SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Catabasis Pharma (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Catabasis Pharma is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, geopolitical disruptions, technology disruption,
supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Catabasis Pharma can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Catabasis Pharma, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Catabasis Pharma 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 Catabasis Pharma can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Catabasis Pharma
2. Improving business portfolio management of Catabasis Pharma
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Biotechnology & Drugs sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Catabasis Pharma
Strengths of Catabasis Pharma | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Catabasis Pharma are -
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Catabasis Pharma has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Catabasis Pharma staying ahead in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Strong track record of project management in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry
– Catabasis Pharma is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Analytics focus
– Catabasis Pharma 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 Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Catabasis Pharma comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Catabasis Pharma is present in almost all the verticals within the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This has provided Catabasis Pharma a diverse revenue stream that has helped it to survive disruptions such as global pandemic in Covid-19, financial disruption of 2008, and supply chain disruption of 2021.
Training and development
– Catabasis Pharma 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Catabasis Pharma has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Biotechnology & Drugs industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Catabasis Pharma have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
High brand equity
– Catabasis Pharma has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Catabasis Pharma to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Catabasis Pharma has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Catabasis Pharma 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Catabasis Pharma is one of the most innovative firm in Biotechnology & Drugs sector.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Catabasis Pharma are driving operational speed, building greater agility, and keeping the organization nimble to compete with new competitors. It helps are organization to ideate new ideas, and execute them swiftly in the marketplace.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Catabasis Pharma is one of the leading players in the Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Weaknesses of Catabasis Pharma | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Catabasis Pharma are -
Employees’ less understanding of Catabasis Pharma strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Catabasis Pharma 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in United States, Catabasis Pharma 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Catabasis Pharma has some of the most successful models in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Catabasis Pharma should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Catabasis Pharma has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
High dependence on Catabasis Pharma ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Catabasis Pharma still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Biotechnology & Drugs industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Catabasis Pharma has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Catabasis Pharma 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Catabasis Pharma, in the dynamic environment of Biotechnology & Drugs industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Catabasis Pharma has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Lack of clear differentiation of Catabasis Pharma products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Catabasis Pharma needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Catabasis Pharma, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Catabasis Pharma has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry over the last five years. Catabasis Pharma 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Catabasis Pharma is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Catabasis Pharma to provide better information regarding Biotechnology & Drugs products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Catabasis Pharma Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Catabasis Pharma are -
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Catabasis Pharma is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Catabasis Pharma can utilize new technology in the field of Biotechnology & Drugs industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Catabasis Pharma 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Catabasis Pharma can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Catabasis Pharma operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Biotechnology & Drugs sector.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Catabasis Pharma 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 Catabasis Pharma to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Catabasis Pharma 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Catabasis Pharma can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Catabasis Pharma 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Catabasis Pharma has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This can help Catabasis Pharma to build a more holistic ecosystem for Catabasis Pharma products in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Catabasis Pharma 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 Catabasis Pharma to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Catabasis Pharma to increase its market reach. Catabasis Pharma 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Biotechnology & Drugs industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Catabasis Pharma in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. Now Catabasis Pharma can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Catabasis Pharma 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. Catabasis Pharma 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Catabasis Pharma can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Threats Catabasis Pharma External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Catabasis Pharma are -
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Catabasis Pharma in Biotechnology & Drugs industry. The Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Catabasis Pharma is facing in Biotechnology & Drugs sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Catabasis Pharma
– Post Covid-19 there is a sharp increase in the wages especially in the jobs that require interaction with people. The increasing wages can put downward pressure on the margins of Catabasis Pharma.
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. Catabasis Pharma needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Catabasis Pharma 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.
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 Catabasis Pharma in the Biotechnology & Drugs sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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. Catabasis Pharma 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 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Catabasis Pharma can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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 Catabasis Pharma business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Biotechnology & Drugs industry are lowering. It can presents Catabasis Pharma with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Biotechnology & Drugs sector.
Environmental challenges
– Catabasis Pharma 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. Catabasis Pharma can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry.
Regulatory challenges
– Catabasis Pharma needs to prepare for regulatory challenges as consumer protection groups and other pressure groups are vigorously advocating for more regulations on big business - to reduce inequality, to create a level playing field, to product data privacy and consumer privacy, to reduce the influence of big money on democratic institutions, etc. This can lead to significant changes in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry regulations.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Catabasis Pharma Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Catabasis Pharma 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 Catabasis Pharma 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 Catabasis Pharma 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 Catabasis Pharma 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 Catabasis Pharma needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
