Metallica Minerals Limited SWOT Analysis / Matrix

Business Essays, Term Papers & Research Papers

SWOT analysis is a strategic planning tool that can be used by Metallica Minerals Limited 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) Metallica Minerals Limited is facing in its current business environment.

The Metallica Minerals Limited is one of the leading organizatations in its industry. Metallica Minerals Limited maintains its dominant 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 firm 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 Metallica Minerals Limited to develop four types of strategies:

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

Metallica Minerals Limited swot analysis / matrix

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 Metallica Minerals Limited strengths, and eradicate its weaknesses.

Step by Step Guide to Metallica Minerals Limited SWOT Analysis

Strengths of Metallica Minerals Limited – Internal Strategic Factors

As one of the leading firms in its industry, Metallica Minerals 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 Metallica Minerals Limited are –

Read - Metallica Minerals Limited Porter 5 Forces Analysis & Industry Analysis
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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.
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 – Metallica Minerals 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 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.
Strong Brand Portfolio – Over the years Metallica Minerals Limited has invested in building a strong brand portfolio. The SWOT analysis of Metallica Minerals Limited 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.
Highly successful at Go To Market strategies for its products.
Automation of activities brought consistency of quality to Metallica Minerals Limited products and has enabled the company to scale up and scale down based on the demand conditions in the market.

Weakness of Metallica Minerals Limited – Internal Strategic Factors

Weakness are the areas where Metallica Minerals 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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High attrition rate in work force – compare to other organizations in the industry Metallica Minerals Limited has a higher attrition rate and have to spend a lot more compare to its competitors on training and development of its employees.
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 Metallica Minerals Limited
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.
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 Metallica Minerals Limited is not very good at demand forecasting thus end up keeping higher inventory both in-house and in channel.
Limited success outside core business – Even though Metallica Minerals Limited is one of the leading organizations in its industry it has faced challenges in moving to other product segments with its present 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.
Not highly successful at integrating firms with different work culture. As mentioned earlier even though Metallica Minerals Limited is successful at integrating small companies it has its share of failure to merge firms that have different work culture.

Opportunities for Metallica Minerals Limited – External Strategic Factors

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The new technology provides an opportunity to Metallica Minerals 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.
Decreasing cost of transportation because of lower shipping prices can also bring down the cost of Metallica Minerals 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.
Lower inflation rate – The low inflation rate bring more stability in the market, enable credit at lower interest rate to the customers of Metallica Minerals Limited.
New trends in the consumer behavior can open up new market for the Metallica Minerals Limited . It provides a great opportunity for the organization to build new revenue streams and diversify into new product categories too.
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 Metallica Minerals Limited to drive home its advantage in new technology and gain market share in the new product category.
The new taxation policy can significantly impact the way of doing business and can open new opportunity for established players such as Metallica Minerals Limited to increase its profitability.
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.
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 Metallica Minerals Limited in other product categories.

Threats Metallica Minerals Limited Facing - External Strategic Factors

Imitation of the counterfeit and low quality product is also a threat to Metallica Minerals Limited’s product especially in the emerging markets and low income markets.
Liability laws in different countries are different and Metallica Minerals Limited 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 Metallica Minerals Limited 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.
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 Metallica Minerals Limited
Changing consumer buying behavior from online channel could be a threat to the existing physical infrastructure driven supply chain model.
New environment regulations under Paris agreement (2016) could be a threat to certain existing product categories .

Limitations of SWOT Analysis for Metallica Minerals 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 Metallica Minerals 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 Metallica Minerals 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 Metallica Minerals 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 Metallica Minerals 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)