Strategic Management and Sustainability

Strategic Management
and Sustainability

Contents
Introduction...............................................................................................................................................3
Main Body..................................................................................................................................................3
Company Background and strategic direction.........................................................................................3
External Business Environment...............................................................................................................4
Industry Analysis.....................................................................................................................................6
Internal Business Environment................................................................................................................8
SWOT ANALYSIS.................................................................................................................................9
Strategic Growth Choices......................................................................................................................10
Strategic Positioning..............................................................................................................................12
Sustainability competitive advantage.....................................................................................................12
Evaluating strategy................................................................................................................................14
Conclusion................................................................................................................................................15

Introduction
Strategic management define as an essential function which is considered as an ongoing
planning, examining, identifying as well as assessing all the essential necessities which is
required by a business organization in order to meet their goals and targets. It has been said that
there is a continuous and rapid change in the environments will requires a business organizations
to assess all their strategies in order to get success and long term sustainability at the
marketplace. In other words it is said that strategic management is a process which assists a
business organizations in order to take stock of their current environment, develop strategies,
deploy them as well as examining the effectiveness of all the executed management strategies.
On the other hand, sustainability refers to the process of meeting all the needs without doing any
kind of compromises for meeting the needs of future generations (Barbosa-Castañeda, Ayarza
and Ferreira, 2020). In this report, a base company is chosen which is AstraZeneca PLC in order
to conduct the whole report in an effective manner. This is a British-Swedish international
pharmaceutical as well as biopharmaceutical organization. The company was founded in the year
1999 and its headquarter is located in Cambridge, England. The business entity was established
through a merger established between the Swedish Astra AB & the British Zeneca Group. In the
present report various elements are going to be discussed with the help of which overall
knowledge and understanding of learners will be improved. It includes external as well as
internal business environment condition which assist in modifying strategies of the company so
that they will be able to gain positive outcomes. Along with this, there is a detail industry
analysis which help in identifying the competition level as well as company position at the
marketplace. Apart from this detail information about the growth choices are going to be
discussed in this report so that best and most suitable growth strategy will be adopted.
Main Body
Company Background and strategic direction
In the present report, AstraZeneca PLC is chosen as the base organization which is a
British-Sweden multinational organization deals in medical and pharmaceutical sector. The
company was established and start functioning in the year 1999. Astra AB is an organization
which was established in the year 1913 in Södertälje, Sweden, with the help of around 400

doctors & apothecaries. In the year 1993 the British chemicals organization ICI demerged their
pharmaceuticals businesses along with its agrochemicals as well as specialties businesses in
order to form a Zeneca Group plc. At the end, finally in the year 1999 Astra as well as Zeneca
Group merged so that they can form AstraZeneca plc, and its headquarters is located in London.
Research and Development team of the company is based in US, Cambridge, Maryland, Gaithers
burg and Mölndal, Sweden. AstraZeneca is a pharmaceutical company who have its portfolio of
various products for some major disease which consist of cancer, gastrointestinal, cardiovascular,
respiratory, infection, neuroscience, inflammation and many more. It is necessary for the
business organization to develop effective strategies and policies which will help them to
perform all their defined task and objectives in an effective way (Beckmann, Schaltegger and
Landrum, 2020). It has also been said that the strategy of the pharmaceutical company is that
they must drive by some innovative science where the main focus is on delivery of effective,
life-changing medicines which will assist infueling growth as well as contributing and adding
value to the patients along with the society. Apart from this, access of the organization to the
healthcare strategy aims that they increase the access to healthcare for those under-served patient
among the populations which consist of three factors: providing high-quality, appropriate as well
as effective medicines to those who requires them. It has also been said that the strategy of
AstraZeneca assist in order to address affordability as well as healthcare barriers and ensuring to
provide effective as well as high-quality medicines to those people who requires them. In order
to do business and gain sustainability at the competitive marketplace, it is necessary for the
business organizations to modify their strategies and policies as per the changing environment
and requirements of customers. This will assist them in order to maintain long term sustainability
of the company at the competitive marketplace.
External Business Environment
External environment is one of the most influential factor which affect the whole
business performance in both positive and negative way. It is necessary for the management
team to conduct an external environment analysis, for which PESTEL analysis is the most
suitable approach. PESTEL analysis define as a strategic tool used by business organizations in
order to examine the macro environment of a business entity (Boyd, 2020). In reference to the
present organization, changes within the macro-environment elements have their direct