Intersections (INTX) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Computer Services
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Intersections (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Intersections is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – technology disruption, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, there is backlash against globalization, geopolitical disruptions, wage bills are increasing,
supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing transportation and logistics costs, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Intersections can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Intersections, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Intersections 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 Intersections can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Intersections
2. Improving business portfolio management of Intersections
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Computer Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Intersections
Strengths of Intersections | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Intersections are -
High brand equity
– Intersections has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Intersections to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Intersections 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Intersections 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
– Intersections 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.
Organizational Resilience of Intersections
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Intersections does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Diverse revenue streams
– Intersections is present in almost all the verticals within the Computer Services industry. This has provided Intersections 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.
Digital Transformation in Computer Services industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Intersections digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Intersections 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Computer Services industry
– Intersections has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Intersections to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Computer Services industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Intersections to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Intersections has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Intersections staying ahead in the Computer Services industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Analytics focus
– Intersections 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 Computer Services 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.
Ability to lead change in Computer Services
– Intersections is one of the leading players in the Computer Services industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Computer Services industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Intersections in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Learning organization
- Intersections 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 Intersections is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Intersections emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Weaknesses of Intersections | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Intersections are -
Products dominated business model
– Even though Intersections has some of the most successful models in the Computer Services industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Intersections should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Skills based hiring in Computer Services industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Intersections 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Intersections has high operating costs in the Computer Services industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Intersections lucrative customers.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Intersections needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Intersections has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Computer Services industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Employees’ less understanding of Intersections strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Intersections 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Intersections is one of the leading players in the Computer Services industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Computer Services industry in last five years.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Intersections, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Computer Services 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 Computer Services industry, Intersections 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Intersections needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Computer Services industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Intersections can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Intersections is planning to shift buying processes online.
Lack of clear differentiation of Intersections products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Intersections needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Intersections Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Intersections are -
Buying journey improvements
– Intersections can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Computer Services 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Intersections 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Intersections 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Intersections has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Computer Services industry. This can help Intersections to build a more holistic ecosystem for Intersections products in the Computer Services industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Intersections in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Computer Services industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Intersections can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Intersections 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Computer Services industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Intersections in the Computer Services industry. Now Intersections can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Intersections 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 Intersections to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Intersections 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Intersections 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 Intersections to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Intersections to increase its market reach. Intersections 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Intersections can develop new processes and procedures in Computer Services 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 Intersections External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Intersections are -
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Intersections may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Computer Services sector.
Environmental challenges
– Intersections 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. Intersections can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Computer Services industry.
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 Intersections business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Regulatory challenges
– Intersections 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 Computer Services industry regulations.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Computer Services industry are lowering. It can presents Intersections with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Computer Services sector.
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 Intersections in the Computer Services sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Intersections is facing in Computer Services sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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. Intersections needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Computer Services industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Intersections 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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Computer Services industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Intersections can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Intersections 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 Computer Services industry.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Intersections in Computer Services industry. The Computer Services 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.
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. Intersections 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Intersections Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Intersections 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 Intersections 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 Intersections 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 Intersections 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 Intersections needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.