SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for AfroCentric Investment Corp (South Africa)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , AfroCentric Investment Corp is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing household debt because of falling income levels, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, geopolitical disruptions, there is backlash against globalization, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation,
increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, technology disruption, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of AfroCentric Investment Corp
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that AfroCentric Investment Corp can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the AfroCentric Investment Corp, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which AfroCentric Investment Corp 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 AfroCentric Investment Corp can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of AfroCentric Investment Corp
2. Improving business portfolio management of AfroCentric Investment Corp
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in South Africa
4. Making a Healthcare Facilities sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of AfroCentric Investment Corp
Strengths of AfroCentric Investment Corp | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of AfroCentric Investment Corp are -
Successful track record of launching new products
– AfroCentric Investment Corp has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. AfroCentric Investment Corp 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of AfroCentric Investment Corp comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Healthcare Facilities 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Healthcare Facilities industry
– AfroCentric Investment Corp has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled AfroCentric Investment Corp to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Healthcare Facilities industry. The sustainable margins have also helped AfroCentric Investment Corp to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Training and development
– AfroCentric Investment Corp has one of the best training and development program in Healthcare 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of AfroCentric Investment Corp in the Healthcare sector have low bargaining power. AfroCentric Investment Corp has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps AfroCentric Investment Corp to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Ability to recruit top talent
– AfroCentric Investment Corp is one of the leading players in the Healthcare Facilities industry in South Africa. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in South Africa. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– AfroCentric Investment Corp has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – AfroCentric Investment Corp staying ahead in the Healthcare Facilities industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Learning organization
- AfroCentric Investment Corp 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 AfroCentric Investment Corp is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at AfroCentric Investment Corp emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the AfroCentric Investment Corp 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that AfroCentric Investment Corp 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of AfroCentric Investment Corp in Healthcare Facilities industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Organizational Resilience of AfroCentric Investment Corp
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing AfroCentric Investment Corp does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Weaknesses of AfroCentric Investment Corp | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of AfroCentric Investment Corp are -
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of AfroCentric Investment Corp is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Healthcare Facilities industry, but AfroCentric Investment Corp needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help AfroCentric Investment Corp to focus more on services in the Healthcare Facilities industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Skills based hiring in Healthcare Facilities industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at AfroCentric Investment Corp 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.
Need for greater diversity
– AfroCentric Investment Corp 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, AfroCentric Investment Corp is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help AfroCentric Investment Corp to provide better information regarding Healthcare Facilities products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Employees’ less understanding of AfroCentric Investment Corp strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of AfroCentric Investment Corp 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of South Africa, AfroCentric Investment Corp needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that AfroCentric Investment Corp needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Healthcare Facilities industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at AfroCentric Investment Corp can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as AfroCentric Investment Corp is planning to shift buying processes online.
Products dominated business model
– Even though AfroCentric Investment Corp has some of the most successful models in the Healthcare Facilities industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. AfroCentric Investment Corp should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
AfroCentric Investment Corp has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Healthcare Facilities industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of AfroCentric Investment Corp, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Healthcare Facilities 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of AfroCentric Investment Corp products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, AfroCentric Investment Corp needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
AfroCentric Investment Corp Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of AfroCentric Investment Corp are -
Loyalty marketing
– AfroCentric Investment Corp 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Healthcare Facilities industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. AfroCentric Investment Corp can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help AfroCentric Investment Corp to increase its market reach. AfroCentric Investment Corp 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.
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. AfroCentric Investment Corp can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Healthcare Facilities industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. AfroCentric Investment Corp 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. AfroCentric Investment Corp 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for AfroCentric Investment Corp 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 AfroCentric Investment Corp to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– AfroCentric Investment Corp has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Healthcare Facilities sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled AfroCentric Investment Corp to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help AfroCentric Investment Corp 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, AfroCentric Investment Corp 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 AfroCentric Investment Corp to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects AfroCentric Investment Corp can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Developing new processes and practices
– AfroCentric Investment Corp can develop new processes and procedures in Healthcare Facilities 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, AfroCentric Investment Corp is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. AfroCentric Investment Corp can utilize new technology in the field of Healthcare Facilities 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 AfroCentric Investment Corp has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Healthcare Facilities industry. This can help AfroCentric Investment Corp to build a more holistic ecosystem for AfroCentric Investment Corp products in the Healthcare Facilities industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for AfroCentric Investment Corp 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.
Threats AfroCentric Investment Corp External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of AfroCentric Investment Corp are -
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– AfroCentric Investment Corp 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 Healthcare Facilities industry.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for AfroCentric Investment Corp in Healthcare Facilities industry. The Healthcare Facilities 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.
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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– AfroCentric Investment Corp has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Healthcare Facilities industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, AfroCentric Investment Corp needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Healthcare Facilities 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, AfroCentric Investment Corp may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Healthcare Facilities sector.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, AfroCentric Investment Corp 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 AfroCentric Investment Corp prominent markets.
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. AfroCentric Investment Corp 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. AfroCentric Investment Corp needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Healthcare Facilities industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Consumer confidence and its impact on AfroCentric Investment Corp 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 Healthcare Facilities industry and other sectors.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Healthcare Facilities industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. AfroCentric Investment Corp can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Healthcare Facilities industry are lowering. It can presents AfroCentric Investment Corp with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Healthcare Facilities sector.
Environmental challenges
– AfroCentric Investment Corp 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. AfroCentric Investment Corp can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Healthcare Facilities industry.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– AfroCentric Investment Corp 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of AfroCentric Investment Corp Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at AfroCentric Investment Corp 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 AfroCentric Investment Corp 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 AfroCentric Investment Corp 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 AfroCentric Investment Corp 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 AfroCentric Investment Corp needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.