UNICHEMA Case Solution And Analysis, HBR Case Study Solution & Analysis of Harvard Case Studies

Introduction

Unichema, the company that served as a subsidiary of Unilever in the Oleo chemicals industry for decades now has been quite efficient in delivering the needs of the customers quite efficiently. Unilever is one of the largest companies in the consumer goods segment and has been present significantly in the chemicals industry as well. Unichema is the company that is serving the purpose of developing chemicals and serving international markets quite effectively.

Unichema International has been present in around 4 continents with production and manufacturing facilities located at around 9 different sites. Unichema Chemie B.V is the company that is located in Netherlands and emerged because of a joint venture between Unilever and Emery industries. Moreover, Unilever took complete control and operated Unichema Chemie B.V as a wholly owned subsidiary.

Unlike Unichema International, Unichema Chemie has around 200 products that are only serving or competing in the Oleo chemicals industry globally. The company’s performance in the recent years has been quite impressive and the company is regarded as a strong player with impressive product portfolio in the industry.

The site has the capacity of accommodating more than 500 people but the employee base of the company at this site is around 430 employees while 120 employees can be added or serve as additional employees. The products that are produced have a wide application area and there are many fields in which these products can be utilized effectively. The products can serve in areas like polymers to leather, and paper to lubricants etc.

However, there are few features that can be regarded as the key success factors of the company or the major strengths of the company. The most significant strengths that the company has include the versatility and the efficiency that the company has in producing and delivering products to achieve customer satisfaction.

Furthermore, building business relationships or forming joint ventures with the customers helped the company to enhance the business performance. On the other hand, the company lacked in some areas like addressing and assessing the needs of the customers timely and overcoming the issues like lead time that are the major weaknesses of the company. Furthermore, the company has the opportunity to assimilate new processes and technologies to increase the efficiency of the company and the increase the presence globally.

Besides that, new technology and innovation can be used to increase the portfolio and diversify. However, competition and the volatile market demand are the biggest threats pertaining the company. The complete outset of the company is described that provides a detail overview of the company and its condition.

Situation Analysis

This section will provide a detail analysis of the situation that is being faced by Unichema in the current scenario. Assessing the major issues that are present in the situation is an important task and will further enhance the ability on developing the right conclusion for the paper. Unichema is under real threat from competition which is emerging to be the major hurdle in allowing the company to excel in its business performance.

The industry is becoming stagnant and the pressure on the players in the industry is increasing and forcing them to become more competitive. Unichema one of the largest chemical producers in Europe is also under this threat despite the large size of the firm. There can be many reasons that the companies are facing immense pressure to become highly competitive. Some major issues include the environmental concerns and the factors that are raising concerns over the production of the most suitable and environmental friendly chemicals.

Secondly, the legal constraints are also becoming apparent on the industry players forcing them to become more efficient and environmental friendly while producing new and innovative chemicals. However, the profit margins in the industry are decking significantly due to the cost pressures on the players, the fixed cost is quite high which is why the profit margins are facing a declining trend and the players are paying immense focus in this regard.UNICHEMA Case Solution

Apart from that, the issues regarding the capacity and inventory management are also the concerning factors that are making the sustainability a difficult factor. However, another major issue is the emergence of low cost manufacturers that are mostly belonging to the Southeast Asia are becoming a significant threat.................

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