Afrox (AFXJ) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Afrox (South Africa)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Afrox is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing transportation and logistics costs, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, wage bills are increasing, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, 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, technology disruption, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Afrox

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Afrox can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Afrox, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Afrox 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.

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SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix

SWOT analysis of Afrox can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Afrox
2. Improving business portfolio management of Afrox
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in South Africa
4. Making a Chemical Manufacturing sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Afrox

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Strengths of Afrox | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of Afrox are -

Analytics focus

– Afrox 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry. The technology infrastructure of South Africa 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.

Diverse revenue streams

– Afrox is present in almost all the verticals within the Chemical Manufacturing industry. This has provided Afrox 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.

Training and development

– Afrox has one of the best training and development program in Basic Materials 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.

Innovation driven organization

– Afrox is one of the most innovative firm in Chemical Manufacturing sector.

Effective Research and Development (R&D)

– Afrox has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Afrox staying ahead in the Chemical Manufacturing industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.

Learning organization

- Afrox 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 Afrox is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Afrox emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.

Cross disciplinary teams

– Horizontal connected teams at the Afrox 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.

Ability to lead change in Chemical Manufacturing

– Afrox is one of the leading players in the Chemical Manufacturing industry in South Africa. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Chemical Manufacturing industry in South Africa but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Afrox in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.

Strong track record of project management in the Chemical Manufacturing industry

– Afrox is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.

High switching costs

– The high switching costs that Afrox 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.

Highly skilled collaborators

– Afrox has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Chemical Manufacturing industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Afrox have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.

Superior customer experience

– The customer experience strategy of Afrox in Chemical Manufacturing industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.

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Weaknesses of Afrox | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of Afrox are -

High cash cycle compare to competitors

Afrox has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Chemical Manufacturing industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.

Workers concerns about automation

– As automation is fast increasing in the Chemical Manufacturing industry, Afrox 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 harness new channels of communication

– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Afrox is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Afrox to provide better information regarding Chemical Manufacturing products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.

Compensation and incentives

– The revenue per employee of Afrox is just above the Chemical Manufacturing 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.

Need for greater diversity

– Afrox 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.

Lack of clear differentiation of Afrox products

– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Afrox needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.

Employees’ less understanding of Afrox strategy

– From the outside it seems that the employees of Afrox 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.

Increasing silos among functional specialists

– The organizational structure of Afrox is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Chemical Manufacturing industry, but Afrox needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Afrox to focus more on services in the Chemical Manufacturing industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.

High operating costs

– Compare to the competitors, Afrox has high operating costs in the Chemical Manufacturing industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Afrox lucrative customers.

Slow to strategic competitive environment developments

– As Afrox is one of the leading players in the Chemical Manufacturing industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Chemical Manufacturing industry in last five years.

Ability to respond to the competition

– As the decision making is very deliberative at Afrox, in the dynamic environment of Chemical Manufacturing industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Afrox has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.

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Afrox Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of Afrox are -

Developing new processes and practices

– Afrox can develop new processes and procedures in Chemical Manufacturing 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.

Learning at scale

– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Afrox 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.

Buying journey improvements

– Afrox can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Chemical Manufacturing 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.

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 Afrox 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.

Reforming the budgeting process

- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Afrox 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, Afrox is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Afrox can utilize new technology in the field of Chemical Manufacturing industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.

Creating value in data economy

– The success of analytics program of Afrox has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Chemical Manufacturing industry. This can help Afrox to build a more holistic ecosystem for Afrox products in the Chemical Manufacturing industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.

Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19

– consumer behavior has changed in the Chemical Manufacturing industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Afrox 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. Afrox 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.

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Afrox in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Chemical Manufacturing industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.

Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Chemical Manufacturing industry

– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Afrox in the Chemical Manufacturing industry. Now Afrox can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.

Better consumer reach

– The expansion of the 5G network will help Afrox to increase its market reach. Afrox will be able to reach out to new customers. Secondly 5G will also provide technology framework to build new tools and products that can help more immersive consumer experience and faster consumer journey.

Leveraging digital technologies

– Afrox 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.

Increase in government spending

– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Afrox can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Afrox operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Chemical Manufacturing sector.

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Threats Afrox External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of Afrox are -

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 Afrox in the Chemical Manufacturing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins

– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Afrox 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 Afrox prominent markets.

High dependence on third party suppliers

– Afrox 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.

Environmental challenges

– Afrox 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. Afrox can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Chemical Manufacturing industry.

Learning curve for new practices

– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Afrox may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Chemical Manufacturing sector.

Increasing wage structure of Afrox

– 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 Afrox.

Easy access to finance

– Easy access to finance in Chemical Manufacturing industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Afrox can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.

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. Afrox 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.

Barriers of entry lowering

– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Chemical Manufacturing industry are lowering. It can presents Afrox with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Chemical Manufacturing sector.

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. Afrox needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Chemical Manufacturing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.

Stagnating economy with rate increase

– Afrox 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry.

Shortening product life cycle

– it is one of the major threat that Afrox is facing in Chemical Manufacturing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.

Regulatory challenges

– Afrox 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry regulations.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Afrox Template, Example

Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Afrox 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 Afrox 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 Afrox 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 Afrox 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 Afrox needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.

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