Assignment 2: Internal Environmental Analysis/Strategy Analysis and Strategy Selection Purpose: This assignment is the second of three assignments. Students will use the tools and concepts learned in the course and in previous business courses to develop an understanding of how organizations develop and manage strategies to establish, safeguard and sustain its position in a competitive market. Students also have the opportunity to review an organization’s objectives and goals and the key functional areas within the organization. Performing an internal environment analysis helps assess a firm’s internal resources and capabilities and plays a critical role in formulating strategy by identifying a firm’s strengths to overcome weaknesses. Students will then 1) assess long-term objectives, 2) identify and evaluate alternative strategies and 3) recommend strategies for a company to pursue. Instructions: In completing the assignment, students will perform research on the company from Assignment 1, answer the questions below in narrative form following the steps provided below: Step 1: Create a double-spaced, 12-point font Word or Rich Text Format (RTF) document. The final product cannot be longer than 14 pages in length, which includes all tables and matrices but excludes the title page and reference page. Step 2: Review assignment grading rubric. Step 3: Follow this format. Be sure to use headings under each topic.      Title page with title, your name, the course, the instructor’s name; Company Background/Information Internal Environmental Analysis Strategic Analysis & Strategy Selection Reference page Step 4: In writing the analysis, writing in the third person. What this means is that there are no words such as “I, me, my, we, or us” (first person writing), nor is there use of “you or your” (second person writing). If uncertain how to write in the third person, view this link: http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/first-second-and-thirdperson Step 5: In writing this assignment, students are asked to support the reasoning using in-text citations and a reference list. If information is taken from a source document, it has to be cited and referenced. A reference within a reference list cannot exist without an associated in-text citation and vice versa. Step 6: In writing this assignment, students are expected to paraphrase and not use direct quotes unless citing the mission statement of a company. Learn to paraphrase by reviewing this link: https://writing.wisc.edu/Handbook/QPA_paraphrase2.html Step 7: Read all course material for weeks 1 through 6 and perform independent research to provide a comprehensive internal environmental analysis, strategy analysis and selection. Step 8: Jot down key facts about the company. Consider making an outline to capture key points in the paper. Step 9: In your paper, respond to the following:           Background analysis including vision and mission statements and objectives Internal Environmental Analysis Corporate Level Strategy Business Unit Level Strategy Functional Level Strategy o Assess the company’s interactions with its stakeholders, the organizational structure, the organizational culture, and communication/decision making among managers within human resources, marketing production, operations, finance and accounting, R&D, and computer information systems, which can be accomplished by viewing the company’s website, interviews, and surveys. Financial analysis for the last reported fiscal year: o Use the company’s income statement and balance sheet to calculate key (emphasis added), but no less than 10 key financial ratios to the business. Using Excel or a Word table, record key financial ratios in the first column; o Research the industry average financial ratios for the same ratios above and record in a second column; o In the third column, indicate whether the financial ratio is a strength, a weakness or a neutral factor. Explain the results and compare and contrast the company financials to the industry; o Technique Analysis: develop and explain an IFE, BCG matrix, Grand Strategy Matrix, QSPM, Strategy Analysis: Identify company strengths and weaknesses. Discuss success factors and what the company must do to perform successfully in the industry? Discuss what strategies would allow the company to capitalize on its major strengths. Discuss strategies that would allow the company to improve upon its major weaknesses Generate a minimum of three possible alternative strategies Identify and discuss cultural factors that should be considered in analyzing and choosing among the alternative strategies;   Prioritize selection of alternative strategies Recommend the best strategies among the alternative strategies and explain why these strategies are the best; Step 10: Create an introductory paragraph. The Introduction should clearly and concisely convey the main points of the assignment’s requirements. Review the following website to learn how to write an introductory paragraph: http://www.writing.ucsb.edu/faculty/donelan/intro.html Step 11: Write a summary paragraph. A summary paragraph restates the main idea(s) of the essay. Make sure to leave a reader with a sense that the essay is complete. The summary paragraph is the last paragraph of a paper. Step 12: Using the grading rubric as a comparison, read through the paper to ensure all required elements are presented. Introduction External factors determine the viability of a business enterprise. While many businesses have diverse internal conditions, it easier to determine the strategic management of an organization according to the external factors is facing. Therefore, this presentation is going to carry a complete external analysis of Citrix System and its strategies to establish itself in the competitive market. This will be carried out by performing an external analysis on the company by integrating the information with SWOT analysis.  Citrix is an American based multinational software company that provides server application, cloud computing service, software as a service (SaaS) and networking services. It was founded in 1989 in Richardson, Texas by Ed Iacobucci. Present the company makes network access to mobile held smartphones and other devices across the wireless and wired network. The company has freed customers from hurdles of installing and updating software on each device. Further, its product line includes application of visualization software (XenDesktop), network access devices (Net scaler) and online meeting software (GoToMeeting). Additionally, Citrix offers managed online service for technical support and remote desktop access.     Citrix systems divides its line of business into two segments; Service provider and Enterprise departments. Most importantly enterprise department involves data centre, desktops and cloud products. Mobility segments are composed of documents clouds, communication cloud, and workflow cloud product. The enterprise department accounts for about 78% of total sales while the mobility segment takes care of the rest.    Florida-based Citrix systems gain about 43% of its revenue from outside the USA. Canada, USA, and Latin America are the companies biggest segment which accounts for about 61% of the sales. Europe, Africa, and the Middle East contribute about 29% of the market share. Asia pacific region contributes about 10% of the market share (Hald et al., 2013). Citrix systems markets and licenses its services and products through independent software vendors, directly through the web and through original equipment manufacturers. Profoundly this channels of distribution are managed by Citrix systems global sales and services organization which provide training for integrators and issues them certification. Its products and service are meant for customers who subscribe to remote access of its GoToMyPc remote access service. Citrix systems target customers such as infrastructure managers, network architects, and server operation managers. Citrix systems have experienced strong growth in revenue for the past decade. In 2015, the company recorded reported sales of about $3.3 billion which were about 4% increase from, 2014 record. Additionally, the company realized a gain in revenue updates and rise in maintenance revenues from cloud products such as grasshopper and GoToMeeting. Net income soared to 27% in 2015 which was boosted by high revenues and rise in income tax benefit. Wyatt & Rozenfeld (2013) denoted that, in 2015, Citrix systems laid off about 700 jobs and made GoTo online software to operate as a separate company. The company projected that it would have saved about $200 over a period of 18 months. Future plans to focus its resources on core products such as XenMobil, ShareFile, XenDesktop and Net scaler. The company plans to add some product to its ranks while others will be declined from operations. Presently, the company has focused on business virtualization, which it uses to introduce new versions into the market. In the year 2015, the company sold Cloud Portal Business manager products to Persistent Telecom Solutions. The company competes globally with other technology-based firms offering similar activities such as:  Adobe incorporated systems  Cisco systems Inc.  Hewlett-Packard Company  Oracle Corporation  EMC Corporation Cloud computing industry is rapidly expanding, thus attracting a lot of attention among other business vertical. Prevalently in the business world, we are using cloud infrastructure to cater for our business solutions. Services provided by companies such as Citrix systems and Cisco are increasingly becoming important and more popular in business facets. Services such as Platform as a Service (PaaS), Software as a Service (SaaS) and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) have boosted the growth of this industry (Wu et al., 2014). Additionally, the recovery of global economy and massive demand for IT services are the main reason for the growth of this industry.  Private cloud computing has increased from about 63% to about 78% thus driving hybrid adoption up from 58% to about 71% over past year.  Additionally, there have been a shift of more enterprise workloads to cloud computing.17% of enterprises have had more than 1,000 VMs in the public cloud.  Moreover, private cloud showed 31% growth from previous 22% growth in 2015(Duparc et al. 2013).  Worldwide spending on the public cloud services will grow at a 19.4% annual growth rate from about $80B in 2016 to about $145 in 2020  Spending on public cloud software infrastructure is projected to grow up to $12B in 2016.  Where future projections have the cost to maintain at around $55B by the year 2026.  Management services are projected to reach at least $245 in 2018.  Additionally, emerging markets are, poised to take about 21% of the worldwide public IT cloud market by 2018.  CRM, Azure, and Office365 are expected to grow to about 30$ in 2018. Citrix systems competitor, Microsoft, is set to gain more revenue if the trends are not affected by economic upheavals.  Additionally, Amazon Web services will generate about $7.78 Billion of revenues in 2017. Competition in the cloud computing industry is set to intensify because of entry of IBM in the provision of private and hybrid cloud infrastructure service.  Management of cloud computing will increase by about 18% in an every year. Companies such as Cisco and IBM have instituted cloud cost management practices which provide perfect opportunities for cost savings. Cisco and Citrix systems are taking critical actions for cloud cost optimization such as shutting down unused workloads and also selecting lower cloud regions.  From the year 2013, security has been cited as the top challenge in cloud computing. However, inadequate resources have overtaken security to be the top challenge in cloud computing (Bleckmann 2013). Many organizations such as Citrix systems and Cisco are putting more workload in the cloud whereby the expertise remain the same. All companies are advocating for additional training and development to take care of the deficit  Citrix systems main competitors include VMware, Cisco, IBM, Oracle, Microsoft and Logmein Inc. However, VMware presents the most potential competitor inherent to Citrix systems going concern.  While comparing the financial performance of the two companies Citrix systems profits increased by 5% in 2016 while VMware experienced a 0.28% slump in revenues. Whereas, the company experienced lower profits than its competitors because of 14.4% net margin.  Citrix systems depend on desktop application process which are based on alternative technology, platform. The process is time-consuming, expensive and subject to inconsistency. Other companies have automated this services and also providing alternative platforms for installation. Companies such as VMware Horizon and Oracle Corporation have come up with a visualization stack in their OS. However, XenApp and XenDesktop gives Citrix systems a competitive advantage by providing customers with multiple ways to visualize and deliver desktops with a one integrated visualization system Citrix systems have a cloud based product code-named NetScaler. This product is competing against established products such as F5 Networks and A10 networksF5 present an ideal internet based competition. However, the company has put in efforts to make sure it perfects it trade e in the Net scalar product by expanding to telco and Cloud provider markets  VMware is the main competitor in the cloud platform. Citrix systems have their XenApp while VMware has their horizon cloud computing software. According to IT experts, they favour XenApp since it leads the industry in desktop resolutions by mobilizing apps, mobile, and desktops for any use. On the other hand, VMware impairs the user experience with constant problems for IT users. Moreover, it fails to meet business requirements for IT users. Strengths The company has increased its investment in development and research. Moreover, it directly reaches to the consumer thus saving the retail margin due to diversified geographical coverage as denoted by Baek (2015). To customize their product easily, the company has developed a strong online marketing technique. In order to reduce cost, the company has adopted an excellent supply chain. In addition, the company has a formidable workforce in development centres in India, UK, and Australia.  Weakness Failure of suppliers to reach the target marker due to operational issues .Additionally, there is restricted global penetration in comparison to other countries  Opportunities The virtualization industry is growing daily whereas technology partnership is sprouting each day. Moreover, the company has started developing low-cost computers. Additionally, the company is anticipating strategic acquisitions to bolster its market share. • Threats Presently, the market is flooded with many cloud computing products in the market. Moreover, new entrants are gaining a market niche over the organization. Current inflation rates are affecting the company’s revenue values •  Citrix systems aim at powering the world by making people and organizations securely connected. The company provides an integrated portfolio such as SaaS and PaaS solutions that empower delivery of cloud computing activities. Although the company faces massive competition it's able to deliver cloud computing products specifically built for business needs • • Baek, O. K. (2015). U.S. Patent No. 9,063,711. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Bleckmann, D. M., Starnes, W. W., & Andersen, B. D. (2013). U.S. Patent No. 8,429,412. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. • Duparc, J., Moser, T., Sieber, P., Thorleifsson, H., Timalapur, A. K., Guenther, F., & Bold, A. (2013). U.S. Patent No. 8,515,794. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. • Hald, C., Schneider, T., Hambrecht, K., & Seibel, A. (2013). U.S. Patent No. 8,423,418. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. • Wu, Z., Otway, D., van der Linden, R., & Rabey, J. (2014). U.S. Patent No. 8,924,703. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. • Wyatt, N., & Rozenfeld, J. E. (2013). U.S. Patent No. 8,346,811. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
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