SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for 7C Solarparken (Germany)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , 7C Solarparken is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing commodity prices, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , wage bills are increasing, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing transportation and logistics costs,
challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, there is backlash against globalization, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that 7C Solarparken can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the 7C Solarparken, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which 7C Solarparken 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 7C Solarparken can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of 7C Solarparken
2. Improving business portfolio management of 7C Solarparken
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Germany
4. Making a Electric Utilities sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of 7C Solarparken
Strengths of 7C Solarparken | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of 7C Solarparken are -
Highly skilled collaborators
– 7C Solarparken has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Electric Utilities industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of 7C Solarparken have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that 7C Solarparken 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.
Training and development
– 7C Solarparken has one of the best training and development program in Utilities 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 brand equity
– 7C Solarparken has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled 7C Solarparken to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Innovation driven organization
– 7C Solarparken is one of the most innovative firm in Electric Utilities sector.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of 7C Solarparken in Electric Utilities industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Diverse revenue streams
– 7C Solarparken is present in almost all the verticals within the Electric Utilities industry. This has provided 7C Solarparken 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– 7C Solarparken has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. 7C Solarparken 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.
Ability to lead change in Electric Utilities
– 7C Solarparken is one of the leading players in the Electric Utilities industry in Germany. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Electric Utilities industry in Germany but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled 7C Solarparken in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– 7C Solarparken has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – 7C Solarparken staying ahead in the Electric Utilities 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 7C Solarparken 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.
Analytics focus
– 7C Solarparken 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 Electric Utilities industry. The technology infrastructure of Germany 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.
Weaknesses of 7C Solarparken | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of 7C Solarparken are -
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at 7C Solarparken, in the dynamic environment of Electric Utilities industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. 7C Solarparken has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, 7C Solarparken 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 Electric Utilities industry using digital technology.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that 7C Solarparken needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Electric Utilities industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at 7C Solarparken can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as 7C Solarparken is planning to shift buying processes online.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Electric Utilities industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Germany, 7C Solarparken 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 Electric Utilities industry.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As 7C Solarparken is one of the leading players in the Electric Utilities industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Electric Utilities industry in last five years.
Lack of clear differentiation of 7C Solarparken products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, 7C Solarparken needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Employees’ less understanding of 7C Solarparken strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of 7C Solarparken 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of 7C Solarparken is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Electric Utilities industry, but 7C Solarparken needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help 7C Solarparken to focus more on services in the Electric Utilities industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
7C Solarparken has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Electric Utilities 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 Electric Utilities industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at 7C Solarparken 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though 7C Solarparken has some of the most successful models in the Electric Utilities industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. 7C Solarparken should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
7C Solarparken Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of 7C Solarparken are -
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for 7C Solarparken 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, 7C Solarparken is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. 7C Solarparken can utilize new technology in the field of Electric Utilities industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– 7C Solarparken has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Electric Utilities sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled 7C Solarparken to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help 7C Solarparken to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Loyalty marketing
– 7C Solarparken 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 Electric Utilities industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. 7C Solarparken 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. 7C Solarparken 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.
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. 7C Solarparken can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for 7C Solarparken 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 7C Solarparken to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at 7C Solarparken 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 Electric Utilities industry.
Buying journey improvements
– 7C Solarparken can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Electric Utilities 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, 7C Solarparken 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 7C Solarparken to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Electric Utilities industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for 7C Solarparken in the Electric Utilities industry. Now 7C Solarparken can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Manufacturing automation
– 7C Solarparken can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Electric Utilities 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
– 7C Solarparken 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.
Threats 7C Solarparken External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of 7C Solarparken are -
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 7C Solarparken business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, 7C Solarparken 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 7C Solarparken prominent markets.
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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Electric Utilities industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. 7C Solarparken can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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 7C Solarparken in the Electric Utilities sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Consumer confidence and its impact on 7C Solarparken 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 Electric Utilities industry and other sectors.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Electric Utilities industry are lowering. It can presents 7C Solarparken with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Electric Utilities sector.
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. 7C Solarparken needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Electric Utilities industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Increasing wage structure of 7C Solarparken
– 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 7C Solarparken.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– 7C Solarparken 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 Electric Utilities industry.
Regulatory challenges
– 7C Solarparken 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 Electric Utilities industry regulations.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that 7C Solarparken is facing in Electric Utilities sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Environmental challenges
– 7C Solarparken 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. 7C Solarparken can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Electric Utilities industry.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of 7C Solarparken Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at 7C Solarparken 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 7C Solarparken 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 7C Solarparken 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 7C Solarparken 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 7C Solarparken needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.