SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for EKF Diagnostics (United Kingdom)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , EKF Diagnostics is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, 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, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google,
increasing transportation and logistics costs, 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 EKF Diagnostics can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the EKF Diagnostics, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which EKF Diagnostics 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 EKF Diagnostics can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of EKF Diagnostics
2. Improving business portfolio management of EKF Diagnostics
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United Kingdom
4. Making a Scientific & Technical Instr. sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of EKF Diagnostics
Strengths of EKF Diagnostics | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of EKF Diagnostics are -
Training and development
– EKF Diagnostics has one of the best training and development program in Technology 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of EKF Diagnostics comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Scientific & Technical Instr. 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.
High brand equity
– EKF Diagnostics has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled EKF Diagnostics to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the EKF Diagnostics 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 EKF Diagnostics in the Technology sector have low bargaining power. EKF Diagnostics has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps EKF Diagnostics to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Analytics focus
– EKF Diagnostics 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 Scientific & Technical Instr. 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.
Digital Transformation in Scientific & Technical Instr. industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For EKF Diagnostics digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. EKF Diagnostics 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– EKF Diagnostics is present in almost all the verticals within the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry. This has provided EKF Diagnostics 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– EKF Diagnostics has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – EKF Diagnostics staying ahead in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Strong track record of project management in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry
– EKF Diagnostics 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 lead change in Scientific & Technical Instr.
– EKF Diagnostics is one of the leading players in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry in United Kingdom. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry in United Kingdom but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled EKF Diagnostics in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Successful track record of launching new products
– EKF Diagnostics has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. EKF Diagnostics 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.
Weaknesses of EKF Diagnostics | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of EKF Diagnostics are -
Need for greater diversity
– EKF Diagnostics 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of EKF Diagnostics is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry, but EKF Diagnostics needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help EKF Diagnostics to focus more on services in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, EKF Diagnostics has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry over the last five years. EKF Diagnostics even though has strong showing on digital transformation primary two stages, it has struggled to capitalize the power of digital transformation in marketing efforts and new venture efforts.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Scientific & Technical Instr. industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in United Kingdom, EKF Diagnostics is facing high bargaining power of the channel partners. So far it has not able to streamline the operations to reduce the bargaining power of the value chain partners in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As EKF Diagnostics is one of the leading players in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry in last five years.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of EKF Diagnostics is just above the Scientific & Technical Instr. 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 EKF Diagnostics products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, EKF Diagnostics needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, EKF Diagnostics is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help EKF Diagnostics to provide better information regarding Scientific & Technical Instr. products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, EKF Diagnostics has high operating costs in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract EKF Diagnostics lucrative customers.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that EKF Diagnostics needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at EKF Diagnostics can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as EKF Diagnostics is planning to shift buying processes online.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, EKF Diagnostics has not been able to do capital spending to the tune of the competition. This has resulted into fewer innovations and company facing stiff competition from both existing competitors and new entrants who are disrupting the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry using digital technology.
EKF Diagnostics Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of EKF Diagnostics are -
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– EKF Diagnostics has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Scientific & Technical Instr. sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled EKF Diagnostics to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help EKF Diagnostics to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for EKF Diagnostics in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for EKF Diagnostics 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 EKF Diagnostics to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Scientific & Technical Instr. industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. EKF Diagnostics can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of EKF Diagnostics has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Scientific & Technical Instr. industry. This can help EKF Diagnostics to build a more holistic ecosystem for EKF Diagnostics products in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Buying journey improvements
– EKF Diagnostics can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Scientific & Technical Instr. 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects EKF Diagnostics can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, EKF Diagnostics can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that EKF Diagnostics operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Scientific & Technical Instr. sector.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, EKF Diagnostics is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. EKF Diagnostics can utilize new technology in the field of Scientific & Technical Instr. industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, EKF Diagnostics 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 EKF Diagnostics to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Scientific & Technical Instr. industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for EKF Diagnostics in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry. Now EKF Diagnostics can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at EKF Diagnostics 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 Scientific & Technical Instr. industry.
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. EKF Diagnostics can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Threats EKF Diagnostics External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of EKF Diagnostics are -
Environmental challenges
– EKF Diagnostics 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. EKF Diagnostics can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– EKF Diagnostics has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, EKF Diagnostics needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Scientific & Technical Instr. sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
Instability in the European markets
– European Union markets are facing three big challenges post Covid – expanded balance sheets, Brexit related business disruption, and aggressive Russia looking to distract the existing security mechanism. EKF Diagnostics 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. EKF Diagnostics needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Scientific & Technical Instr. industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that EKF Diagnostics is facing in Scientific & Technical Instr. sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Scientific & Technical Instr. industry are lowering. It can presents EKF Diagnostics with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Scientific & Technical Instr. sector.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, EKF Diagnostics may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Scientific & Technical Instr. sector.
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 EKF Diagnostics.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, EKF Diagnostics 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 EKF Diagnostics prominent markets.
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 EKF Diagnostics in the Scientific & Technical Instr. sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– EKF Diagnostics 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.
Increasing wage structure of EKF Diagnostics
– 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 EKF Diagnostics.
Consumer confidence and its impact on EKF Diagnostics 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 Scientific & Technical Instr. industry and other sectors.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of EKF Diagnostics Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at EKF Diagnostics 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 EKF Diagnostics 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 EKF Diagnostics 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 EKF Diagnostics 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 EKF Diagnostics needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.