Ampal American Israel (AMPLQ) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Chemical Manufacturing
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Ampal American Israel (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Ampal American Israel is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy,
increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Ampal American Israel
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Ampal American Israel can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Ampal American Israel, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Ampal American Israel 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 Ampal American Israel can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Ampal American Israel
2. Improving business portfolio management of Ampal American Israel
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Chemical Manufacturing sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Ampal American Israel
Strengths of Ampal American Israel | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Ampal American Israel are -
Innovation driven organization
– Ampal American Israel is one of the most innovative firm in Chemical Manufacturing sector.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Ampal American Israel has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Ampal American Israel 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.
Organizational Resilience of Ampal American Israel
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Ampal American Israel does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Training and development
– Ampal American Israel 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Chemical Manufacturing industry
– Ampal American Israel has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Ampal American Israel to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Chemical Manufacturing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Ampal American Israel to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Ampal American Israel in Chemical Manufacturing industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Ampal American Israel comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Chemical Manufacturing 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
– Ampal American Israel 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 Ampal American Israel have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Learning organization
- Ampal American Israel 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 Ampal American Israel is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Ampal American Israel emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Analytics focus
– Ampal American Israel 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 United States 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.
Ability to lead change in Chemical Manufacturing
– Ampal American Israel is one of the leading players in the Chemical Manufacturing industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Chemical Manufacturing industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Ampal American Israel in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Ampal American Israel in the Basic Materials sector have low bargaining power. Ampal American Israel has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Ampal American Israel to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Weaknesses of Ampal American Israel | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Ampal American Israel are -
Products dominated business model
– Even though Ampal American Israel has some of the most successful models in the Chemical Manufacturing industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Ampal American Israel should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
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 Ampal American Israel supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Ampal American Israel is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Ampal American Israel vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Ampal American Israel is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Chemical Manufacturing industry, but Ampal American Israel needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Ampal American Israel to focus more on services in the Chemical Manufacturing industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Need for greater diversity
– Ampal American Israel 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Ampal American Israel, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Chemical Manufacturing 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.
High dependence on Ampal American Israel ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Ampal American Israel still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Chemical Manufacturing industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Ampal American Israel has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Ampal American Israel is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Ampal American Israel to provide better information regarding Chemical Manufacturing products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Ampal American Israel needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Ampal American Israel, in the dynamic environment of Chemical Manufacturing industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Ampal American Israel has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Employees’ less understanding of Ampal American Israel strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Ampal American Israel 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Chemical Manufacturing industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in United States, Ampal American Israel 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry.
Ampal American Israel Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Ampal American Israel are -
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Ampal American Israel can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Ampal American Israel has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Chemical Manufacturing sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Ampal American Israel to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Ampal American Israel to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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 Ampal American Israel 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Chemical Manufacturing industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Ampal American Israel can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Ampal American Israel 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 Ampal American Israel to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Developing new processes and practices
– Ampal American Israel 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Ampal American Israel 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Ampal American Israel is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Ampal American Israel 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.
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. Ampal American Israel 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. Ampal American Israel 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Ampal American Israel 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Ampal American Israel can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Chemical Manufacturing 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Ampal American Israel to increase its market reach. Ampal American Israel 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Ampal American Israel has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Chemical Manufacturing industry. This can help Ampal American Israel to build a more holistic ecosystem for Ampal American Israel products in the Chemical Manufacturing industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Threats Ampal American Israel External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Ampal American Israel are -
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Ampal American Israel in Chemical Manufacturing industry. The Chemical Manufacturing industry is already at various protected from local competition in China, with the rise of trade war the protection levels may go up. This presents a clear threat of current business model in Chinese market.
Aging population
– As the populations of most advanced economies are aging, it will lead to high social security costs, higher savings among population, and lower demand for goods and services in the economy. The household savings in US, France, UK, Germany, and Japan are growing faster than predicted because of uncertainty caused by pandemic.
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.
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. Ampal American Israel can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Ampal American Israel 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry and other sectors.
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 Ampal American Israel 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, Ampal American Israel 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 Ampal American Israel prominent markets.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Ampal American Israel 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Ampal American Israel is facing in Chemical Manufacturing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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. Ampal American Israel 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 dependence on third party suppliers
– Ampal American Israel 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Chemical Manufacturing industry are lowering. It can presents Ampal American Israel with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Chemical Manufacturing sector.
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 Ampal American Israel business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Ampal American Israel Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Ampal American Israel 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 Ampal American Israel 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 Ampal American Israel 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 Ampal American Israel 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 Ampal American Israel needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.