Atlas Mara Ltd in Consumer Financial Services industry. The Consumer Financial Services 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.
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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Atlas Mara Ltd may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Consumer Financial Services sector.
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 Atlas Mara Ltd in the Consumer Financial Services sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Atlas Mara Ltd 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Atlas Mara Ltd has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Consumer Financial Services industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Atlas Mara Ltd needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Consumer Financial Services 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Atlas Mara Ltd Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Atlas Mara Ltd 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 Atlas Mara Ltd 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 Atlas Mara Ltd 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 Atlas Mara Ltd 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 Atlas Mara Ltd needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.