Innovation Management and SWOT Analysis

The provided document is a comprehensive analysis of innovation management in the context of personal computer and laptop manufacturing. It highlights the significance of SWOT analysis in identifying strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats for businesses. The document also touches upon Porter's Five Forces model to understand industry dynamics, including competitive rivalry, bargaining power of suppliers, threat of substitutes, and more. This analysis provides valuable insights for companies seeking to remain competitive in the market.

Managing Innovation in
Business

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
This report contains a detailed analysis about the importance of managing innovation in
business practices for achieving competitive advantage at marketplace. Innovation support a
company in fulfilling the expectation of its customers by providing unique and more advanced
product or services to them. Apple Incorporation is an American multinational company which is
headquartered in California. It provides a variety of products in category like mobile, computer,
music system and many more related to communication and entertainment. This report contains
an innovational review of Apple from its establishment to its presents and for this assignment is
divided into three parts.
First part includes a detail about innovational history of Apple using various macro
environmental factors that supported them in its success and brining new capabilities to market.
This help company in determining its capabilities that can be used for future innovation. Second
part contains SWOT analysis of Apple that support in determining its present strength that
support in future growth. From this it has been find that brand image and technical capability of
company is strong enough to bring future innovation. Third section consists of industrial analysis
using Porter's five force model for determining the positive forces which support innovation.
From this part it has been found that competition is higher but threat for new entrant is minimum.
Apart from this bargaining power of supplier is also low which provide a option to Apple for
arranging tools and other raw material easily from suppliers. These all support Apple to
maintaining its position in marketplace and continue to bring on innovative product or services.

Table of Contents
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ............................................................................................................2
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
The Organisation & Industry Overview..........................................................................................1
The Organisation and its Innovation History (500 words).....................................................1
The Organisations existing Innovation Performance and Capabilities (800 words)..............2
The Industry............................................................................................................................5
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7

INTRODUCTION
Business innovation is defined as the process of brining fresh idea, process, method,
product or services to market for improving its current performance and to achieve competitive
advantage (Tidd and Bessant, 2014). This report is about Apple Incorporation which was
established in year 1977 with the introduction of first personal computer Apple I in California. It
belong to consumer electronic industry and offers a range of product or services in both
hardware as well as software related to entertainment, communication and media. This report
elaborates about the innovational history of Apple from its inception to till date using PESTLE
analysis. It also involve a detail description related to current capabilities of Apple Incorporation
through SWOT analysis and then industrial analysis using porter's five force model.
The Organisation & Industry Overview
The Organisation and its Innovation History (500 words)
Apple Incorporation is a multinational company established on January 3, 1977 as a
manufacturer and trader of consumer electronic. It deals in both software as well as hardware
along with media and communication related devices. Apple has a great history of success or
achievements in consumer electronics and is a most demanding brand worldwide (Cheng, Yang
and Sheu, 2014). The innovational history of Apple can be better understood using PESTLE
analysis. It depict about various factor which supported company to achieve success in
marketplace.
PESTLE
 Political:- Apple Incorporation started its business from California which maintain a
good political relation with other countries. This supported Apple to expand its business
in other nations and it become able to expand its business worldwide by providing several
gadgets like Ipad, IMac etc.
 Economical:- Globalisation helped in enhancing the economical condition of developed
as well as developing country to a large extend by providing employment opportunity
and increasing the disposable income of people. This social advancement has motivated
company, as customer started demanding more technical advanced and personalised
gadgets. This factor act as a innovation driver for Apple as it started enhancing it
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technical operations and company introduced Macintosh a computer based on graphical
user interface.
 Social:- With the enhancement of living standard, people started updating their paper
based operation into digitalisation which act as a driver of innovation for Apple (Du,
Leten and Vanhaverbeke, 2014). Therefore it started seeking for improvement over its
computer and introduce its first laptop in year 1997 named as “Macintosh power book”
 Technological:- Apple Incorporation first setup its business in California, a techno-
driven country which is known for its innovational support toward military like
aerospace. So this factor supported Apple to a large extend by providing them with
various infrastructure and resource related facilities. This provided Steve Jobs and its
friend with required technical support and they become able to introduce Apple I which
was the first personal computer in 1976.
 Legal:- Introduction of internet for connecting the whole world contribute toward
improving and simplifying the business and communicational activities. But it also brings
up a number of crime with it which leads to increase in demand of security. By assessing
the security demand of people, Apple take an initiative to launch a advance laptop named
as “iMac” in year 2017. This laptop consist of a Secure Enclave coprocessor with a T2
chip which provide a foundation for secure boot, encrypted storage capability and touch
ID which uses fingerprint as a passcode. This support user to keep away unauthorised
access and threats that may affects the system (Trevino and Nelson, 2016).
 Environmental:- The increasing concern of people toward environmental protection,
customers started demanding the products which are produce less harmful radiance and
are recyclable. In order to maintain its market share, Apple started replacing the use of
plastic in gadgets to material which is easier to recycle.
The Organisations existing Innovation Performance and Capabilities (800 words)
Apple Incorporation is one of the best known brand around the world which belong to
consumer electronics and provide several innovational products. Company invest more over
research & development operations in order to identify the opportunities present in market. This
help them in bringing gadgets with innovative and unique feature that further support Apple to
remain always first choice of customers. It has a high skilled and talented technical staff who
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work harder to maintain the capability of company so that they keep on providing innovative
gadgets to its customer for years.
The current innovational products of Apple Incorporation are MacBook Pro, iPad Pro,
iPad mini, MacBook Air etc. From these gadgets MacBook Air is the latest innovation of Apple
and gaining higher attention among people. It is powered by an 8th generation Intel Core dual-
core i5 processor and also includes features like Intel Graphics processor, touch ID and two
thunderbolt 3 port. This provide a more personalised, secure operations with around 8GB of
2133MHz memory with up to 256GB SDD storage which provide a greater customer experience
(The next generation of security, 2018). The current capabilities form up a base for future
innovations. Therefore, it is very essential for Apple Inc. to identify its capabilities on the basis
of internal and external analysis for determining its ability to bring future innovation. This can be
better analysed using SWOT analysis which provide informations regarding the current strength
which support in exploiting future opportunities. It also present information regarding the
weaknesses of Apple along with threats that are required to be consider while brining new
innovation.
SWOT
Strength:-
One of the biggest strength of Apple is its ability to develop and design hardware,
application, software and services. This allows company to introduce unique, advanced and easy
to use products which includes iPad, Macbook etc. Another strength of Apple is its strongest
brand image, as it always focuses on bringing the best to market for fulfilling the expectation of
customers (Dawson and Andriopoulos, 2014). Its innovational product from iPad to Macs are
most successful innovations of Apple and main reason of its attractiveness among people is level
of technological innovation. This support Apple to launch a laptop in MacBook range named as
MacBook Air with advance features that provide higher security assurance using fingerprint as a
passcode along with vast memory and storage option. It always try to provide a seamless
experience to its customers by investing huge amount of fund in R&D to determine the
capabilities required to develop for brining new innovation. This support Apple to manage its
capability to being compatible with changing expectation and for offering innovative product to
customer in future also.
Weakness:-
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Apple is a well known brand for its high-tech and innovational featured product which
provide a seamless experience to customer and a new way to live their life with more
technological advanced gadget (Kindström and Kowalkowski, 2014). But major drawback of
Apple is that it offer products at a premium price which is not affordable to everyone. This factor
has limited the target consumers of company who are able to afford such gadget at premium
price.
Opportunities:-
There are number of opportunities present in front of Apple which company can exploit
for maintaining its position in marketplace and expanding its operations. Apple can broad up its
market share by providing product or services at price which is affordable to customers. Another
major innovational opportunity that Apple can bring in its personal computer is artificial
intelligence where users are not required to provide command through keyboard rather they can
use voice recognition method to make system function. This will be an in-built function which it
can provide that will save user's time.
Apart from this Apple can also bring hologram technology in its current personal
computer or laptops. This will be one of the most advanced and highly acceptable gadget in
market which removes the option of USB or hardware by proving all in one operation. Here it
will make up a virtual image in front of user from where they can operate there system
effectively.
Threat:-
Major threats that are present in front of Apple Incorporation is increasing number of
competitors or substitute product in market. As Apple always become first to bring new or
innovative product which then make it as a trend and also increase the expectation of customers
(Gawer and Cusumano, 2014). Therefore, it leads other competitors to imitate that feature and
offer to its customer at relatively low price. Major competitors of Apple is Microsoft, Dell, HP
etc. which provides a wide range of laptop with various feature at an affordable price.
But increasing competition act as a innovational driver for Apple Incorporation, as with
the introduction of substitute or competitive product, company started seeking for new way to
make its product more innovative and rare which is harder to imitate.
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The Industry
Consumer electronic industry refers to the sector which includes group of companies that
deals in manufacturing and offering of electronic product to customer for personal as well as
business purpose. It includes various types of devices related to the communication,
entertainment and official equipments (Frow and et. al., 2015). This is one of the fastest growing
and evolving industry where trends changes on frequently and new innovations are introduced on
daily bases. Industry involves huge competition as companies like Microsoft, Samsung, Apple,
HP etc. are the biggest player under consumer electronic industry. These companies making
competition tougher day by day by brining new or innovational product to the market for
offering customers beyond their expectation to make their life much easier. It has been assumed
that in past 10 years the innovation in computer and related devices are increasing continuously.
This has enhanced the thinking capacity of players in industry and as a result of which the they
keep on innovating products.
Therefore, consumer electronic industry is offering innovative product and also
motivating companies under this sector to bring on more innovative and technologically
advanced gadgets for fulfilling the expectations of customers. For instance, Apple is planing to
introduce more advanced feature in its personal computer as well as laptop range i.e. hologram
and artificial intelligence. These features will changes the whole way in which computers are
being operated by providing more advanced feature in current system. In order to use current
capabilities for future innovation it is very essential for a company to analyse the industry to
determine the growth opportunities present in marketplace (Schaltegger and Wagner, 2017).
This can be done using Porter's five force model which consists of five major factors that directly
influence the operations performed by a company. These are as explained below:
 Threats of new entrants:- Consumer electronic is one of the most competitive industry
which always focuses on bringing new technology and innovational product in
marketplace. Therefore the threat of new entrant is very less because it requires lots of
capital as well as technical assistance for setup business and offering product to market
where large number of competitors are present.
 Buyer power:- The buyers power is relatively higher in consumer electronics as there are
number of options available to customers to choose from where they get similar featured
product at price of their choice.
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 Supplier power:- Bargaining power of suppliers are relatively lower as there are large
number of suppliers present in market who are ready to provide raw material at lower
price. This provide companies to choose from range of suppliers for offering their
services.
 Threats of substitute:- Threat regarding the availability of substitute product in market
is relatively higher in consumer electronics as there are number of competitors present
who always seeks an opportunity to bring innovative product for differentiating them
over others (Rothaermel, 2015).
 Competitive rivalry:- Competition is relatively higher in this industry for personal
computer and laptops as there are number of well established companies which offer
similar products in term of technology.
CONCLUSION
From the above given image it can be concluded that innovation is one of the major
factor that must be consider by each company to fulling the expectation of its customer and
remain competitive in marketplace. For determining the innovation that can be offered to market,
a company must perform SWOT analysis. This help in determining the strength that a company
have which support them in forming a base for exploiting the opportunity present in market. But
before introducing any innovation in marketplace, company must perform industrial analysis
using porter's five force model.
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REFERENCES
Books & Journals
Cheng, C. C., Yang, C. L. and Sheu, C., 2014. The link between eco-innovation and business
performance: a Taiwanese industry context. Journal of Cleaner Production. 64. pp.81-
90.
Dawson, P. and Andriopoulos, C., 2014. Managing change, creativity and innovation. Sage.
Du, J., Leten, B. and Vanhaverbeke, W., 2014. Managing open innovation projects with science-
based and market-based partners. Research Policy. 43(5). pp.828-840.
Frow, P. and et. al., 2015. Managing co‐creation design: A strategic approach to innovation.
British Journal of Management. 26(3). pp.463-483.
Gawer, A. and Cusumano, M. A., 2014. Industry platforms and ecosystem innovation. Journal of
Product Innovation Management. 31(3). pp.417-433.
Kindström, D. and Kowalkowski, C., 2014. Service innovation in product-centric firms: A
multidimensional business model perspective. Journal of Business & Industrial
Marketing. 29(2). pp.96-111.
Rothaermel, F. T., 2015. Strategic management. McGraw-Hill Education,.
Schaltegger, S. and Wagner, M., 2017. Managing the business case for sustainability: The
integration of social, environmental and economic performance. Routledge.
Tidd, J. and Bessant, J., 2014. Strategic innovation management. John Wiley & Sons.
Trevino, L. K. and Nelson, K. A., 2016. Managing business ethics: Straight talk about how to do
it right. John Wiley & Sons.
Online
The next generation of security. 2018. [Online] Available
through<https://www.apple.com/in/macos/security/>./
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