Swot Analysis of The Exxon Mobil Corporation

Exxon Mobil Corporation is a multinational, public company which deals with oil and gas and has its headquarters in Irving, Texas situated in America. It was formed in 1999 by the merging of two major oil companies, Exxon and Mobil. It is the largest refiner in the world. It deals with products such as crude oil, other oils, natural gas, petrochemicals and power generation. To understand more of the internal and external issues, the SWOT analysis is used where Strength (S) and Weakness (W) help identify the internal factors whereas Opportunity (O) and Threats (T) help identify the external factors. On stating the above, the SWOT analysis of ExxonMobil are as follows:

Strengths:

• ExxonMobil is one of the oldest companies and has been a leader in its area of business for more than a century which in turn has earned the company very positive and strong reputation, trust in their products/services, dependence due to its quality products and existing relationship with contracting customers and moreover a belief that the company will deliver as demanded like always.
• The energy producing industries are a huge sector and ExxonMobil has expanded it’s functioning by entering new segments of the energy producing industries while further developing other strong brand names among its portfolio. This expansion strategy has benefited the company.
• ExxonMobil has formed a well-managed and effectively functioning corporate social responsibility and crisis management program framework which has aided the organization to gain a positive image to a certain extent after the reputation it had lost due to previous oil spills and other safety issues/dangers. This has also helped the organization to improve its style of communication on its various decisive moves and also in cases where its fails to have taken the right decision over the last few years. This step has shown a big deal of improvement when compared to the period when the organization did not effectively communicate and mishandled the situation during the Exxon Valdez oil spill.
• The company is of lately is well known for it unique strategies and overall development due to a strong research and development sector that aims to meet the expectations of it shareholders and industrial needs. The organization takes up various research and development projects to keep itself relevant in the market. Some of which include to develop methods to enable technologies to be able to mine relevant sources efficiently. It strongly strives to use water resources most efficiently, reduce the emission of various greenhouse gases, and also use various chemical combinations that help make undeveloped resources more productive.
• The company is a global leader in its nature of business and has various subsidiaries and tie ups around the globe. Some of the main client countries would be Middle East, India and China. The organization also working with these countries to further develop its infrastructural facility, production of energy with respect to demand and also help in the growth of the respective local economies through education, job creation, and local charity drives with efforts to improve standards.

Weaknesses

• ExxonMobil is still viewed as not doing enough for the environment. Stakeholders are still accusing the company of pollution and overuse of natural resources as well as carbon emissions that are still too high to meet the climate change targets.
• The company’s ongoing profitability in the wake of rising petrol prices has positioned it in the minds of some stakeholders, including petrol customers, as a greedy corporate giant. The idea that the company continues to become rich and make such a significant profit does not bode well with its customer base.
• Environmental interest groups still do not believe that ExxonMobil communicates with them and is transparent enough on their policy to be a greener company.
• The company has not developed alternative energy products to the extent that it could and continues to rely on oil as its main business segment, which is not a sustainable strategy.

Opportunities

• There is a significant opportunity to meet increasing demands for energy in many developing economies including those in the Middle East, Asia, South Asia and South East Asia.
• There is an opportunity to gain a leadership position in alternative energy markets if the company can develop the solutions faster than the competition can, helping to add brand equity to the ExxonMobil name.
• The company has a real opportunity to improve its image through more effort in all the countries where it does business with more community involvement and other social responsibility initiatives.
• Exxon has other brands that it can create more strategies for in terms of brand extension products to further diversify its portfolio, thereby reducing its reliance on oil and fossil fuels.

Threat

• Economic recessions even in the developing countries of China and India have slowed energy demand while these countries also must now look at alternative energy sources due to the pressure by environmental groups and global organizations that are demanding lower carbon emissions. This puts pressure on the company’s profitability and potentially raises their cost structure in terms of having to spend more to develop alternative energy sources at a faster rate.
• Competitors in the energy industry are developing alternative energy sources and offering more to meet stakeholder expectations than ExxonMobil, which also puts pressure on the company to change its strategy or not be able to sustain its current profitability.
• More stakeholder groups are demanding accountability on the part of energy companies like ExxonMobil, so they must become more transparent in terms of their operations and their level of social responsibility, showing how they put this before profitability.