Australian Agricultural Projects Limited SWOT Analysis / Matrix

Business Essays, Term Papers & Research Papers

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

The Australian Agricultural Projects Limited is one of the leading companies in its industry. Australian Agricultural Projects Limited maintains its dominant 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 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 known as SWOT Matrix.

The Strengths-Weaknesses-Opportunities-Threats (SWOT) Analysis / Matrix helps the managers of the Australian Agricultural Projects Limited 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 primary purpose of SWOT matrix is to identify the strategies that an organization can utilize to exploit external opportunities, counter threats, and build on & protect Australian Agricultural Projects Limited strengths, and eradicate its weaknesses.

Step by Step Guide to Australian Agricultural Projects Limited SWOT Analysis

Strengths of Australian Agricultural Projects Limited – Internal Strategic Factors

As one of the leading companies in its industry, Australian Agricultural Projects Limited 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 Australian Agricultural Projects Limited are –

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• Reliable suppliers – It has a strong base of reliable supplier of raw material thus enabling the company to overcome any supply chain bottlenecks.
• Superb Performance in New Markets – Australian Agricultural Projects Limited 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 Brand Portfolio – Over the years Australian Agricultural Projects Limited has invested in building a strong brand portfolio. The SWOT analysis of Australian Agricultural Projects Limited just underlines this fact. This brand portfolio can be extremely useful if the organization wants to expand into new product categories.
• 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. Australian Agricultural Projects Limited 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.
• Highly successful at Go To Market strategies for its 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.
• Good Returns on Capital Expenditure – Australian Agricultural Projects Limited is relatively successful at execution of new projects and generated good returns on capital expenditure by building new revenue streams.

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Weakness of Australian Agricultural Projects Limited – Internal Strategic Factors

Weakness are the areas where Australian Agricultural Projects Limited 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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• 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.
• 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 Australian Agricultural Projects Limited is successful at integrating small companies it has its share of failure to merge firms that have different work culture.
• The profitability ratio and Net Contribution % of Australian Agricultural Projects Limited are below the industry average.
• 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. Australian Agricultural Projects Limited has to build internal feedback mechanism directly from sales team on ground to counter these challenges.
• 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 Australian Agricultural Projects Limited
• Need more investment in new technologies. Given the scale of expansion and different geographies the company is planning to expand into, Australian Agricultural Projects Limited 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.

Opportunities for Australian Agricultural Projects Limited – 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 Australian Agricultural Projects Limited. In the next few years the company can leverage this opportunity by knowing its customer better and serving their needs using big data analytics.
• Decreasing cost of transportation because of lower shipping prices can also bring down the cost of Australian Agricultural Projects Limited’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.
• Economic uptick and increase in customer spending, after years of recession and slow growth rate in the industry, is an opportunity for Australian Agricultural Projects Limited to capture new customers and increase its market share.
• The new technology provides an opportunity to Australian Agricultural Projects Limited 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.
• The new taxation policy can significantly impact the way of doing business and can open new opportunity for established players such as Australian Agricultural Projects Limited to increase its profitability.
• New trends in the consumer behavior can open up new market for the Australian Agricultural Projects Limited . It provides a great opportunity for the organization to build new revenue streams and diversify into new product categories too.
• 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 Australian Agricultural Projects Limited in other product categories.
• Lower inflation rate – The low inflation rate bring more stability in the market, enable credit at lower interest rate to the customers of Australian Agricultural Projects Limited.

Threats Australian Agricultural Projects Limited Facing - External Strategic Factors

• Imitation of the counterfeit and low quality product is also a threat to Australian Agricultural Projects Limited’s product especially in the emerging markets and low income markets.
• New environment regulations under Paris agreement (2016) could be a threat to certain existing product categories .
• Shortage of skilled workforce in certain global market represents a threat to steady growth of profits for Australian Agricultural Projects Limited   in those markets.
• 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.
• Rising pay level especially movements such as $15 an hour and increasing prices in the China can lead to serious pressure on profitability of Australian Agricultural Projects Limited
• The company can face lawsuits in various markets given - different laws and continuous fluctuations regarding product standards in those markets.
• New technologies developed by the competitor or market disruptor could be a serious threat to the industry in medium to long term future.
• Rising raw material can pose a threat to the Australian Agricultural Projects Limited profitability.

Limitations of SWOT Analysis for Australian Agricultural Projects Limited

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 Australian Agricultural Projects Limited
• 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 Australian Agricultural Projects Limited

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 Australian Agricultural Projects Limited 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 Australian Agricultural Projects Limited

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)