Colabor Group Inc. (GCL) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Colabor Group Inc. (Canada)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Colabor Group Inc. is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, geopolitical disruptions, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing commodity prices, increasing transportation and logistics costs, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Colabor Group Inc.

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Colabor Group Inc. can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Colabor Group Inc., and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Colabor Group 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.

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SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix

SWOT analysis of Colabor Group Inc. can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Colabor Group Inc.
2. Improving business portfolio management of Colabor Group Inc.
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Canada
4. Making a Food Processing sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Colabor Group Inc.

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Strengths of Colabor Group Inc. | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of Colabor Group Inc. are -

High brand equity

– Colabor Group Inc. has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Colabor Group Inc. to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.

Digital Transformation in Food Processing industry

- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Colabor Group Inc. digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Colabor Group 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.

Ability to lead change in Food Processing

– Colabor Group Inc. is one of the leading players in the Food Processing industry in Canada. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Food Processing industry in Canada but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Colabor Group Inc. in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.

Successful track record of launching new products

– Colabor Group Inc. has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Colabor Group Inc. 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.

Diverse revenue streams

– Colabor Group Inc. is present in almost all the verticals within the Food Processing industry. This has provided Colabor Group 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.

Learning organization

- Colabor Group 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 Colabor Group Inc. is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Colabor Group Inc. emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.

Operational resilience

– The operational resilience strategy of Colabor Group Inc. comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Food Processing 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.

Superior customer experience

– The customer experience strategy of Colabor Group Inc. in Food Processing industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.

High switching costs

– The high switching costs that Colabor Group 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.

Sustainable margins compare to other players in Food Processing industry

– Colabor Group Inc. has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Colabor Group Inc. to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Food Processing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Colabor Group Inc. to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.

Ability to recruit top talent

– Colabor Group Inc. is one of the leading players in the Food Processing industry in Canada. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Canada. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.

Highly skilled collaborators

– Colabor Group Inc. has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Food Processing industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Colabor Group Inc. have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.

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Weaknesses of Colabor Group Inc. | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of Colabor Group Inc. are -

Workers concerns about automation

– As automation is fast increasing in the Food Processing industry, Colabor Group 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.

Capital Spending Reduction

– Even during the low interest decade, Colabor Group Inc. 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 Food Processing industry using digital technology.

High operating costs

– Compare to the competitors, Colabor Group Inc. has high operating costs in the Food Processing industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Colabor Group Inc. lucrative customers.

Products dominated business model

– Even though Colabor Group Inc. has some of the most successful models in the Food Processing industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Colabor Group Inc. should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.

Slow to strategic competitive environment developments

– As Colabor Group Inc. is one of the leading players in the Food Processing industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Food Processing industry in last five years.

Compensation and incentives

– The revenue per employee of Colabor Group Inc. is just above the Food Processing 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.

Slow decision making process

– As mentioned earlier in the report, Colabor Group Inc. has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Food Processing industry over the last five years. Colabor Group Inc. 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.

Skills based hiring in Food Processing industry

– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Colabor Group 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.

Aligning sales with marketing

– From the outside it seems that Colabor Group Inc. needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Food Processing industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Colabor Group Inc. can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Colabor Group Inc. is planning to shift buying processes online.

Increasing silos among functional specialists

– The organizational structure of Colabor Group Inc. is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Food Processing industry, but Colabor Group Inc. needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Colabor Group Inc. to focus more on services in the Food Processing industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.

No frontier risks strategy

– From the 10K / annual statement of Colabor Group Inc., it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Food Processing 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.

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Colabor Group Inc. Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of Colabor Group Inc. are -

Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities

– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Colabor Group 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 Colabor Group Inc. to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.

Low interest rates

– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Colabor Group Inc. 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.

Better consumer reach

– The expansion of the 5G network will help Colabor Group Inc. to increase its market reach. Colabor Group 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.

Loyalty marketing

– Colabor Group 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.

Learning at scale

– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Colabor Group Inc. 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.

Finding new ways to collaborate

– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Food Processing industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Colabor Group Inc. can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Colabor Group 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 Food Processing industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.

Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Food Processing industry

– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Colabor Group Inc. in the Food Processing industry. Now Colabor Group Inc. can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.

Increase in government spending

– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Colabor Group Inc. can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Colabor Group Inc. operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Food Processing sector.

Manufacturing automation

– Colabor Group Inc. can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Food Processing 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.

Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains

– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Colabor Group Inc. 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 Colabor Group Inc. to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.

Leveraging digital technologies

– Colabor Group 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.

Using analytics as competitive advantage

– Colabor Group Inc. has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Food Processing sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Colabor Group Inc. to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Colabor Group Inc. to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.

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Threats Colabor Group Inc. External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of Colabor Group Inc. are -

Trade war between China and United States

– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Colabor Group Inc. in Food Processing industry. The Food Processing 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.

Barriers of entry lowering

– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Food Processing industry are lowering. It can presents Colabor Group Inc. with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Food Processing sector.

Environmental challenges

– Colabor Group Inc. 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. Colabor Group Inc. can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Food Processing 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 Colabor Group Inc..

Consumer confidence and its impact on Colabor Group Inc. 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 Food Processing 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.

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. Colabor Group Inc. needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Food Processing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.

Stagnating economy with rate increase

– Colabor Group 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 Food Processing industry.

Increasing wage structure of Colabor Group Inc.

– 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 Colabor Group Inc..

Regulatory challenges

– Colabor Group 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 Food Processing industry regulations.

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 Colabor Group Inc. business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, 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 Colabor Group Inc. in the Food Processing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

High dependence on third party suppliers

– Colabor Group 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.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Colabor Group Inc. Template, Example

Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Colabor Group 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 Colabor Group 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 Colabor Group 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 Colabor Group 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 Colabor Group Inc. needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.

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