Intelligent Living America (ILIV) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Software & Programming
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Intelligent Living America (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Intelligent Living America is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, there is backlash against globalization, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs,
digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Intelligent Living America
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Intelligent Living America can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Intelligent Living America, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Intelligent Living America 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 Intelligent Living America can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Intelligent Living America
2. Improving business portfolio management of Intelligent Living America
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Software & Programming sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Intelligent Living America
Strengths of Intelligent Living America | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Intelligent Living America are -
Training and development
– Intelligent Living America has one of the best training and development program in Technology 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 Software & Programming
– Intelligent Living America is one of the leading players in the Software & Programming industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Software & Programming industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Intelligent Living America in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Intelligent Living America in Software & Programming industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Innovation driven organization
– Intelligent Living America is one of the most innovative firm in Software & Programming sector.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Software & Programming industry
– Intelligent Living America has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Intelligent Living America to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Software & Programming industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Intelligent Living America to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Strong track record of project management in the Software & Programming industry
– Intelligent Living America is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Intelligent Living America has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Intelligent Living America staying ahead in the Software & Programming industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Learning organization
- Intelligent Living America 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 Intelligent Living America is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Intelligent Living America emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Diverse revenue streams
– Intelligent Living America is present in almost all the verticals within the Software & Programming industry. This has provided Intelligent Living America 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.
Organizational Resilience of Intelligent Living America
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Intelligent Living America does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Intelligent Living America in the Technology sector have low bargaining power. Intelligent Living America has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Intelligent Living America to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Intelligent Living America has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Intelligent Living America 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.
Weaknesses of Intelligent Living America | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Intelligent Living America are -
Need for greater diversity
– Intelligent Living America 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 Intelligent Living America needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Software & Programming industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Intelligent Living America can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Intelligent Living America is planning to shift buying processes online.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Intelligent Living America is just above the Software & Programming 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Intelligent Living America 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 Software & Programming industry using digital technology.
Skills based hiring in Software & Programming industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Intelligent Living America 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Intelligent Living America 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Intelligent Living America is one of the leading players in the Software & Programming industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Software & Programming industry in last five years.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Intelligent Living America, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Software & Programming 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Software & Programming industry, Intelligent Living America 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Intelligent Living America needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Intelligent Living America is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Intelligent Living America to provide better information regarding Software & Programming products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Intelligent Living America Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Intelligent Living America are -
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Intelligent Living America can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Intelligent Living America can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Intelligent Living America operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Software & Programming sector.
Loyalty marketing
– Intelligent Living America 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Intelligent Living America 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Intelligent Living America to increase its market reach. Intelligent Living America 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.
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 Intelligent Living America 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Intelligent Living America 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 Software & Programming industry.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Intelligent Living America in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Software & Programming industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Manufacturing automation
– Intelligent Living America can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Software & Programming 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Intelligent Living America has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Software & Programming industry. This can help Intelligent Living America to build a more holistic ecosystem for Intelligent Living America products in the Software & Programming industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Intelligent Living America 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Intelligent Living America 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Intelligent Living America can develop new processes and procedures in Software & Programming 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.
Threats Intelligent Living America External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Intelligent Living America are -
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Intelligent Living America may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Software & Programming sector.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Intelligent Living America 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 Software & Programming industry.
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.
Increasing wage structure of Intelligent Living America
– 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 Intelligent Living America.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Intelligent Living America in Software & Programming industry. The Software & Programming 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 dependence on third party suppliers
– Intelligent Living America 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.
Environmental challenges
– Intelligent Living America 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. Intelligent Living America can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Software & Programming industry.
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 Intelligent Living America.
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. Intelligent Living America 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Software & Programming industry are lowering. It can presents Intelligent Living America with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Software & Programming sector.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Intelligent Living America is facing in Software & Programming sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Intelligent Living America 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 Intelligent Living America prominent markets.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Intelligent Living America 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 Software & Programming industry and other sectors.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Intelligent Living America Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Intelligent Living America 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 Intelligent Living America 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 Intelligent Living America 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 Intelligent Living America 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 Intelligent Living America needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.