The Impact of Innovation, Ethics & CSR on OCADO Group PLC Business

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of the impact of innovation, business ethics, and corporate social responsibility on modern business organizations, with a specific focus on OCADO Group PLC. It examines how innovation drives competitive advantages, organizational changes, and strategic partnerships for OCADO, while also addressing associated risks and uncertainties. Furthermore, the report explores the influence of business ethics and CSR on OCADO's reputation, talent retention, and environmental impact, utilizing Carroll's Pyramid of CSR to evaluate OCADO's economic, legal, ethical, and philanthropic responsibilities. The analysis highlights OCADO's efforts in balancing technological advancements with ethical considerations and societal expectations, contributing to a sustainable and responsible business model. Desklib offers similar solved assignments and resources for students.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY..................................................................................................................................3
Impact of innovation on modern business organization.............................................................3
Impact of business ethics and corporate social responsibilities on modern business
organization.................................................................................................................................6
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Modern organization itself describes the organization as boundary-less in terms of networking as
well as collaborating together. They have well suitable properties towards the innovation as well
as the organizational ethics in business practices. Modern businesses have become ideal among
the companies that wants to grow in the technical industries. This business report includes the
impact as well as the critical analysis of the of innovation upon modern industry and the way
company is facing changes due to the innovation are also included in this study. Moreover, the
business ethics and the complete practices towards the CSR activities are also included in the
study. Application of business concept to the company OCADO Group PLC have been added in
the report.
MAIN BODY
Company profile: OCADO group PLC is a technology leading platform using software and
robotics in the business to provide end to end unique solutions to the online grocery around the
world. OCADO now have a joint venture with Mark & Spencers in the UK. OCADO have latest
technologies and expertise, with these any company can create their own unique grocery
shopping services. These type of modern business are in a major demand nowadays.
Impact of innovation on modern business organization
OCADO Group PLC is also a type of modern business within the industry and there are various
factors among industries that have an influence over these modern businesses. Among them
innovation is the one. Introduction of the Innovation in the modern business have provided
technological growths to the industry in terms of the biggest improvement in life and as a result,
modern companies that are embracing innovation have advantages over meeting the demands of
customers (Gittins and Morland, 2021). Here are main critical factors are defined in the terms of
impact of innovation in modern business organization.
The innovation has various impacts upon the business organization among environment,
organization and the strategical categories.
Competitive advantages
The introduction of innovation among the modern businessn it have many more competitive
advantages Over the traditional business(Rodríguez-López and Souto,2020). Through

implimentationof the innovation, a larger firm tends to became a leader within thwe market. The
successful implimentation of the innovation with the technology leads the firm in the terms of
growrth. (Viriyasitavat and Hoonsopon, 2019). If the market is already too competitive within
the industry then the profit of the firms are very low generally but with the innovation within the
process leads the company towards a big decent growth in the terms of profit. OCADO have
been successful within the industry by innovating technologies as well as the Artificial
intelligence interface within the internal process. Through the IP the companty has developed,
assebling of the technologies within the business of OCADO became very profitable. The
introduction of AL had mazximised the operational wefficiency og the company and that
effeiciency lead the company towards the better customer experience and the growth of the base
within the customer population boosted up the growth scale of OCADO.
Organizational impact
 Instant reaction towards the changing conditions: The organizations within the
modern era facing the different challenges in the industry (Baykara, 2018). As the
government of the industry is changing the regulations are also changing frequently and
that is having a huge impact upon the businesses. With the changes among the
technological standards as well as the customer trends are affecting the pattern of
organization working. To become sustainable within the market, OCADO industries are
also adopting the eco-friendly as well as technical artificial intelligence techniques in
their routine (Ridoutt, Hendrie and Noakes, 2017). On the implementation of the
innovation in these practices OCADO Group PLC is reacting quickly towards these
changes and efficiently becoming successful as well.
 Market growth and gives the new identity: The biggest threat for any company is new
entrants offering the products at lower prices comparatively. To differentiate own
company from the new entrant the introduction of innovation became compulsory.
OCADO is providing unique solution to the companies to ease their approach to the
customer and product delivery to the customers. After all the growth of OCKADO, it is
now being listed withinh the top online grocery retailers in UK (Craft, 2021).
 New market development: Innovation provides ideas and the opportunity to enter a new
market by implementing new business models, strategies in the business. For the new

entry the company have to transfer the technologies and the business model as well but
by keeping the existing industry model in the mind. OCKADO is providing new and
different software solution to each customer companies. As per the new technologies ,
the company has reported 40% growth in the duration of lockdown.
 Efficiency increment and cost reduction: Innovation leads the company to reduces the
cost of the product as well as the efficiency increases as by innovating new ideas within
the strategy of the company, the efficiency and effectiveness of the company can be
significantly increased.
Strategic impact
 Partnership with the leading retailers: OCADO is providing end to end solutions to of
e-commerce and fulfilling the solution to the leading retailers. With the innovation and
unique solution company have partnered with market leader retailers (Lu, 2020). The
company is providing three type of solution to the customers as Software with cloud
based architecture, hardware with the warehouse automation and the service supports
that includes the account management with the use of technology.
 Networking effect: Adds up the value towards the society: By introducing smart
technologies under the business practices it is possible to innovate the idea of the
business and the organization gets added values in the industry. By reducing the resource
consumption as well as the individuals, it is possible to implement the innovation within
the business of OCADO and that effects the networking of the company. Different
companies demand different technologies within the same industries so introducing the
innovation in between the trend of company have extra advantages in the terms of better
and improved custom network or company network.
 Impact, Investment, Expand: These are the challenges for the OCADO as with the
ongoing transformation, the aligning of reporting structures are becoming complex. In
the term of investment, the innovation is impacting in the form of complex advanced tool
that are needed to roll over the simultaneous project over the globe (Morabito, 2017). To
increase the velocity within the benefits of the businesses, the innovation is being a sort
of threat to the company. However, the threats are being managed carefully with unique
capabilities of the company.

Risk and uncertainties
As the OCADO is implementing all the new technologies under the innovation, This is resulting
the business in terms of the risk and uncertainties (Jakimowicz and Rzeczkowski, 2019). There
are 13 risks, identified under the report of financial times (Annual Financial Report, 2021).
 Declination risk in the high level services
 Failing to maintain the broad customer base
 Risk the pricing level current solutions
 Sustainable infrastructure for multiple solutions
 Risk of delay in program delivery
 Technological innovation supersedes the improved offer
 Risk of failing to protect their own IP
 Risk of disruption in the supply chain
 Safety incident risk
 Risk of change in regulation in business model
 Negative effect due to changes in the geopolitical as well as the economic environment
using Brexit
 Cyber attack and confidentiality risk
 Risk of interruption in the business.
Impact of business ethics and corporate social responsibilities on modern business organization
Business ethics includes appropriate policies under the business and the practices of the
controversial subjects within the industry. Impact of the Business ethics on OCKADO business
also includes the factors that have relationship with the environment, social and the organization.
Organizational impact Improve the business reputation: By using ethics as well as the policies of governance,
OCADO have increased their revenue drastically in the few past years and now they have
25% shares of online grocery market in UK (Annual Financial Report, 2021). The fair
environment as well as the business practices allows the company to grow exponentially
with the improvement in their business reputation.

 Helps to retain the top talent: By empowering the employees and enhancing their skills
by treating them equally tends towards their better performance towards the target
achievement. They remain loyal towards the organization as well as towards the industry.
 Equality and diversity: By utilizing the ethics in the business practice, OCKADO had
limited the risk of conflicts between the organizations. The employer at OCKADO
follows the ethics and policies of the equality and diversity and as a result the
environment of the company is free from the discrimination on the bases of age., sex,
gender, religion etc. They empower and appreciate all the employees that leads to the
motivation in between the employees of the organization.
Environmental impact
Cayroll's pyramid of CSR:
This model of CSR suggest the responsibilities of the corporate to be fulfilled in the term four
level and these levels are : Economic level, legal level. Ethical level and the philanthropic level.
This all levels are set up in the pyramid form. This pyramid helps the companies to think about
the holistically of CSR. As the CSR activities can be described in the range of the philanthropic
giving as well as the skilled voluntarism, donations, all the skills are required to be in frame and
measured with respect to the campaign conducted with the CSR model.
Implication of Cayroll's CSR model on OCADO:Organizations should engage in between the
all levels of the pyramid model describing the corporate social responsibility within the industry
(Constantinescu, and Kaptein, 2020).
All the four level of the pyramid model contain the characteristics in the terms of Economic,
legal, Ethical, Philanthropic Whereas the lower most level is lebelled as Economical whereas it
is used to describe the “Turn a profit”, The lower layer tagged as Legal which follows the law.
The ethical layer is described on the basis of “Be an organization that is ethical” moreover the
top most layer is Philanthropic that explain the moral practice of “Be a good corporate citizen”.
These types of responsibilities impacting OCADO is can be detailed here as:
 Economic responsibilities: It is the most basic level of the pyramid as well as the
business practice responsibilities. At this level the organization need to create profit
followed in the term of growth. OCADO is following the same practice and without
being successful in this practice it became almost near to impossible to do any CSR work

within the business. If the respective company shows interest in society supporting over a
long time period then the company must haver to meet all the requirement of the core
responsibilities in the favour of economy (Anheier, Krlev. and Mildenberger, 2018). For
an example If the OCADO wants to change the approach of using technologies within the
programming or the artificial intelligence and want to move forward toward the eco-
friendly practices within the industry then the have to move towards the lesser carbon
emission as well as they have to force the other customer companies to follow the
economical obligations with the lower costing. This way logistic and the retailers can
adopt the economical responsibilities within their business practices.
 Ethical responsibilities: This level of pyramid is all about the expectations of the society
(Ferrell And et. al., 2019). The management of OCADO makes the moral decision that
affects the business or company, consumers, environment as well as the employees.
Word of mouth as well as the perception of the customer company impacts upon the
bottom line of OCADO. As an example whenever the employees of OCADO speaks
about the internal practices of the company to the external people of organization then
most of the companies think to fire those employees by following the economical legal
rights but the OCADO leaders make the calculations to cost benefit practices. They use
the weighted perception of the external people or organization and inflict that idea into
the economical reality of the company by choosing the innovation techniques as well as
the new solutions within the business. This type of consideration cuts the core of values
within the organization.
 Legal responsibility: Organization implies the laws and regulation following the
business regulation in their business practices. These legal rules are decided by the
government of respective country at where the organization is operating. OCADO also
follows all the regulation decided by the UK government as in the form of social
contract. OCADO follows all the responsibilities as it remember the government is the
one to form the market through the legal interventions, taxes, fines etc. So the citizen of
the respective countries have the power to empower their leader to be governed in the
context companies do conduct their business. OCADO follows the regulation that affects

the legal framework of the environment such as clean air, water without those the
survival of human is not possible. They follow the level designated by the government
towards the environment safety because negative consequences can leads the company
towards the legal proceedings. Moreover they are leading the radical reducing within
their own operations.
 Philanthropic responsibilities: Generous contribution of the company towards the
community comes under philanthropic responsibilities. Modern consumers within the
industries as well as the modern customers in the market wants the interconnection in
between to do business within the community. OCADO has built the philanthropic
operation in the form of OCADO foundation. Within the foundation the OCADA group
is leveraging their passion for technology as well as the knowledge to the people around
the community to equip them in life of those people. They are accessing learning in the
for the better future of the community as well as the society.
 Protecting the environment and trying to reduce the carbon foot print: By following
the policies as well as the practices following these business ethics, OCADO is taking
the responsibilities to consider the factors protection and care towards the environment.
By the impact, intensity of carbon footprint has been decreased as well as the efficiency
has been increased as the company always striving for more sustainable process within
the business. On implicating all these practices the company is trying to protect the
potential environment.
Social impact
Socio-economic development: By implicating the business ethics and CSR activities within the
business practices the company is significantly affecting the employment as well as the safety to
the retail industry (Kohler, and Chesbrough, 2019). The company OCADO adopt the practices
related to the employee within the organization.
CONCLUSION
From the above study it can be concluded as the innovation and the business ethics with
corporate social responsibility have major impact upon the modern business. OCADO Group
PLC have majorly beneficial Impact with the innovation in terms of growth and market image.

On following these business practices the company is developing socially, economically. In
between the organizational as well as the environmental prospectus the company is doing pretty
good within the industry. However on the contrary note, company is facing some risk of
uncertainties but overall OCADO is trying to balance these risk with the better strategical
practices among the business.

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Annual Financial Report, 2021. [Online]. Available through
<https://markets.ft.com/data/announce/detail?dockey=1323-14858542-
4PHQPA4VA7KV24S1ONQ143BV6E >
Craft, 2021. [Online]. Available through <https://craft.co/ocado/competitors>