Suburban Minerals Co (SUBB) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Suburban Minerals Co (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Suburban Minerals Co is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing transportation and logistics costs, wage bills are increasing, increasing energy prices,
banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Suburban Minerals Co
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Suburban Minerals Co can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Suburban Minerals Co, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Suburban Minerals Co 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 Suburban Minerals Co can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Suburban Minerals Co
2. Improving business portfolio management of Suburban Minerals Co
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 Suburban Minerals Co
Strengths of Suburban Minerals Co | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Suburban Minerals Co are -
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Suburban Minerals Co in industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Innovation driven organization
– Suburban Minerals Co is one of the most innovative firm in sector.
Diverse revenue streams
– Suburban Minerals Co is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided Suburban Minerals Co 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.
Training and development
– Suburban Minerals Co 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.
Digital Transformation in industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Suburban Minerals Co digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Suburban Minerals Co 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.
Learning organization
- Suburban Minerals Co 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 Suburban Minerals Co is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Suburban Minerals Co emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Suburban Minerals Co 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Suburban Minerals Co 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Suburban Minerals Co in the sector have low bargaining power. Suburban Minerals Co has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Suburban Minerals Co to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Organizational Resilience of Suburban Minerals Co
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Suburban Minerals Co does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Suburban Minerals Co 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 Suburban Minerals Co have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Suburban Minerals Co has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Suburban Minerals Co 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.
Weaknesses of Suburban Minerals Co | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Suburban Minerals Co are -
Skills based hiring in industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Suburban Minerals Co 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 Suburban Minerals Co, 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 Suburban Minerals Co ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Suburban Minerals Co still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Suburban Minerals Co has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Suburban Minerals Co 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 Suburban Minerals Co lucrative customers.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the industry, Suburban Minerals Co 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Suburban Minerals Co is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the industry, but Suburban Minerals Co needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Suburban Minerals Co to focus more on services in the industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Suburban Minerals Co 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 Suburban Minerals Co 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. Suburban Minerals Co should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Suburban Minerals Co is one of the leading players in the industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the industry in last five years.
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 Suburban Minerals Co supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Suburban Minerals Co is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Suburban Minerals Co vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Suburban Minerals Co is just above the 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.
Suburban Minerals Co Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Suburban Minerals Co are -
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Suburban Minerals Co 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 industry.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Suburban Minerals Co 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 Suburban Minerals Co to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Buying journey improvements
– Suburban Minerals Co can improve the customer journey of consumers in the 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.
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 Suburban Minerals Co 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Suburban Minerals Co can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
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. Suburban Minerals Co can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Suburban Minerals Co 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Suburban Minerals Co 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Suburban Minerals Co can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Suburban Minerals Co 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Suburban Minerals Co to increase its market reach. Suburban Minerals Co 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.
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. Suburban Minerals Co 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. Suburban Minerals Co 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Suburban Minerals Co in the industry. Now Suburban Minerals Co can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Threats Suburban Minerals Co External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Suburban Minerals Co are -
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Suburban Minerals Co 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 Suburban Minerals Co prominent markets.
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. Suburban Minerals Co 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Suburban Minerals Co 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.
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 Suburban Minerals Co.
Aging population
– As the populations of most advanced economies are aging, it will lead to high social security costs, higher savings among population, and lower demand for goods and services in the economy. The household savings in US, France, UK, Germany, and Japan are growing faster than predicted because of uncertainty caused by pandemic.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to industry are lowering. It can presents Suburban Minerals Co with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Suburban Minerals Co 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.
Increasing wage structure of Suburban Minerals Co
– 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 Suburban Minerals Co.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Suburban Minerals Co 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.
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. Suburban Minerals Co 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.
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. Suburban Minerals Co needs to understand the core reasons impacting the industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Environmental challenges
– Suburban Minerals Co 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. Suburban Minerals Co can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the industry.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Suburban Minerals Co Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Suburban Minerals Co 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 Suburban Minerals Co 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 Suburban Minerals Co 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 Suburban Minerals Co 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 Suburban Minerals Co needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.