SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Biosig Tech (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Biosig Tech is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, technology disruption, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing commodity prices, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%,
there is increasing trade war between United States & China, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Biosig Tech can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Biosig Tech, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Biosig Tech 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 Biosig Tech can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Biosig Tech
2. Improving business portfolio management of Biosig Tech
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Medical Equipment & Supplies sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Biosig Tech
Strengths of Biosig Tech | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Biosig Tech are -
Analytics focus
– Biosig Tech 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 Medical Equipment & Supplies 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 Medical Equipment & Supplies industry
– Biosig Tech 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 Biosig Tech comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Medical Equipment & Supplies 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.
Training and development
– Biosig Tech 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Biosig Tech has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Biosig Tech staying ahead in the Medical Equipment & Supplies 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 Medical Equipment & Supplies
– Biosig Tech is one of the leading players in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Biosig Tech in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Biosig Tech are driving operational speed, building greater agility, and keeping the organization nimble to compete with new competitors. It helps are organization to ideate new ideas, and execute them swiftly in the marketplace.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Biosig Tech in the Healthcare sector have low bargaining power. Biosig Tech has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Biosig Tech to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Biosig Tech 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Biosig Tech is one of the most innovative firm in Medical Equipment & Supplies sector.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry
– Biosig Tech has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Biosig Tech to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Biosig Tech to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Learning organization
- Biosig Tech 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 Biosig Tech is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Biosig Tech emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Weaknesses of Biosig Tech | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Biosig Tech are -
Need for greater diversity
– Biosig Tech 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Biosig Tech needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Biosig Tech can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Biosig Tech is planning to shift buying processes online.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Biosig Tech, in the dynamic environment of Medical Equipment & Supplies industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Biosig Tech has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Biosig Tech is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry, but Biosig Tech needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Biosig Tech to focus more on services in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Biosig Tech has some of the most successful models in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Biosig Tech should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in United States, Biosig Tech 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 Medical Equipment & Supplies industry.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Biosig Tech needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Biosig Tech has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry over the last five years. Biosig Tech even though has strong showing on digital transformation primary two stages, it has struggled to capitalize the power of digital transformation in marketing efforts and new venture efforts.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Biosig Tech has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Medical Equipment & Supplies 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 Medical Equipment & Supplies industry, Biosig Tech 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.
High dependence on Biosig Tech ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Biosig Tech still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Biosig Tech has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Biosig Tech Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Biosig Tech are -
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Biosig Tech is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Biosig Tech can utilize new technology in the field of Medical Equipment & Supplies industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Biosig Tech can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
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 Biosig Tech 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 Biosig Tech can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Biosig Tech 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Biosig Tech can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Medical Equipment & Supplies 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Biosig Tech 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. Biosig Tech 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.
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. Biosig Tech can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Biosig Tech 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 Medical Equipment & Supplies industry.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Biosig Tech 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Biosig Tech 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 Biosig Tech to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Biosig Tech has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. This can help Biosig Tech to build a more holistic ecosystem for Biosig Tech products in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Biosig Tech has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Medical Equipment & Supplies sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Biosig Tech to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Biosig Tech to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Threats Biosig Tech External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Biosig Tech are -
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. Biosig Tech 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Biosig Tech has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Biosig Tech needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Medical Equipment & Supplies 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Biosig Tech 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 Biosig Tech prominent markets.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Biosig Tech is facing in Medical Equipment & Supplies sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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 Biosig Tech in the Medical Equipment & Supplies sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Biosig Tech can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Biosig Tech may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Medical Equipment & Supplies sector.
Capital market disruption
– During the Covid-19, Dow Jones has touched record high. The valuations of a number of companies are way beyond their existing business model potential. This can lead to capital market correction which can put a number of suppliers, collaborators, value chain partners in great financial difficulty. It will directly impact the business of Biosig Tech.
Environmental challenges
– Biosig Tech 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. Biosig Tech can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry.
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.
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. Biosig Tech needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Biosig Tech 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Biosig Tech 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 Medical Equipment & Supplies industry.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Biosig Tech Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Biosig Tech 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 Biosig Tech 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 Biosig Tech 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 Biosig Tech 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 Biosig Tech needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.