Blackcow Food A (2387) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Electronic Instr. & Controls
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Blackcow Food A (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Blackcow Food A is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – technology disruption, geopolitical disruptions, increasing transportation and logistics costs, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, there is backlash against globalization, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic ,
wage bills are increasing, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Blackcow Food A can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Blackcow Food A, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Blackcow Food A 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 Blackcow Food A can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Blackcow Food A
2. Improving business portfolio management of Blackcow Food A
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Electronic Instr. & Controls sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Blackcow Food A
Strengths of Blackcow Food A | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Blackcow Food A are -
Diverse revenue streams
– Blackcow Food A is present in almost all the verticals within the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry. This has provided Blackcow Food A 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Blackcow Food A has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Blackcow Food A staying ahead in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Blackcow Food A in the Technology sector have low bargaining power. Blackcow Food A has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Blackcow Food A to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Innovation driven organization
– Blackcow Food A is one of the most innovative firm in Electronic Instr. & Controls sector.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Blackcow Food A has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Electronic Instr. & Controls industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Blackcow Food A have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Learning organization
- Blackcow Food A 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 Blackcow Food A is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Blackcow Food A emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Blackcow Food A 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Blackcow Food A is one of the leading players in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry in China. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in China. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Training and development
– Blackcow Food A has one of the best training and development program in Technology 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Blackcow Food A 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.
Analytics focus
– Blackcow Food A is putting a lot of focus on utilizing the power of analytics in business decision making. This has put it among the leading players in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry. The technology infrastructure of China is also helping it to harness the power of analytics for – marketing optimization, demand forecasting, customer relationship management, inventory management, information sharing across the value chain etc.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Blackcow Food A comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Electronic Instr. & Controls 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 Blackcow Food A | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Blackcow Food A are -
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 Blackcow Food A supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Blackcow Food A is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Blackcow Food A vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Blackcow Food A, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Electronic Instr. & Controls 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 cash cycle compare to competitors
Blackcow Food A has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Employees’ less understanding of Blackcow Food A strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Blackcow Food A don’t have comprehensive understanding of the firm’s strategy. This is reflected in number of promotional campaigns over the last few years that had mixed messaging and competing priorities. Some of the strategic activities and services promoted in the promotional campaigns were not consistent with the organization’s strategy.
Need for greater diversity
– Blackcow Food A 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Blackcow Food A has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry over the last five years. Blackcow Food A 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of China, Blackcow Food A needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Blackcow Food A is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Blackcow Food A to provide better information regarding Electronic Instr. & Controls products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry, Blackcow Food A 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, Blackcow Food A 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 Electronic Instr. & Controls industry using digital technology.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Electronic Instr. & Controls industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in China, Blackcow Food A 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 Electronic Instr. & Controls industry.
Blackcow Food A Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Blackcow Food A are -
Leveraging digital technologies
– Blackcow Food A 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Blackcow Food A 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Blackcow Food A in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Blackcow Food A is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Blackcow Food A can utilize new technology in the field of Electronic Instr. & Controls industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Blackcow Food A 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 Blackcow Food A to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Developing new processes and practices
– Blackcow Food A can develop new processes and procedures in Electronic Instr. & Controls 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Blackcow Food A can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Electronic Instr. & Controls industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Blackcow Food A in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry. Now Blackcow Food A can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
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. Blackcow Food A can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Loyalty marketing
– Blackcow Food A 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Blackcow Food A 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 Electronic Instr. & Controls industry.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Blackcow Food A 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. Blackcow Food A 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 Blackcow Food A 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.
Threats Blackcow Food A External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Blackcow Food A are -
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 Blackcow Food A in the Electronic Instr. & Controls sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Regulatory challenges
– Blackcow Food A 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 Electronic Instr. & Controls industry regulations.
Increasing wage structure of Blackcow Food A
– 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 Blackcow Food A.
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. Blackcow Food A 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Blackcow Food A 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 Blackcow Food A prominent markets.
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 Blackcow Food A business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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.
Environmental challenges
– Blackcow Food A 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. Blackcow Food A can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry.
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. Blackcow Food A needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Blackcow Food A 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 Electronic Instr. & Controls industry.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Electronic Instr. & Controls industry are lowering. It can presents Blackcow Food A with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Electronic Instr. & Controls sector.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Electronic Instr. & Controls industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Blackcow Food A can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Blackcow Food A may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Electronic Instr. & Controls sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Blackcow Food A Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Blackcow Food A 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 Blackcow Food A 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 Blackcow Food A 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 Blackcow Food A 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 Blackcow Food A needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
