SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for iRhythm Tech (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , iRhythm Tech is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – geopolitical disruptions, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, wage bills are increasing,
digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing commodity prices, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that iRhythm Tech can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the iRhythm Tech, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which iRhythm Tech 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 iRhythm Tech can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of iRhythm Tech
2. Improving business portfolio management of iRhythm Tech
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Healthcare Facilities sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of iRhythm Tech
Strengths of iRhythm Tech | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of iRhythm Tech are -
Innovation driven organization
– iRhythm Tech is one of the most innovative firm in Healthcare Facilities sector.
Successful track record of launching new products
– iRhythm Tech has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. iRhythm Tech 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.
Learning organization
- iRhythm Tech 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 iRhythm Tech is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at iRhythm Tech emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Healthcare Facilities industry
– iRhythm Tech has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled iRhythm Tech to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Healthcare Facilities industry. The sustainable margins have also helped iRhythm Tech to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Ability to recruit top talent
– iRhythm Tech is one of the leading players in the Healthcare Facilities 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that iRhythm Tech 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Healthcare Facilities industry
– iRhythm Tech is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Diverse revenue streams
– iRhythm Tech is present in almost all the verticals within the Healthcare Facilities industry. This has provided iRhythm Tech 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of iRhythm Tech in the Healthcare sector have low bargaining power. iRhythm Tech has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps iRhythm Tech to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Organizational Resilience of iRhythm Tech
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing iRhythm Tech does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– iRhythm Tech has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – iRhythm Tech staying ahead in the Healthcare Facilities industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of iRhythm Tech comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Healthcare Facilities 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.
Weaknesses of iRhythm Tech | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of iRhythm Tech are -
Need for greater diversity
– iRhythm Tech 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.
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 iRhythm Tech supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, iRhythm Tech is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left iRhythm Tech vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that iRhythm Tech needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Healthcare Facilities industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at iRhythm Tech can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as iRhythm Tech is planning to shift buying processes online.
Skills based hiring in Healthcare Facilities industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at iRhythm Tech 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, iRhythm Tech has high operating costs in the Healthcare Facilities industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract iRhythm Tech lucrative customers.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, iRhythm Tech needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, iRhythm Tech 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 Healthcare Facilities industry using digital technology.
Products dominated business model
– Even though iRhythm Tech has some of the most successful models in the Healthcare Facilities industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. iRhythm Tech should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As iRhythm Tech is one of the leading players in the Healthcare Facilities industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Healthcare Facilities industry in last five years.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, iRhythm Tech is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help iRhythm Tech to provide better information regarding Healthcare Facilities products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of iRhythm Tech is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Healthcare Facilities industry, but iRhythm Tech needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help iRhythm Tech to focus more on services in the Healthcare Facilities industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
iRhythm Tech Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of iRhythm Tech are -
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for iRhythm Tech in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Healthcare Facilities industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Manufacturing automation
– iRhythm Tech can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Healthcare Facilities 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help iRhythm Tech to increase its market reach. iRhythm Tech 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, iRhythm Tech can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that iRhythm Tech operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Healthcare Facilities sector.
Loyalty marketing
– iRhythm Tech 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Healthcare Facilities industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. iRhythm Tech can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Leveraging digital technologies
– iRhythm Tech 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 iRhythm Tech has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Healthcare Facilities industry. This can help iRhythm Tech to build a more holistic ecosystem for iRhythm Tech products in the Healthcare Facilities industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, 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 iRhythm Tech 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.
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. iRhythm Tech can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects iRhythm Tech can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for iRhythm Tech 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 iRhythm Tech to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Buying journey improvements
– iRhythm Tech can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Healthcare Facilities 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.
Threats iRhythm Tech External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of iRhythm Tech 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. iRhythm Tech needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Healthcare Facilities industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Healthcare Facilities industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. iRhythm Tech can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Consumer confidence and its impact on iRhythm Tech 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 Healthcare Facilities industry and other sectors.
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.
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. iRhythm Tech 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.
Environmental challenges
– iRhythm Tech 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. iRhythm Tech can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Healthcare Facilities industry.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– iRhythm Tech 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.
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 iRhythm Tech business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, iRhythm Tech may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Healthcare Facilities sector.
Increasing wage structure of iRhythm Tech
– 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 iRhythm Tech.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that iRhythm Tech is facing in Healthcare Facilities 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, iRhythm Tech 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 iRhythm Tech prominent markets.
Regulatory challenges
– iRhythm Tech 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 Healthcare Facilities industry regulations.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of iRhythm Tech Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at iRhythm Tech 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 iRhythm Tech 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 iRhythm Tech 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 iRhythm Tech 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 iRhythm Tech needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
