International Expansion Strategy

Client Objectives:

Oakview was commissioned to propose and international expansion strategy for a service business operating in the UK:

• Analyse the global markets by size, sector and alignment to the company business model and offer and identify a shortlist of potential markets.
• Conduct a detailed options appraisal of the shortlisted markets and identify a single market.
• Prepare a detailed expansion strategy and delivery plan.

Our Impact:

We started out on this project by identifying the key stakeholders and set up interviews to understand the current business model, the value proposition, the services, the route to market, the industry, the competitors and what international expansion meant for them.

Our initial approach was to understand the context in which the business was operating and what aspects could be leveraged internally to test their proposition on a different market.

We identified a number of possible targets and used a comparative analysis grid to compare and analyse different elements such as market access, market potential, Market security and other Macro economic factors.

Using the result of the target market analysis, we performed a Macro and Industry level analysis to understand the factors that could impact companies in the sector that wish to establish themselves in the target country. We used framework such as PESTEL or Opportunity and Risk Matrix.

We conducted an analysis of the competitive landscape within the industry to ascertain the prevailing market conditions. This enabled us to assess the feasibility of attaining a competitive advantage and discern the key success factors necessary for market entry and subsequent development. We analysed the forces influencing the sector, its life-cycle, the strategic groups, the challenges.

We undertook an internal diagnostic of the business aiming to identify the risks and opportunities available to the company when undertaking such strategy.

Finally, we put forward a series of recommendations aimed at facilitating the successful implementation of an expansion
strategy. These recommendations were designed to address key challenges, optimise resources, and maximise outcomes.

Client Benefits:

• A comprehensive approach of international expansion strategy
• An analysis of the business, opportunities and risks.
• A market analysis.
• A series of recommendations relating to the business structure, management and marketing approach.