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Real Industry, Inc. SWOT Analysis / Matrix
Business Essays, Term Papers & Research Papers
SWOT analysis is a strategic planning tool that can be used by Real Industry, Inc. managers to do a situational analysis of the organization . It is a handy technique to analyze the present Strengths (S), Weakness (W), Opportunities (O) & Threats (T) Real Industry, Inc. is facing in its current business environment.
The Real Industry, Inc. is one of the leading companies in its industry. Real Industry, Inc. maintains its prominent position in market by critically analyzing and reviewing the SWOT analysis. SWOT analysis a highly interactive process and requires effective coordination among various departments within the company such as – marketing, finance, operations, management information systems and strategic planning.
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The SWOT Analysis framework enables an organization to identify the internal strategic factors such as -strengths and weaknesses, & external strategic factors such as - opportunities and threats. It leads to a 2X2 matrix – also called SWOT Matrix.
The Strengths-Weaknesses-Opportunities-Threats (SWOT) Analysis / Matrix helps the managers of the Real Industry, Inc. to develop four types of strategies:
- SO (strengths-opportunities) Strategies
- WO (weaknesses-opportunities) Strategies
- ST (strengths-threats) Strategies
- WT (weaknesses-threats) Strategies
SWOT Matrix Strategies Objective
The main purpose of SWOT matrix is to identify the strategies that a firm can use to exploit external opportunities, counter threats, and build on & protect Real Industry, Inc. strengths, and eradicate its weaknesses.
Step by Step Guide to Real Industry, Inc. SWOT Analysis
Strengths of Real Industry, Inc. – Internal Strategic Factors
As one of the leading firms in its industry, Real Industry, Inc. has numerous strengths that help it to thrive in the market place. These strengths not only help it to protect the market share in existing markets but also help in penetrating new markets. Based on Fern Fort University extensive research – some of the strengths of Real Industry, Inc. are –
Read - Real Industry, Inc. Porter 5 Forces Analysis & Industry Analysis
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- Strong dealer community – It has built a culture among distributor & dealers where the dealers not only promote company’s products but also invest in training the sales team to explain to the customer how he/she can extract the maximum benefits out of the products.
- Successful track record of integrating complimentary firms through mergers & acquisition. It has successfully integrated number of technology companies in the past few years to streamline its operations and to build a reliable supply chain.
- Strong Brand Portfolio – Over the years Real Industry, Inc. has invested in building a strong brand portfolio. The SWOT analysis of Real Industry, Inc. just underlines this fact. This brand portfolio can be extremely useful if the organization wants to expand into new product categories.
- High level of customer satisfaction – the company with its dedicated customer relationship management department has able to achieve a high level of customer satisfaction among present customers and good brand equity among the potential customers.
- Highly skilled workforce through successful training and learning programs. Real Industry, Inc. is investing huge resources in training and development of its employees resulting in a workforce that is not only highly skilled but also motivated to achieve more.
- Good Returns on Capital Expenditure – Real Industry, Inc. is relatively successful at execution of new projects and generated good returns on capital expenditure by building new revenue streams.
- Highly successful at Go To Market strategies for its products.
- Automation of activities brought consistency of quality to Real Industry, Inc. products and has enabled the company to scale up and scale down based on the demand conditions in the market.
Weakness of Real Industry, Inc. – Internal Strategic Factors
Weakness are the areas where Real Industry, Inc. can improve upon. Strategy is about making choices and weakness are the areas where an organization can improve using SWOT analysis and build on its competitive advantage and strategic positioning.
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- Not highly successful at integrating firms with different work culture. As mentioned earlier even though Real Industry, Inc. is successful at integrating small companies it has its share of failure to merge firms that have different work culture.
- Financial planning is not done properly and efficiently. The current asset ratio and liquid asset ratios suggest that the company can use the cash more efficiently than what it is doing at present.
- There are gaps in the product range sold by the company. This lack of choice can give a new competitor a foothold in the market.
- The profitability ratio and Net Contribution % of Real Industry, Inc. are below the industry average.
- The marketing of the products left a lot to be desired. Even though the product is a success in terms of sale but its positioning and unique selling proposition is not clearly defined which can lead to the attacks in this segment from the competitors.
- Need more investment in new technologies. Given the scale of expansion and different geographies the company is planning to expand into, Real Industry, Inc. needs to put more money in technology to integrate the processes across the board. Right now the investment in technologies is not at par with the vision of the company.
- The company has not being able to tackle the challenges present by the new entrants in the segment and has lost small market share in the niche categories. Real Industry, Inc. has to build internal feedback mechanism directly from sales team on ground to counter these challenges.
Opportunities for Real Industry, Inc. – External Strategic Factors
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- New environmental policies – The new opportunities will create a level playing field for all the players in the industry. It represent a great opportunity for Real Industry, Inc. to drive home its advantage in new technology and gain market share in the new product category.
- The market development will lead to dilution of competitor’s advantage and enable Real Industry, Inc. to increase its competitiveness compare to the other competitors.
- Organization’s core competencies can be a success in similar other products field. A comparative example could be - GE healthcare research helped it in developing better Oil drilling machines.
- New trends in the consumer behavior can open up new market for the Real Industry, Inc. . It provides a great opportunity for the organization to build new revenue streams and diversify into new product categories too.
- Decreasing cost of transportation because of lower shipping prices can also bring down the cost of Real Industry, Inc.’s products thus providing an opportunity to the company - either to boost its profitability or pass on the benefits to the customers to gain market share.
- Lower inflation rate – The low inflation rate bring more stability in the market, enable credit at lower interest rate to the customers of Real Industry, Inc..
- Opening up of new markets because of government agreement – the adoption of new technology standard and government free trade agreement has provided Real Industry, Inc. an opportunity to enter a new emerging market.
- Stable free cash flow provides opportunities to invest in adjacent product segments. With more cash in bank the company can invest in new technologies as well as in new products segments. This should open a window of opportunity for Real Industry, Inc. in other product categories.
Threats Real Industry, Inc. Facing - External Strategic Factors
- Liability laws in different countries are different and Real Industry, Inc. may be exposed to various liability claims given change in policies in those markets.
- Imitation of the counterfeit and low quality product is also a threat to Real Industry, Inc.’s product especially in the emerging markets and low income markets.
- Rising pay level especially movements such as $15 an hour and increasing prices in the China can lead to serious pressure on profitability of Real Industry, Inc.
- The demand of the highly profitable products is seasonal in nature and any unlikely event during the peak season may impact the profitability of the company in short to medium term.
- Intense competition – Stable profitability has increased the number of players in the industry over last two years which has put downward pressure on not only profitability but also on overall sales.
- Shortage of skilled workforce in certain global market represents a threat to steady growth of profits for Real Industry, Inc. in those markets.
- Changing consumer buying behavior from online channel could be a threat to the existing physical infrastructure driven supply chain model.
- Growing strengths of local distributors also presents a threat in some markets as the competition is paying higher margins to the local distributors.
Limitations of SWOT Analysis for Real Industry, Inc.
Although the SWOT analysis is widely used as a strategic planning tool, the analysis does have its share of limitations.
- Certain capabilities or factors of an organization can be both a strength and weakness at the same time. This is one of the major limitations of SWOT analysis . For example changing environmental regulations can be both a threat to company it can also be an opportunity in a sense that it will enable the company to be on a level playing field or at advantage to competitors if it able to develop the products faster than the competitors.
- SWOT does not show how to achieve a competitive advantage, so it must not be an end in itself.
- The matrix is only a starting point for a discussion on how proposed strategies could be implemented. It provided an evaluation window but not an implementation plan based on strategic competitiveness of Real Industry, Inc.
- SWOT is a static assessment - analysis of status quo with few prospective changes. As circumstances, capabilities, threats, and strategies change, the dynamics of a competitive environment may not be revealed in a single matrix.
- SWOT analysis may lead the firm to overemphasize a single internal or external factor in formulating strategies. There are interrelationships among the key internal and external factors that SWOT does not reveal that may be important in devising strategies.
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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Real Industry, Inc.
In light of the above mentioned limitations of the SWOT analysis / matrix, corporate managers decided to provide weightage to each internal strength and weakness of the firm. Organizations also assess the likelihood of events taking place in the coming future and how strong their impact could be on company's performance.
This method is called Weighted SWOT analysis. It is better than doing simplistic SWOT analysis because with Weighted SWOT Analysis Real Industry, Inc. managers can focus on the most critical factors and discount the non-important one. It also solves the long list problem where organizations ends up making a long list but none of the factors deemed too critical.
Limitation of Weighted SWOT analysis of Real Industry, Inc.
This approach also suffers from one major drawback - it focus on individual importance of factor rather than how they are collectively important and impact the business holistically.
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SWOT Worksheet & Template
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References / Citations & Bibliography
- M. E. Porter, Competitive Strategy(New York: Free Press, 1980)
- A. D. Chandler, Strategy and Structure (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1962)
- O. E. Williamson, Markets and Hierarchies(New York: Free Press, 1975);
- L. Wrigley, Divisional Autonomy and Diversification (PhD, Harvard Business School, 1970)
- R. E. White, Generic Business Strategies, Organizational Context and Performance: An Empirical Investigation, Strategic Management Journal7 (1986)
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