Voxeljet AG SWOT Analysis / Matrix

Business Essays, Term Papers & Research Papers

SWOT analysis is a strategic planning tool that can be used by Voxeljet AG managers to do a situational analysis of the company . It is a useful technique to understand the present Strengths (S), Weakness (W), Opportunities (O) & Threats (T) Voxeljet AG is facing in its current business environment.

The Voxeljet AG is one of the leading companies in its industry. Voxeljet AG maintains its prominent position in market by carefully analyzing and reviewing the SWOT analysis. SWOT analysis a highly 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 known as SWOT Matrix.

The Strengths-Weaknesses-Opportunities-Threats (SWOT) Analysis / Matrix enables the managers of the Voxeljet AG 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 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 Voxeljet AG strengths, and eradicate its weaknesses.

Step by Step Guide to Voxeljet AG SWOT Analysis

Strengths of Voxeljet AG – Internal Strategic Factors

As one of the leading organizations in its industry, Voxeljet AG 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 Voxeljet AG are –

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Highly successful at Go To Market strategies for its products.
Superb Performance in New Markets – Voxeljet AG 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.
Strong distribution network – Over the years Voxeljet AG has built a reliable distribution network that can reach majority of its potential market.
Automation of activities brought consistency of quality to Voxeljet AG products and has enabled the company to scale up and scale down based on the demand conditions in the market.
Good Returns on Capital Expenditure – Voxeljet AG is relatively successful at execution of new projects and generated good returns on capital expenditure by building new revenue streams.
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.
Highly skilled workforce through successful training and learning programs. Voxeljet AG 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.
Successful track record of developing new products – product innovation.

Weakness of Voxeljet AG – Internal Strategic Factors

Weakness are the areas where Voxeljet AG 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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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 Voxeljet AG 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. Voxeljet AG has to build internal feedback mechanism directly from sales team on ground to counter these challenges.
The profitability ratio and Net Contribution % of Voxeljet AG are below the industry average.
Limited success outside core business – Even though Voxeljet AG is one of the leading organizations in its industry it has faced challenges in moving to other product segments with its present culture.
Organization structure is only compatible with present business model thus limiting expansion in adjacent product segments.
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.
Investment in Research and Development is below the fastest growing players in the industry. Even though Voxeljet AG 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.

Opportunities for Voxeljet AG – External Strategic Factors

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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 Voxeljet AG. In the next few years the company can leverage this opportunity by knowing its customer better and serving their needs using big data analytics.
The new taxation policy can significantly impact the way of doing business and can open new opportunity for established players such as Voxeljet AG to increase its profitability.
Government green drive also opens an opportunity for procurement of Voxeljet AG products by the state as well as federal government contractors.
The new technology provides an opportunity to Voxeljet AG 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.
Decreasing cost of transportation because of lower shipping prices can also bring down the cost of Voxeljet AG’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.
The market development will lead to dilution of competitor’s advantage and enable Voxeljet AG to increase its competitiveness compare to the other competitors.
Economic uptick and increase in customer spending, after years of recession and slow growth rate in the industry, is an opportunity for Voxeljet AG to capture new customers and increase its market share.
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.

Threats Voxeljet AG Facing - External Strategic Factors

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.
Rising pay level especially movements such as $15 an hour and increasing prices in the China can lead to serious pressure on profitability of Voxeljet AG
Growing strengths of local distributors also presents a threat in some markets as the competition is paying higher margins to the local distributors.
Liability laws in different countries are different and Voxeljet AG may be exposed to various liability claims given change in policies in those markets.
Shortage of skilled workforce in certain global market represents a threat to steady growth of profits for Voxeljet AG in those markets.
Imitation of the counterfeit and low quality product is also a threat to Voxeljet AG’s product especially in the emerging markets and low income markets.
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.
Rising raw material can pose a threat to the Voxeljet AG profitability.

Limitations of SWOT Analysis for Voxeljet AG

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 Voxeljet AG
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 Voxeljet AG

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 Voxeljet AG 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 Voxeljet AG

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)