Pbs Holding, Inc. (PBHG) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Pbs Holding, Inc. (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Pbs Holding, Inc. is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing commodity prices, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, wage bills are increasing, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, there is backlash against globalization,
technology disruption, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Pbs Holding, Inc.
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Pbs Holding, Inc. can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Pbs Holding, Inc., and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Pbs Holding, Inc. 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 Pbs Holding, Inc. can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Pbs Holding, Inc.
2. Improving business portfolio management of Pbs Holding, Inc.
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Pbs Holding, Inc.
Strengths of Pbs Holding, Inc. | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Pbs Holding, Inc. are -
Highly skilled collaborators
– Pbs Holding, Inc. has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Pbs Holding, Inc. have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Ability to lead change in
– Pbs Holding, Inc. is one of the leading players in the industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Pbs Holding, Inc. in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Pbs Holding, Inc. has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Pbs Holding, Inc. staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Pbs Holding, Inc. 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Pbs Holding, Inc. comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Pbs Holding, Inc. is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided Pbs Holding, Inc. 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Pbs Holding, Inc. is one of the leading players in the 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.
Learning organization
- Pbs Holding, Inc. 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 Pbs Holding, Inc. is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Pbs Holding, Inc. emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
High brand equity
– Pbs Holding, Inc. has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Pbs Holding, Inc. to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Digital Transformation in industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Pbs Holding, Inc. digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Pbs Holding, Inc. 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Pbs Holding, Inc. 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.
Training and development
– Pbs Holding, Inc. has one of the best training and development program in 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.
Weaknesses of Pbs Holding, Inc. | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Pbs Holding, Inc. are -
Skills based hiring in industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Pbs Holding, Inc. 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Pbs Holding, Inc., it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact 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.
High dependence on Pbs Holding, Inc. ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Pbs Holding, Inc. still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Pbs Holding, Inc. has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Need for greater diversity
– Pbs Holding, Inc. 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Pbs Holding, Inc. 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the industry, Pbs Holding, Inc. 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 operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Pbs Holding, Inc. has high operating costs in the industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Pbs Holding, Inc. lucrative customers.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Pbs Holding, Inc. has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Pbs Holding, Inc. has some of the most successful models in the industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Pbs Holding, Inc. should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Pbs Holding, Inc. needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Pbs Holding, Inc. can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Pbs Holding, Inc. is planning to shift buying processes online.
Lack of clear differentiation of Pbs Holding, Inc. products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Pbs Holding, Inc. needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Pbs Holding, Inc. Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Pbs Holding, Inc. are -
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Pbs Holding, Inc. has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Pbs Holding, Inc. to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Pbs Holding, Inc. to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Manufacturing automation
– Pbs Holding, Inc. can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Pbs Holding, Inc. 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.
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. Pbs Holding, Inc. can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Pbs Holding, Inc. in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Pbs Holding, Inc. 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Pbs Holding, Inc. 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. Pbs Holding, Inc. 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.
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 Pbs Holding, Inc. 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Pbs Holding, Inc. can develop new processes and procedures in 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Pbs Holding, Inc. 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 Pbs Holding, Inc. to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Pbs Holding, Inc. can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Pbs Holding, Inc. to increase its market reach. Pbs Holding, Inc. 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Pbs Holding, Inc. is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Pbs Holding, Inc. can utilize new technology in the field of industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Threats Pbs Holding, Inc. External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Pbs Holding, Inc. are -
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Pbs Holding, Inc. in industry. The 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Pbs Holding, Inc. may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of sector.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to industry are lowering. It can presents Pbs Holding, Inc. with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Pbs Holding, Inc. can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Pbs Holding, Inc. is facing in sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Pbs Holding, Inc. 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 industry.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Pbs Holding, Inc. 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Pbs Holding, Inc. 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 industry regulations.
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. Pbs Holding, Inc. 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.
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 Pbs Holding, Inc..
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. Pbs Holding, Inc. needs to understand the core reasons impacting the industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Pbs Holding, Inc. in the sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Pbs Holding, Inc. Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Pbs Holding, Inc. 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 Pbs Holding, Inc. 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 Pbs Holding, Inc. 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 Pbs Holding, Inc. 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 Pbs Holding, Inc. needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.