MGMT19128 Strategy and Change: Otis Elevator | Case Study

Critically analyse the external environmental forces influencing the company, 

Answer:

Introduction of the company

The Otis elevator is American organisations that are responsible for developing and manufacturing the elevators, escalators and movable walkways. It has headquarters in Farmington, Connecticut and United States. It was founded in year 1853.It is one of the largest manufacturer companies for deploying transportation system equipment’s. It offers its product and services in more than 200 countries and maintains approximately 1.9 million elevators across the globe. It is the unit of a leading service provider that is United Technologies Corp., which is a leading organisation in the building industry. It is a service based organisation which has covered a wide area across the globe. The revenue of the company is approximately 1,234.1 crores USD (2017). Apart from that, Otis also has a wide range of network in the field of engineering facilities. It has focused on shaping the better future.

The external environmental forces that influenced OTIS

Some of the factors that impact the development of an organisation are developed below. Before launching can strategic marketing plan it is necessary to understand the external factors the affect the firm (Flynn, 2018). In case of OTIS, some of the external environmental forces that influenced the company are:

The economy and capital market- The economy and profit margin of the company depend upon the rate at which customers borrow the product (Rogers & Marvin, 2016). The profit margin also fluctuates due to the variation in currency rates.

Emerging technologies- In the market the innovation is growing at a fast phase as it becomes difficult for the organisation to maintain their good brand image in the market. Thus, the competitors may bet the existing technology by innovating new plans (Rogers & Marvin, 2016). In case of OTIS, they work on latest technology that is cable free elevators and multi-directional.  

Laws- These are the other factors that influences the workflow of an organisation. OTIS has captured its market in more than 200 countries, as every country has their own laws that can be a threat for the organisation (Info enterprenurs, 2017). It indirectly affects the financial source of the local companies present. The regional aid policies are different for every country that is one of the factors that affect the customer demand (Wesson, et. al, 2017). It becomes difficult in figuring out the demand of the customers (Miyajima,  Hootsmans & Ikeda, 2017). Every organisation should have detail knowledge about the rules of other country so that they can design the plans accordingly.

Social and cultural factors- OTIS is affected by belief of an individual and their patterns in accepting to the trend and new innovation (Christy, Montague, Stanley & Williams, 2016). The external factor like demographic factor also affects the organisation as the marketing trend change with location.

The other factor that affects the organisation is product differential. The arrival of new products in the market is not differentiable by the customers in many cases. In case of OTIS elevators, they spend a huge amount of money to bring up innovative ideas so that they can break the barrier for entering in the market (Miyajima,  Hootsmans & Ikeda, 2017). Essential technologies are deployed so that they can protect the supply of necessary raw materials that may not be accessible by the external environment.

The capabilities and competencies of Otis

The capabilities support the firm for bringing out favourable outcome. Some of the capabilities of Otis are its innovation and creativity that allow the firm to maintain all the information from distinct places. It helps in becoming alert and tracking down the issues so that down time becomes shorter (Garfinkel, Thebeau,  Watterson,  Lee & Yamane, 2016). There are various new technologies that were initiated by Otis that ramped the energy in the market and also eliminated the need of machine room to operate the system.  The major capability of Otis Elevator Company Limited is its partnership networking and its acquisition. Otis innovated the use of carbon fire in elevators that increased the overall speed and enhanced the performance by allowing traveling more than 1km in a single go. It actually doubled the speed if compared with steel cables (Noxon, Jefferson,  Yang & Karduck, 2018). The Otis also started up their e-service system that helps in recording the performance so that clients can directly request in case of any query. The interface provided by the company is very flexible as they permitted the clients to choose the number of floors they need and permit them to choose their requirement accordingly (Guo, Fang,  Pan & Li, 2016). The quality of elevators and other services are quiet high, like in case Otis the capacity to carry passengers in a single run is quiet high. They have also introduced the concept of security safety by in building an alarm and fire support system.

On the other hand, there are some competencies that are faced by the firm. Identifying the weaknesses is important as it helps in determine the area is which improvement is required. The flaws help in developing the skills so that efficiency of an organization could be enhanced (Lincoln, Birnkrant & Schmidt, 2018). ThyssenKrupp is one of the weaknesses if considering the case of competitors in terms of technological development.  They have come up with much advancement by developing multidirectional elevators. This captured the market and affected the sale of Otis simultaneously.  

Some of the past accidents due to elevators have degraded the brand image, thus it is difficult to retain the brand image as it got hampered due to past experience. There are other competitors who are providing same services like KONE and Schindler, they are ultimately creating competition in the market.

Otis capabilities and competencies are sufficient to cope with the future challenges 

There are various plans that are designed by the organisation like some emergency schemes are planned so that it case of failure they could be undertaken. They have the capability to survive in the market for longer run as they discover the factors of the other competitors so that good policies could be discovered. They have a high client contact that will help Otis to make up a good network by offering them a positive experience (Lincoln, Birnkrant & Schmidt, 2018). They aim to establish strong activities so that attract new customers and compete with the demand from the market. Some of the issues that were faced by Otis is addressing the complexity of users need and understanding the impact of service in the society. The future challenges can be overcome by keeping complete analyses of the market demand. Otis elevators believed in building rapport so that all the trading barriers could be found so that skill acquisition is achieved (Schroeder, et. al, 2017). On the other hand, to improve the profit the policies are formed to increase the sale of the company. They started up with many legitimate activities so that business could be reinforced. The negative behaviour and the poor experience with the service degrade the brand image (Miller, Fargo, Traktovenko & Hubbard, 2017). The complexity of service user needs are resolved by fitting the The good cash flow of an organisation is important to be managed as it offers them alert about new opportunities so that risk can be mitigated.

Conclusion

From the above discussion it can be stated that Otis has various environmental factors that influenced its working. Some of them have been discussed in the report. The capabilities and competencies that are faced by the firm are also listed. The ways to cope up the organisation goals are discussed along with its future challenges. In case of OTIS elevators, they spend a huge amount of money to bring up innovative ideas so that they can break the barrier for entering in the market. .  The major capability of Otis Elevator Company Limited is its partnership networking and its acquisition. The future threats and possibilities are found and ways are initiated through which complexities could be addressed. Thus, it can be stated that for an organization to come in the market they need to use trending technology so that they can bet the competitors.  

References

Christy, T., Montague, W., Stanley, J., & Williams, D. (2016). U.S. Patent No. 9,296,588. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Flynn, M. P. (2018). U.S. Patent No. 9,896,304. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Garfinkel, M., Thebeau, R. E., Watterson, L. C., Lee, S., & Yamane, K. (2016). U.S. Patent No. 9,296,591. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Guo, W., Fang, Y., Pan, W., & Li, D. (2016). Archives as a trusted third party in maintaining and preserving digital records in the cloud environment. Records Management Journal, 26(2), 170-184.

Info enterprenurs. (2017). THE CHALLENGES OF GROWING A BUSINESS - AND HOW TO MEET THEM. Retrieved from https://www.infoentrepreneurs.org/en/guides/the-challenges-of-growing-a-business---and-how-to-meet-them/.

Lincoln, D. L., Birnkrant, M. J., & Schmidt, W. R. (2018). U.S. Patent No. 9,988,242. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Miller, R. M., Fargo, R. N., Traktovenko, B., & Hubbard, J. L. (2017). U.S. Patent No. 9,725,282. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Miyajima, N., Hootsmans, N. A. M., & Ikeda, M. (2017). U.S. Patent No. 9,802,788. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Noxon, J. E., Jefferson, E. W., Yang, L. M., & Karduck, W. C. (2018). U.S. Patent No. 9,998,581. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Rogers, K. W., & Marvin, D. J. (2016). U.S. Patent No. 9,422,135. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Schroeder-Brumloop, H. L., Rebillard, P., Sirigu, G., Dukacz, O. S., Stripling, R. S., Illan, J. A., ... & Martin, J. (2017). U.S. Patent No. 9,637,349. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Wesson, J. P., Thompson, M. S., Irish, J. R., Veronesi, W. A., Pitts, J. T., Perron, W. C., ... & Pierangelo, J. (2017). U.S. Patent No. 9,546,447. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.