Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Impax Asset Management is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, there is backlash against globalization, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs,
wage bills are increasing, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Impax Asset Management
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Impax Asset Management can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Impax Asset Management, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Impax Asset Management 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 Impax Asset Management can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Impax Asset Management
2. Improving business portfolio management of Impax Asset Management
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United Kingdom
4. Making a Investment Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Impax Asset Management
Strengths of Impax Asset Management | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Impax Asset Management are -
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Impax Asset Management 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Impax Asset Management is present in almost all the verticals within the Investment Services industry. This has provided Impax Asset Management 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Impax Asset Management is one of the leading players in the Investment 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Impax Asset Management in the Financial sector have low bargaining power. Impax Asset Management has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Impax Asset Management to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Training and development
– Impax Asset Management 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Investment Services industry
– Impax Asset Management has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Impax Asset Management to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Investment Services industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Impax Asset Management to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Impax Asset Management comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Investment Services 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Impax Asset Management has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Investment Services industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Impax Asset Management have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Impax Asset Management has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Impax Asset Management 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.
Analytics focus
– Impax Asset Management 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 Investment Services industry. The technology infrastructure of United Kingdom 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.
Learning organization
- Impax Asset Management 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 Impax Asset Management is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Impax Asset Management emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Impax Asset Management has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Impax Asset Management staying ahead in the Investment Services industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Weaknesses of Impax Asset Management | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Impax Asset Management are -
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Impax Asset Management is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Investment Services industry, but Impax Asset Management needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Impax Asset Management to focus more on services in the Investment Services industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Impax Asset Management has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Investment 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Impax Asset Management products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Impax Asset Management needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Employees’ less understanding of Impax Asset Management strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Impax Asset Management don’t have comprehensive understanding of the firm’s strategy. This is reflected in number of promotional campaigns over the last few years that had mixed messaging and competing priorities. Some of the strategic activities and services promoted in the promotional campaigns were not consistent with the organization’s strategy.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Impax Asset Management, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Investment 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Investment Services industry, Impax Asset Management 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 to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Impax Asset Management is one of the leading players in the Investment Services industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Investment Services industry in last five years.
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 Impax Asset Management supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Impax Asset Management is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Impax Asset Management 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, Impax Asset Management is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Impax Asset Management to provide better information regarding Investment Services products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Impax Asset Management 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 Impax Asset Management, in the dynamic environment of Investment Services industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Impax Asset Management has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Impax Asset Management Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Impax Asset Management are -
Leveraging digital technologies
– Impax Asset Management 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Impax Asset Management has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Investment Services sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Impax Asset Management to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Impax Asset Management to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Impax Asset Management 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 Impax Asset Management to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Buying journey improvements
– Impax Asset Management can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Investment 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.
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. Impax Asset Management can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Impax Asset Management 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Investment Services industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Impax Asset Management in the Investment Services industry. Now Impax Asset Management can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Investment Services industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Impax Asset Management can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Impax Asset Management can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Impax Asset Management operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Investment Services sector.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Investment Services industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Impax Asset Management 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. Impax Asset Management can further use this consumer data to build better customer loyalty, provide better products and service collection, and improve the value proposition in inflationary times.
Manufacturing automation
– Impax Asset Management can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Investment 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Impax Asset Management 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Impax Asset Management has focused on building a highly responsive customer relationship management platform. This platform is built on in-house data and driven by analytics and artificial intelligence. The customer analytics can help the organization to fine tune its loyalty marketing efforts, increase the wallet share of the organization, reduce wastage on mainstream advertising spending, build better pricing strategies using personalization, etc.
Threats Impax Asset Management External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Impax Asset Management are -
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Impax Asset Management 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 Impax Asset Management prominent markets.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Impax Asset Management in Investment Services industry. The Investment 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.
Increasing wage structure of Impax Asset Management
– 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 Impax Asset Management.
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 Impax Asset Management business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Regulatory challenges
– Impax Asset Management 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 Investment Services industry regulations.
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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Investment Services industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Impax Asset Management can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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.
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. Impax Asset Management 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.
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. Impax Asset Management needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Investment Services industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Impax Asset Management has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Investment Services industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Impax Asset Management needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Investment 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Investment Services industry are lowering. It can presents Impax Asset Management with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Investment Services sector.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Impax Asset Management 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 Investment Services industry and other sectors.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Impax Asset Management Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Impax Asset Management 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 Impax Asset Management 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 Impax Asset Management 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 Impax Asset Management 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 Impax Asset Management needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
