Noble Corporation plc SWOT Analysis / Matrix

Business Essays, Term Papers & Research Papers

SWOT analysis is a vital strategic planning tool that can be used by Noble Corporation plc 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) Noble Corporation plc is facing in its current business environment.

The Noble Corporation plc is one of the leading organizatations in its industry. Noble Corporation plc maintains its dominant position in market by carefully analyzing and reviewing the SWOT analysis. SWOT analysis an immensenly interactive process and requires effective coordination among various departments within the firm 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 enables the managers of the Noble Corporation plc to develop four types of strategies:

SO (strengths-opportunities) Strategies
WO (weaknesses-opportunities) Strategies
ST (strengths-threats) Strategies
WT (weaknesses-threats) Strategies

Noble Corporation plc swot analysis / matrix

SWOT Matrix Strategies Objective

The core purpose of SWOT matrix is to identify the strategies that a firm can utilize to exploit external opportunities, counter threats, and build on & protect Noble Corporation plc strengths, and eradicate its weaknesses.

Step by Step Guide to Noble Corporation plc SWOT Analysis

Strengths of Noble Corporation plc – Internal Strategic Factors

As one of the leading firms in its industry, Noble Corporation plc 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 Noble Corporation plc are –

Read - Noble Corporation plc Porter 5 Forces Analysis & Industry Analysis
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Highly successful at Go To Market strategies for its products.
Strong Free Cash Flow – Noble Corporation plc has strong free cash flows that provide resources in the hand of the company to expand into new projects.
Successful track record of developing new products – product innovation.
Highly skilled workforce through successful training and learning programs. Noble Corporation plc 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.
Superb Performance in New Markets – Noble Corporation plc has built expertise at entering new markets and making success of them. The expansion has helped the organization to build new revenue stream and diversify the economic cycle risk in the markets it operates in.
Good Returns on Capital Expenditure – Noble Corporation plc is relatively successful at execution of new projects and generated good returns on capital expenditure by building new revenue streams.
Automation of activities brought consistency of quality to Noble Corporation plc products and has enabled the company to scale up and scale down based on the demand conditions in the market.
Strong distribution network – Over the years Noble Corporation plc has built a reliable distribution network that can reach majority of its potential market.

Weakness of Noble Corporation plc – Internal Strategic Factors

Weakness are the areas where Noble Corporation plc 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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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.
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 Noble Corporation plc
Need more investment in new technologies. Given the scale of expansion and different geographies the company is planning to expand into, Noble Corporation plc 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.
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.
The profitability ratio and Net Contribution % of Noble Corporation plc are below the industry average.
Not very good at product demand forecasting leading to higher rate of missed opportunities compare to its competitors. One of the reason why the days inventory is high compare to its competitors is that Noble Corporation plc is not very good at demand forecasting thus end up keeping higher inventory both in-house and in channel.
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. Noble Corporation plc has to build internal feedback mechanism directly from sales team on ground to counter these challenges.

Opportunities for Noble Corporation plc – External Strategic Factors

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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.
The new technology provides an opportunity to Noble Corporation plc to practices differentiated pricing strategy in the new market. It will enable the firm to maintain its loyal customers with great service and lure new customers through other value oriented propositions.
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 Noble Corporation plc in other product categories.
Decreasing cost of transportation because of lower shipping prices can also bring down the cost of Noble Corporation plc’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.
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 Noble Corporation plc. In the next few years the company can leverage this opportunity by knowing its customer better and serving their needs using big data analytics.
Opening up of new markets because of government agreement – the adoption of new technology standard and government free trade agreement has provided Noble Corporation plc an opportunity to enter a new emerging market.
Lower inflation rate – The low inflation rate bring more stability in the market, enable credit at lower interest rate to the customers of Noble Corporation plc.
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 Noble Corporation plc to drive home its advantage in new technology and gain market share in the new product category.

Threats Noble Corporation plc Facing - External Strategic Factors

New technologies developed by the competitor or market disruptor could be a serious threat to the industry in medium to long term future.
Liability laws in different countries are different and Noble Corporation plc may be exposed to various liability claims given change in policies in those markets.
Increasing trend toward isolationism in the American economy can lead to similar reaction from other government thus negatively impacting the international sales.
Imitation of the counterfeit and low quality product is also a threat to Noble Corporation plc’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 Noble Corporation plc
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.
Changing consumer buying behavior from online channel could be a threat to the existing physical infrastructure driven supply chain model.
Rising raw material can pose a threat to the Noble Corporation plc profitability.

Limitations of SWOT Analysis for Noble Corporation plc

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 Noble Corporation plc
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 Noble Corporation plc

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 Noble Corporation plc 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 Noble Corporation plc

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

You can email us to get an example document of Weighted SWOT analysis.

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)