Fat Prophets Global (FPC) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Misc. Financial Services
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Fat Prophets Global (Australia)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Fat Prophets Global is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing energy prices, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, there is backlash against globalization, technology disruption,
challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Fat Prophets Global
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Fat Prophets Global can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Fat Prophets Global, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Fat Prophets Global 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 Fat Prophets Global can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Fat Prophets Global
2. Improving business portfolio management of Fat Prophets Global
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Australia
4. Making a Misc. Financial Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Fat Prophets Global
Strengths of Fat Prophets Global | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Fat Prophets Global are -
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Fat Prophets Global in Misc. Financial Services industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Fat Prophets Global comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Misc. Financial Services 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Fat Prophets Global 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 Fat Prophets Global in the Financial sector have low bargaining power. Fat Prophets Global has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Fat Prophets Global to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Fat Prophets Global is one of the leading players in the Misc. Financial Services industry in Australia. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Australia. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Digital Transformation in Misc. Financial Services industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Fat Prophets Global digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Fat Prophets Global 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 Misc. Financial Services industry
– Fat Prophets Global is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Training and development
– Fat Prophets Global has one of the best training and development program in Financial 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Misc. Financial Services industry
– Fat Prophets Global has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Fat Prophets Global to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Misc. Financial Services industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Fat Prophets Global to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Organizational Resilience of Fat Prophets Global
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Fat Prophets Global does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Learning organization
- Fat Prophets Global 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 Fat Prophets Global is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Fat Prophets Global emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Fat Prophets Global has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Fat Prophets Global 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 Fat Prophets Global | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Fat Prophets Global are -
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Fat Prophets Global needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Misc. Financial Services industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Fat Prophets Global can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Fat Prophets Global is planning to shift buying processes online.
Lack of clear differentiation of Fat Prophets Global products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Fat Prophets Global needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Fat Prophets Global has some of the most successful models in the Misc. Financial Services industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Fat Prophets Global should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
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 Fat Prophets Global supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Fat Prophets Global is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Fat Prophets Global vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Fat Prophets Global 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 Misc. Financial Services industry using digital technology.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Fat Prophets Global, in the dynamic environment of Misc. Financial Services industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Fat Prophets Global has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Skills based hiring in Misc. Financial Services industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Fat Prophets Global 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
– Fat Prophets Global 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Fat Prophets Global is just above the Misc. Financial Services 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Australia, Fat Prophets Global needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
High dependence on Fat Prophets Global ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Fat Prophets Global still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Misc. Financial Services industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Fat Prophets Global has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Fat Prophets Global Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Fat Prophets Global are -
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Fat Prophets Global 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 Misc. Financial Services industry.
Loyalty marketing
– Fat Prophets Global 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Fat Prophets Global 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 Fat Prophets Global to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Fat Prophets Global can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Fat Prophets Global to increase its market reach. Fat Prophets Global 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Fat Prophets Global can develop new processes and procedures in Misc. Financial Services 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Fat Prophets Global in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Misc. Financial Services industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
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 Fat Prophets Global 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Fat Prophets Global has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Misc. Financial Services industry. This can help Fat Prophets Global to build a more holistic ecosystem for Fat Prophets Global products in the Misc. Financial Services industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Buying journey improvements
– Fat Prophets Global can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Misc. Financial Services 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Fat Prophets Global has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Misc. Financial Services sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Fat Prophets Global to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Fat Prophets Global to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Fat Prophets Global can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Fat Prophets Global operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Misc. Financial Services sector.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Fat Prophets Global can still utilize the low interest rates to borrow money for capital investment. Secondly it can also use the increase of government spending in infrastructure projects to get new business.
Threats Fat Prophets Global External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Fat Prophets Global are -
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Fat Prophets Global 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 Fat Prophets Global 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 Fat Prophets Global business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Fat Prophets Global 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 Misc. Financial Services industry and other sectors.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Fat Prophets Global 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Fat Prophets Global 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 Misc. Financial Services industry.
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. Fat Prophets Global needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Misc. Financial Services industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Misc. Financial Services industry are lowering. It can presents Fat Prophets Global with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Misc. Financial Services sector.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Fat Prophets Global may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Misc. Financial Services sector.
Increasing wage structure of Fat Prophets Global
– 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 Fat Prophets Global.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Fat Prophets Global has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Misc. Financial Services industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Fat Prophets Global needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Misc. Financial Services 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Fat Prophets Global 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 Misc. Financial Services industry regulations.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Fat Prophets Global in Misc. Financial Services industry. The Misc. Financial Services 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Fat Prophets Global Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Fat Prophets Global 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 Fat Prophets Global 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 Fat Prophets Global 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 Fat Prophets Global 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 Fat Prophets Global needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.