Global Digital Soltn (GDSI) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Auto & Truck Manufacturers
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Global Digital Soltn (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Global Digital Soltn is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing energy prices, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, geopolitical disruptions, increasing transportation and logistics costs,
increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Global Digital Soltn
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Global Digital Soltn can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Global Digital Soltn, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Global Digital Soltn 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 Global Digital Soltn can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Global Digital Soltn
2. Improving business portfolio management of Global Digital Soltn
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Auto & Truck Manufacturers sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Global Digital Soltn
Strengths of Global Digital Soltn | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Global Digital Soltn are -
Ability to lead change in Auto & Truck Manufacturers
– Global Digital Soltn is one of the leading players in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Global Digital Soltn 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 Global Digital Soltn 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry
– Global Digital Soltn has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Global Digital Soltn to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Global Digital Soltn to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Global Digital Soltn 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.
Learning organization
- Global Digital Soltn 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 Global Digital Soltn is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Global Digital Soltn emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Global Digital Soltn in the Consumer Cyclical sector have low bargaining power. Global Digital Soltn has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Global Digital Soltn to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Organizational Resilience of Global Digital Soltn
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Global Digital Soltn does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Global Digital Soltn has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Global Digital Soltn 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Global Digital Soltn has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Global Digital Soltn staying ahead in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Analytics focus
– Global Digital Soltn 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 Auto & Truck Manufacturers 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.
Digital Transformation in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Global Digital Soltn digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Global Digital Soltn 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Global Digital Soltn is present in almost all the verticals within the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry. This has provided Global Digital Soltn 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.
Weaknesses of Global Digital Soltn | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Global Digital Soltn are -
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Global Digital Soltn is just above the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry average. It needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
Skills based hiring in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Global Digital Soltn 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Global Digital Soltn 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 Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry using digital technology.
High dependence on Global Digital Soltn ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Global Digital Soltn still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Global Digital Soltn has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Global Digital Soltn has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry over the last five years. Global Digital Soltn 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Global Digital Soltn, in the dynamic environment of Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Global Digital Soltn 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 Global Digital Soltn products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Global Digital Soltn needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in United States, Global Digital Soltn 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 Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Global Digital Soltn has high operating costs in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Global Digital Soltn lucrative customers.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Global Digital Soltn, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Auto & Truck Manufacturers 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Global Digital Soltn needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Global Digital Soltn Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Global Digital Soltn are -
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. Global Digital Soltn can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Global Digital Soltn to increase its market reach. Global Digital Soltn 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Global Digital Soltn can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Global Digital Soltn operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Auto & Truck Manufacturers sector.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Global Digital Soltn is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Global Digital Soltn can utilize new technology in the field of Auto & Truck Manufacturers 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 Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Global Digital Soltn 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. Global Digital Soltn 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
– Global Digital Soltn 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Global Digital Soltn can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Global Digital Soltn in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Developing new processes and practices
– Global Digital Soltn can develop new processes and procedures in Auto & Truck Manufacturers 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 Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Global Digital Soltn 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 Global Digital Soltn 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Global Digital Soltn can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Global Digital Soltn in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry. Now Global Digital Soltn can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Threats Global Digital Soltn External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Global Digital Soltn are -
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. Global Digital Soltn needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Global Digital Soltn 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 Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry.
Environmental challenges
– Global Digital Soltn 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. Global Digital Soltn can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Global Digital Soltn is facing in Auto & Truck Manufacturers 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 Global Digital Soltn in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Global Digital Soltn in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry. The Auto & Truck Manufacturers 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.
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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Global Digital Soltn may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Auto & Truck Manufacturers sector.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Global Digital Soltn 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 Global Digital Soltn prominent markets.
Increasing wage structure of Global Digital Soltn
– 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 Global Digital Soltn.
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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Global Digital Soltn can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Global Digital Soltn 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 Global Digital Soltn Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Global Digital Soltn 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 Global Digital Soltn 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 Global Digital Soltn 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 Global Digital Soltn 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 Global Digital Soltn needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.