Big Rock Partners (BRPA) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Big Rock Partners (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Big Rock Partners is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing transportation and logistics costs, there is backlash against globalization, technology disruption, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs,
increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Big Rock Partners
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Big Rock Partners can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Big Rock Partners, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Big Rock Partners 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 Big Rock Partners can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Big Rock Partners
2. Improving business portfolio management of Big Rock Partners
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Big Rock Partners
Strengths of Big Rock Partners | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Big Rock Partners are -
Successful track record of launching new products
– Big Rock Partners has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Big Rock Partners 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.
Digital Transformation in industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Big Rock Partners digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Big Rock Partners 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.
Analytics focus
– Big Rock Partners 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 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.
Strong track record of project management in the industry
– Big Rock Partners is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Big Rock Partners comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Big Rock Partners is one of the leading players in the industry in United States. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in United States. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Innovation driven organization
– Big Rock Partners is one of the most innovative firm in sector.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Big Rock Partners has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Big Rock Partners have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Big Rock Partners has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Big Rock Partners staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Ability to lead change in
– Big Rock Partners is one of the leading players in the industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Big Rock Partners in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Big Rock Partners 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Big Rock Partners 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.
Weaknesses of Big Rock Partners | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Big Rock Partners are -
Products dominated business model
– Even though Big Rock Partners has some of the most successful models in the industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Big Rock Partners should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Need for greater diversity
– Big Rock Partners 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Big Rock Partners needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Big Rock Partners has borrowed money from the capital market at higher rates. It needs to restructure the interest payment and costs so that it can compete better and improve profitability.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Big Rock Partners is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the industry, but Big Rock Partners needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Big Rock Partners to focus more on services in the industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Big Rock Partners, in the dynamic environment of industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Big Rock Partners has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Big Rock Partners, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact 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 Big Rock Partners products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Big Rock Partners needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Skills based hiring in industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Big Rock Partners 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Big Rock Partners has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Big Rock Partners is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Big Rock Partners to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Big Rock Partners Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Big Rock Partners are -
Buying journey improvements
– Big Rock Partners can improve the customer journey of consumers in the 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Big Rock Partners 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 industry.
Developing new processes and practices
– Big Rock Partners can develop new processes and procedures in 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Big Rock Partners can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Big Rock Partners 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 Big Rock Partners to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Big Rock Partners can still utilize the low interest rates to borrow money for capital investment. Secondly it can also use the increase of government spending in infrastructure projects to get new business.
Loyalty marketing
– Big Rock Partners 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Big Rock Partners 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. Big Rock Partners 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Big Rock Partners has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in industry. This can help Big Rock Partners to build a more holistic ecosystem for Big Rock Partners products in the 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 Big Rock Partners to conduct training and development for its employees across the world. This will result in not only reducing the cost of training but also help employees in different part of the world to integrate with the headquarter work culture, ethos, and standards.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Big Rock Partners in the industry. Now Big Rock Partners can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Big Rock Partners in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
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. Big Rock Partners can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Threats Big Rock Partners External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Big Rock Partners 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 Big Rock Partners in the sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Big Rock Partners may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of sector.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Big Rock Partners 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 Big Rock Partners prominent markets.
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 Big Rock Partners business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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 acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Big Rock Partners has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Big Rock Partners needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Big Rock Partners 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 industry.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Big Rock Partners is facing in sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Environmental challenges
– Big Rock Partners 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. Big Rock Partners can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the industry.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to industry are lowering. It can presents Big Rock Partners with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Big Rock Partners in industry. The 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.
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. Big Rock Partners needs to understand the core reasons impacting the industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Big Rock Partners 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 Big Rock Partners Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Big Rock Partners 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 Big Rock Partners 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 Big Rock Partners 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 Big Rock Partners 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 Big Rock Partners needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.