Euro Sun Mining (ESM) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Euro Sun Mining (Canada)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Euro Sun Mining is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing transportation and logistics costs, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, technology disruption, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Euro Sun Mining

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Euro Sun Mining can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Euro Sun Mining, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Euro Sun Mining 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 Euro Sun Mining can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Euro Sun Mining
2. Improving business portfolio management of Euro Sun Mining
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Canada
4. Making a Gold & Silver sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Euro Sun Mining

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Strengths of Euro Sun Mining | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of Euro Sun Mining are -

Ability to recruit top talent

– Euro Sun Mining is one of the leading players in the Gold & Silver 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.

Training and development

– Euro Sun Mining has one of the best training and development program in Basic Materials 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.

Superior customer experience

– The customer experience strategy of Euro Sun Mining in Gold & Silver industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.

Operational resilience

– The operational resilience strategy of Euro Sun Mining comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Gold & Silver 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.

Highly skilled collaborators

– Euro Sun Mining has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Gold & Silver industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Euro Sun Mining have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.

Digital Transformation in Gold & Silver industry

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

Strong track record of project management in the Gold & Silver industry

– Euro Sun Mining is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.

Ability to lead change in Gold & Silver

– Euro Sun Mining is one of the leading players in the Gold & Silver industry in Canada. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Gold & Silver industry in Canada but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Euro Sun Mining in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.

Sustainable margins compare to other players in Gold & Silver industry

– Euro Sun Mining has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Euro Sun Mining to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Gold & Silver industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Euro Sun Mining to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.

Innovation driven organization

– Euro Sun Mining is one of the most innovative firm in Gold & Silver sector.

Organizational Resilience of Euro Sun Mining

– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Euro Sun Mining does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.

Cross disciplinary teams

– Horizontal connected teams at the Euro Sun Mining 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.

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Weaknesses of Euro Sun Mining | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of Euro Sun Mining are -

Compensation and incentives

– The revenue per employee of Euro Sun Mining is just above the Gold & Silver 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 to harness new channels of communication

– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Euro Sun Mining is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Euro Sun Mining to provide better information regarding Gold & Silver products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.

Ability to respond to the competition

– As the decision making is very deliberative at Euro Sun Mining, in the dynamic environment of Gold & Silver industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Euro Sun Mining has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.

Workers concerns about automation

– As automation is fast increasing in the Gold & Silver industry, Euro Sun Mining 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, Euro Sun Mining 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 Gold & Silver industry using digital technology.

Slow to strategic competitive environment developments

– As Euro Sun Mining is one of the leading players in the Gold & Silver industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Gold & Silver industry in last five years.

Skills based hiring in Gold & Silver industry

– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Euro Sun Mining 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.

Need for greater diversity

– Euro Sun Mining 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.

Low market penetration in new markets

– Outside its home market of Canada, Euro Sun Mining needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.

High dependence on Euro Sun Mining ‘s star products

– The top 2 products and services of Euro Sun Mining still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Gold & Silver industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Euro Sun Mining has relatively successful track record of launching new products.

High bargaining power of channel partners in Gold & Silver industry

– because of the regulatory requirements in Canada, Euro Sun Mining is facing high bargaining power of the channel partners. So far it has not able to streamline the operations to reduce the bargaining power of the value chain partners in the Gold & Silver industry.

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Euro Sun Mining Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of Euro Sun Mining are -

Using analytics as competitive advantage

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

Manufacturing automation

– Euro Sun Mining can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Gold & Silver 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.

Leveraging digital technologies

– Euro Sun Mining 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 Euro Sun Mining has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Gold & Silver industry. This can help Euro Sun Mining to build a more holistic ecosystem for Euro Sun Mining products in the Gold & Silver industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.

Better consumer reach

– The expansion of the 5G network will help Euro Sun Mining to increase its market reach. Euro Sun Mining 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.

Buying journey improvements

– Euro Sun Mining can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Gold & Silver 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.

Redefining models of collaboration and team work

– As explained in the weaknesses section, Euro Sun Mining is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Euro Sun Mining can utilize new technology in the field of Gold & Silver industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.

Building a culture of innovation

– managers at Euro Sun Mining 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 Gold & Silver industry.

Learning at scale

– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Euro Sun Mining 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.

Loyalty marketing

– Euro Sun Mining 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.

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Euro Sun Mining in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Gold & Silver 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 Euro Sun Mining 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, Euro Sun Mining can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Euro Sun Mining operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Gold & Silver sector.

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Threats Euro Sun Mining External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of Euro Sun Mining are -

High dependence on third party suppliers

– Euro Sun Mining 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.

Shortening product life cycle

– it is one of the major threat that Euro Sun Mining is facing in Gold & Silver sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, 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 Euro Sun Mining in the Gold & Silver sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

Regulatory challenges

– Euro Sun Mining 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 Gold & Silver industry regulations.

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. Euro Sun Mining needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Gold & Silver industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.

Learning curve for new practices

– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Euro Sun Mining may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Gold & Silver sector.

Trade war between China and United States

– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Euro Sun Mining in Gold & Silver industry. The Gold & Silver 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. Euro Sun Mining 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.

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 Euro Sun Mining business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.

Consumer confidence and its impact on Euro Sun Mining 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 Gold & Silver industry and other sectors.

Environmental challenges

– Euro Sun Mining 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. Euro Sun Mining can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Gold & Silver industry.

Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution

– Euro Sun Mining has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Gold & Silver industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Euro Sun Mining needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Gold & Silver sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.

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 Euro Sun Mining.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Euro Sun Mining Template, Example

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

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