SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Edan Instruments Inc (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Edan Instruments Inc is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing household debt because of falling income levels, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, wage bills are increasing, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%,
increasing commodity prices, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Edan Instruments Inc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Edan Instruments Inc can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Edan Instruments Inc, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Edan Instruments 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 Edan Instruments Inc can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Edan Instruments Inc
2. Improving business portfolio management of Edan Instruments Inc
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Medical Equipment & Supplies sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Edan Instruments Inc
Strengths of Edan Instruments Inc | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Edan Instruments Inc are -
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry
– Edan Instruments Inc has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Edan Instruments Inc to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Edan Instruments Inc to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Edan Instruments Inc has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Edan Instruments Inc staying ahead in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Edan Instruments 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Edan Instruments Inc in the Healthcare sector have low bargaining power. Edan Instruments Inc has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Edan Instruments Inc to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Learning organization
- Edan Instruments 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 Edan Instruments Inc is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Edan Instruments Inc emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Diverse revenue streams
– Edan Instruments Inc is present in almost all the verticals within the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. This has provided Edan Instruments 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 lead change in Medical Equipment & Supplies
– Edan Instruments Inc is one of the leading players in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry in China. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry in China but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Edan Instruments Inc in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Training and development
– Edan Instruments Inc has one of the best training and development program in Healthcare 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Edan Instruments Inc has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Edan Instruments 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry
– Edan Instruments Inc is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Edan Instruments Inc in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Organizational Resilience of Edan Instruments Inc
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Edan Instruments Inc does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Weaknesses of Edan Instruments Inc | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Edan Instruments Inc are -
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Edan Instruments 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.
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 Edan Instruments Inc supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Edan Instruments Inc is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Edan Instruments Inc vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Edan Instruments Inc, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Medical Equipment & Supplies 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Edan Instruments 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.
High dependence on Edan Instruments Inc ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Edan Instruments Inc still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Edan Instruments Inc has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Edan Instruments Inc is just above the Medical Equipment & Supplies 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Edan Instruments Inc has some of the most successful models in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Edan Instruments Inc should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Edan Instruments Inc is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry, but Edan Instruments Inc needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Edan Instruments Inc to focus more on services in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Edan Instruments Inc has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Skills based hiring in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Edan Instruments 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Edan Instruments Inc is one of the leading players in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry in last five years.
Edan Instruments Inc Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Edan Instruments Inc are -
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Edan Instruments Inc can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Edan Instruments Inc has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. This can help Edan Instruments Inc to build a more holistic ecosystem for Edan Instruments Inc products in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Edan Instruments Inc 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 Medical Equipment & Supplies industry.
Buying journey improvements
– Edan Instruments Inc can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Medical Equipment & Supplies 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.
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. Edan Instruments Inc can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Edan Instruments Inc is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Edan Instruments Inc can utilize new technology in the field of Medical Equipment & Supplies industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
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 Edan Instruments 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Edan Instruments 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Edan Instruments 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. Edan Instruments 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Edan Instruments 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 Edan Instruments 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Edan Instruments 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 Medical Equipment & Supplies industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Manufacturing automation
– Edan Instruments Inc can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Medical Equipment & Supplies 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Edan Instruments Inc can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Threats Edan Instruments Inc External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Edan Instruments Inc are -
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. Edan Instruments Inc needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Edan Instruments Inc 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 Edan Instruments Inc prominent markets.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Edan Instruments 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 Medical Equipment & Supplies industry.
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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Edan Instruments 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 Medical Equipment & Supplies sector.
Environmental challenges
– Edan Instruments 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. Edan Instruments Inc can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry.
Increasing wage structure of Edan Instruments 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 Edan Instruments Inc.
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 Edan Instruments Inc in the Medical Equipment & Supplies sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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.
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 Edan Instruments Inc.
Regulatory challenges
– Edan Instruments 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 Medical Equipment & Supplies industry regulations.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Edan Instruments Inc in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. The Medical Equipment & Supplies 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Edan Instruments Inc has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Edan Instruments Inc needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Medical Equipment & Supplies 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Edan Instruments Inc Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Edan Instruments 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 Edan Instruments 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 Edan Instruments 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 Edan Instruments 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 Edan Instruments Inc needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.