SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Emergent Biosolutions (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Emergent Biosolutions is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, there is backlash against globalization, geopolitical disruptions, technology disruption, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing energy prices,
cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Emergent Biosolutions
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Emergent Biosolutions can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Emergent Biosolutions, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Emergent Biosolutions 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 Emergent Biosolutions can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Emergent Biosolutions
2. Improving business portfolio management of Emergent Biosolutions
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 Emergent Biosolutions
Strengths of Emergent Biosolutions | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Emergent Biosolutions are -
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Emergent Biosolutions has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Emergent Biosolutions 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
– Emergent Biosolutions is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
High brand equity
– Emergent Biosolutions has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Emergent Biosolutions to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Emergent Biosolutions 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Emergent Biosolutions is one of the most innovative firm in Biotechnology & Drugs sector.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Emergent Biosolutions 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.
Training and development
– Emergent Biosolutions 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.
Ability to lead change in Biotechnology & Drugs
– Emergent Biosolutions is one of the leading players in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Emergent Biosolutions in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Organizational Resilience of Emergent Biosolutions
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Emergent Biosolutions does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Learning organization
- Emergent Biosolutions 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 Emergent Biosolutions is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Emergent Biosolutions emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Emergent Biosolutions has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Emergent Biosolutions 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Emergent Biosolutions in the Healthcare sector have low bargaining power. Emergent Biosolutions has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Emergent Biosolutions to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Weaknesses of Emergent Biosolutions | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Emergent Biosolutions are -
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, Emergent Biosolutions 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 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 Emergent Biosolutions supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Emergent Biosolutions is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Emergent Biosolutions vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Biotechnology & Drugs industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in United States, Emergent Biosolutions 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Emergent Biosolutions has not been able to do capital spending to the tune of the competition. This has resulted into fewer innovations and company facing stiff competition from both existing competitors and new entrants who are disrupting the Biotechnology & Drugs industry using digital technology.
Skills based hiring in Biotechnology & Drugs industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Emergent Biosolutions 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Emergent Biosolutions needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Emergent Biosolutions is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, but Emergent Biosolutions needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Emergent Biosolutions to focus more on services in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Emergent Biosolutions 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Emergent Biosolutions products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Emergent Biosolutions needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Employees’ less understanding of Emergent Biosolutions strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Emergent Biosolutions 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 dependence on Emergent Biosolutions ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Emergent Biosolutions 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 Emergent Biosolutions has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Emergent Biosolutions Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Emergent Biosolutions are -
Manufacturing automation
– Emergent Biosolutions can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Emergent Biosolutions 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Emergent Biosolutions can develop new processes and procedures in Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Emergent Biosolutions has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This can help Emergent Biosolutions to build a more holistic ecosystem for Emergent Biosolutions products in the Biotechnology & Drugs 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 Emergent Biosolutions 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.
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. Emergent Biosolutions can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Emergent Biosolutions can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Emergent Biosolutions operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Biotechnology & Drugs sector.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Emergent Biosolutions to increase its market reach. Emergent Biosolutions 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Emergent Biosolutions 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.
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 Emergent Biosolutions 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Emergent Biosolutions 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Emergent Biosolutions 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Emergent Biosolutions 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.
Threats Emergent Biosolutions External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Emergent Biosolutions are -
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Emergent Biosolutions 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 Emergent Biosolutions prominent markets.
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. Emergent Biosolutions needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Increasing wage structure of Emergent Biosolutions
– 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 Emergent Biosolutions.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Biotechnology & Drugs industry are lowering. It can presents Emergent Biosolutions with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Biotechnology & Drugs 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 Emergent Biosolutions business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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 Emergent Biosolutions.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Emergent Biosolutions 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry and other sectors.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Emergent Biosolutions may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Biotechnology & Drugs sector.
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
– Emergent Biosolutions has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Emergent Biosolutions needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Emergent Biosolutions 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.
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. Emergent Biosolutions 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.
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. Emergent Biosolutions can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Emergent Biosolutions Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Emergent Biosolutions 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 Emergent Biosolutions 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 Emergent Biosolutions 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 Emergent Biosolutions 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 Emergent Biosolutions needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
