Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. SWOT Analysis / Matrix

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SWOT analysis is a vital strategic planning tool that can be used by Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. managers to do a situational analysis of the company . It is a handy technique to analyze the present Strengths (S), Weakness (W), Opportunities (O) & Threats (T) Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. is facing in its current business environment.

The Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. is one of the leading organizatations in its industry. Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. maintains its dominant position in market by critically analyzing and reviewing the SWOT analysis.  SWOT analysis an immensenly interactive process and requires effective coordination among various departments within the organization such as – marketing, finance, operations, management information systems and strategic planning.


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The SWOT Analysis framework facilitates 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 enables the managers of the Commercial Vehicle Group, 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 company can utilize to exploit external opportunities, counter threats, and build on & protect Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. strengths, and eradicate its weaknesses.

Step by Step Guide to Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. SWOT Analysis

Strengths of Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. – Internal Strategic Factors

As one of the leading companies in its industry, Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. has numerous strengths that enable 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 Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. are –

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• 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.
• Strong Brand Portfolio – Over the years Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. has invested in building a strong brand portfolio. The SWOT analysis of Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. just underlines this fact. This brand portfolio can be extremely useful if the organization wants to expand into new product categories.
• Successful track record of developing new products – product innovation.
• Automation of activities brought consistency of quality to Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. products and has enabled the company to scale up and scale down based on the demand conditions in the market.
• Highly skilled workforce through successful training and learning programs. Commercial Vehicle Group, 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.
• Strong Free Cash Flow – Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. has strong free cash flows that provide resources in the hand of the company to expand into new projects.
• 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.

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Weakness of Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. – Internal Strategic Factors

Weakness are the areas where Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. can improve upon. Strategy is about making choices and weakness are the areas where a firm can improve using SWOT analysis and build on its competitive advantage and strategic positioning.

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• Days inventory is high compare to the competitors – making the company raise more capital to invest in the channel. This can impact the long term growth of Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc.
• Organization structure is only compatible with present business model thus limiting expansion in adjacent product segments.
• Not highly successful at integrating firms with different work culture. As mentioned earlier even though Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. is successful at integrating small companies it has its share of failure to merge firms that have different work culture.
• High attrition rate in work force – compare to other organizations in the industry Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. has a higher attrition rate and have to spend a lot more compare to its competitors on training and development of its employees.
• 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.
• Investment in Research and Development is below the fastest growing players in the industry. Even though Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. is spending above the industry average on Research and Development, it has not been able to compete with the leading players in the industry in terms of innovation. It has come across as a mature firm looking forward to bring out products based on tested features in the market.
• The profitability ratio and Net Contribution % of Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. are below the industry average.

Opportunities for Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. – External Strategic Factors

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• Economic uptick and increase in customer spending, after years of recession and slow growth rate in the industry, is an opportunity for Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. to capture new customers and increase its market share.
• The new taxation policy can significantly impact the way of doing business and can open new opportunity for established players such as Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. to increase its profitability.
• 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 Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. to drive home its advantage in new technology and gain market share in the new product category.
• Lower inflation rate – The low inflation rate bring more stability in the market, enable credit at lower interest rate to the customers of Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc..
• New trends in the consumer behavior can open up new market for the Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. . It provides a great opportunity for the organization to build new revenue streams and diversify into new product categories too.
• The market development will lead to dilution of competitor’s advantage and enable Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. to increase its competitiveness compare to the other competitors.
• New customers from online channel – Over the past few years the company has invested vast sum of money into the online platform. This investment has opened new sales channel for Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc.. In the next few years the company can leverage this opportunity by knowing its customer better and serving their needs using big data analytics.
• Government green drive also opens an opportunity for procurement of Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. products by the state as well as federal government contractors.

Threats Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. Facing - External Strategic Factors

• Increasing trend toward isolationism in the American economy can lead to similar reaction from other government thus negatively impacting the international sales.
• Rising raw material can pose a threat to the Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc. profitability.
• As the company is operating in numerous countries it is exposed to currency fluctuations especially given the volatile political climate in number of markets across the world.
• 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.
• No regular supply of innovative products – Over the years the company has developed numerous products but those are often response to the development by other players. Secondly the supply of new products is not regular thus leading to high and low swings in the sales number over period of time.
• Growing strengths of local distributors also presents a threat in some markets as the competition is paying higher margins to the local distributors.
• Imitation of the counterfeit and low quality product is also a threat to Commercial Vehicle Group, Inc.’s product especially in the emerging markets and low income markets.
• The company can face lawsuits in various markets given - different laws and continuous fluctuations regarding product standards in those markets.

Limitations of SWOT Analysis for Commercial Vehicle Group, 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 Commercial Vehicle Group, 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 Commercial Vehicle Group, 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 Commercial Vehicle Group, 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 Commercial Vehicle Group, 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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Example of Weighted SWOT Analysis

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SWOT Worksheet & Template

If you like to do your own SWOT analysis or want to make your own Weighted SWOT SWOT matrix then feel free to download Fern Fort University SWOT Analysis Template.

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)