Essay Example on XYZ Ltd: Strategic Analysis of Established Electronics Company

Introduction

XYZ Limited is a company involved in the production of electronic products to the consumer. It has a presence in 45 countries across the world. The company was established in 1977 and currently has 17,765 employees. The company's average annual revenue is $2.8 million.

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Strategic Analysis

Strengths

XYZ's biggest strength is the solid market base that it has established. While the company cannot march established electronics companies like Sony and Samsung, it still has its fair share of the sizeable market that it controls. This market assures XYZ of meeting its sales targets each year, thus providing stability (van Wijngaarden, Scholten, & van Wijk, 2012). The other competitive strength for XYZ is its ability to churn out high-quality and long-lasting products to the market. It has helped the company to retain many of its customers, and customer retention is one of the key pillars for financial stability to any business. Finally, the ability to a large variety of products has also proved to be the strength to XYZ Company (Gurel & Tat, 2017). The company produces 3,500 different brands of electronic products enabling its customer base to have a variety of choices to pick. The product varieties put the organization in a strong position to come up with different strategies for market segmentation.

Weaknesses

XYZ's biggest weakness is the pricing of its products. Most of the company's products are sold in the Asian market, where the income per capita is relatively low as compared to many developed nations in Europe and America. Some potential customers find XYZ's products to be relatively expensive as compared to the competitors' prices. XYZ loses a chance of tapping this group of customers who opt for price over quality (Kajanus, Leskinen, Kurttila, & Kangas, 2012). I may be part of the reason why XYZ's annual revenue has been stagnant for the last ten years despite the growth in the consumer population. The second weakness in the organization is inefficient management (Yuan, 2013). XYZ was founded by two brothers, and since its inception, the company has been embroiled in leadership wrangles all through. There are two camps in the company, both fighting for leadership, and these disputes have undermined the company's quest to come up with a growth strategy.

Opportunities

One opportunity staring at XYZ Limited is the emerging market. The company produces a wide range of products, including household appliances. Initially, most of the consumers of household appliances used to be people from developed regions like Europe and North America. The paradigm has shifted as the poor nations strive to move to developing nations' status as the developing nations work towards becoming developed nations. The shift has resulted in an increase in household income in the poor and developing nation households. These households are now investing in home appliances like television sets and music systems (Goranczewski & Puciato, 2010). XYZ has an opportunity to take advantage of this development by venturing into more markets in developing and poor nations. Secondly, with a huge working force and stable financial base, the company has an opportunity to invest in the production of new products that are necessitated by the advancement in technology (Akhavan, Barak, Maghsoudlou, & Antucheviciene, 2015). They include more internet, Bluetooth, and Wi-fi enabled products to the market.

Threats

XYZ's biggest threat is the stiff competition from its direct rivals. Large electronic organizations like Samsung, Sony, Phillips, and Panasonic pose a danger to the existence of XYZ Company in the long run. These companies have bigger budgets and attract the best talents as employees (Seker & Ozgurler, 2012). As a result, they produce incredibly high-quality products at a relatively lower price as compared to XYZ's products. They benefit from the economies of scale to minimize the production costs and have the financial power to market their products aggressively. They may drive XYZ out of the market if it does not strategize to remain competitive. The second threat is the volatility of electronic products (Rachid & El Fadel, 2013). Products that are relevant now may not be applicable after a short period as technology makes them irrelevant quickly, thus doing planning for expansion to be a tricky affair.

Strategies and Tactics

The plan is gaining market share in the competitive market. It involves gaining new customers in the existing market and venturing into new markets for expansion purposes (Spee & Jarzabkowski, 2011). The company will gain new customers by reviewing the cost price of its products downwards. The cost price can be reduced by cutting down on operational costs. Unnecessary and expensive services like cleaning and security, shall be outsourced so that there can be a lean and professional team doing that job at a lower price. Investment in modern technological equipment will also cut down on the cost of producing electronic products (Poister, 2010). The reduction in operational costs will lead to a decrease in the prices of the company's products so that they can compete with other products in the market.

Action plan

This strategy will be bestowed in the hands of the production manager, the human resource manager, and the finance manager (Albrechts, 2013). The plan must be implemented within three years.

Monitoring and evaluation

The plan shall be monitored quarterly for its effectiveness, and a team of independent auditors shall be contracted to monitor the progress. The affected managers are expected to release periodic reports every three months on the development of the plan.

Communication of the strategy

The board of directors shall receive a copy of the plan for their approval. A copy will also be sent to the employees so that they can buy into the idea for more straightforward implementation as they will have understood better what their responsibilities are (Wolf & Floyd, 2017). A meeting for the employees shall be held as face-to-face communication is an effective method of presenting information to a team.

XYZ Strategic plan

Strategic Objectives and XYZ Goals Key Performance indicators Implementation

Financial:

• Grow the revenue of the company by 10% each year
• Maintain a net profit margin at 15% every year Increase in sales:
• Sales to increase by at least $1,000,000 annually Come up with a strategic implementation team led by the implementation manager (Song, Im, Bij, & Song, 2011).

Customer:

• Form a strong relationship with the customers
• Aspire to become the leading technology resource in the Asian region Reduction in production costs:
• Production costs to reduce by 10% annually Hold people charged with implementation accountable for success or failure of the plan

Internal/Operational:

• Continue investing in modern technology for innovation
• Achieve a lean and efficient workforce by outsourcing some services

Increase in the customer base:

A 30% increase in customer base annually Develop an incentive implementation plan to motivate those charged with implementation (Tohidi, Jafari, & Afshar, 2010).

People and community:

• Offer further training of our workers for improved productivity
• Engage more in corporate social responsibility (Galbreath, 2010). Provide training and coaching for the attainment of desired results
• Conduct regular implementation meetings every Monday of the week

References

Akhavan, P., Barak, S., Maghsoudlou, H., & Antucheviciene, J. (2015). FQSPM-SWOT for strategic alliance planning and partner selection; case study in a holding car manufacturer company. Technological and Economic Development of Economy, 21(2), 165-185.

Albrechts, L. (2013). Reframing strategic spatial planning by using a coproduction perspective. Planning theory, 12(1), 46-63.

Galbreath, J. (2010). Drivers of corporate social responsibility: The role of formal strategic planning and firm culture. British Journal of Management, 21(2), 511-525.

Goranczewski, B., & Puciato, D. (2010). SWOT analysis in the formulation of tourism development strategies for destinations. tourism, 20(2), 45-53.

Gurel, E., & Tat, M. (2017). SWOT analysis: a theoretical review. Journal of International Social Research, 10(51).

Kajanus, M., Leskinen, P., Kurttila, M., & Kangas, J. (2012). Making use of MCDS methods in SWOT analysis-Lessons learnt in strategic natural resources management. Forest Policy and Economics, 20, 1-9.

Poister, T. H. (2010). The future of strategic planning in the public sector: Linking strategic management and performance. Public Administration Review, 70, s246-s254.

Rachid, G., & El Fadel, M. (2013). Comparative SWOT analysis of strategic environmental assessment systems in the Middle East and North Africa region. Journal of environmental management, 125, 85-93.

Seker, S., & Ozgurler, M. (2012). Analysis of the Turkish consumer electronics firm using SWOT-AHP method. Procedia-social and behavioral sciences, 58, 1544-1554.

Song, M., Im, S., Bij, H. V. D., & Song, L. Z. (2011). Does strategic planning enhance or impede innovation and firm performance?. Journal of Product Innovation Management, 28(4), 503-520.

Spee, A. P., & Jarzabkowski, P. (2011). Strategic planning as communicative process. Organization studies, 32(9), 1217-1245.

Tohidi, H., Jafari, A., & Afshar, A. A. (2010). Strategic planning in Iranian educational organizations. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 2(2), 3904-3908.

van Wijngaarden, J. D., Scholten, G. R., & van Wijk, K. P. (2012). Strategic analysis for health care organizations: the suitability of the SWOTanalysis. The International journal of health planning and management, 27(1), 34-49.

Wolf, C., & Floyd, S. W. (2017). Strategic planning research: Toward a theory-driven agenda. Journal of Management, 43(6), 1754-1788.

Yuan, H. (2013). A SWOT analysis of successful construction waste management. Journal of Cleaner Production, 39, 1-8.