INTRODUCTION
Business environment consists of internal as well as external factors that have direct or indirect impacts on business operations of an organisation. The internal factors include customers, employees and management whereas regulations, supply and demand, competitors and so forth constitute external environment (Erasmus, Strydom and Rudansky-Kloppers, 2016). The report below is based on Vodafone Group plc, which is a British telecommunications conglomerate headquartered in London, United Kingdom. The report consists of expansion of Vodafone in Finland. The agenda of the report is to determine the external business environment of the country that would have an impact on operations of Vodafone. In addition, the report involves appropriate analytical approach for Vodafone to successfully expand its business operations in Finland.
COMPANY OVERVIEW- VODAFONE
Vodafone Group plc is one of the most successful telecommunications firm in the world. It has its operations in Europe, Africa, the Middle East and Asia Pacific. Since its first ever call in the UK in 1985, the firm has come a long way on its pathway of success. Even so, that the company has been ranked 4th in the world's largest telecommunications company in the world in 2017 (Top 10 Telecom Companies in the World 2017, 2018).
The vision of Vodafone is to provide excellent service to its customers and stay ahead of the competition by building a superior and stronger network infrastructure. The firm's investments are aimed towards achieving this objective. It wants to enhance customer experience of its users all around the globe and wants to establish itself as a market leader in every region in which it operates.
The company has recently launched “Digital Vodafone” within the Group with an agenda of simplifying and automating its business operations. It would also enable the firm to deliver excellent experience to its customers. With the rise of Corporate Social Responsibility, Vodafone with this programme plans to enhance revenue growth. To achieve its overall business goals, the firm ensures alignment of its strategies with the commercial objectives (Background information about Vodafone Group, 2017).
The firm serves more than 500 million customers. It transmitted more than 2,700 petabytes of data in 2016/17 (1 petabyte (PB) = 1,000,000 gigabytes (GB) ). To serve at such high range, the firm focuses on innovation for improve its customer service and retaining the users. The firm uses advanced technologies to attain improvements in its operations and stay ahead of other competitive firms in terms of speed, services and assistance (Bringing you a better Vodafone, 2017). Apart from developing products, engineers at Vodafone are working on various projects which would help to unravel the use of technology in the future. The firm alongside PT Scientists and Audi are working towards their first ever private moon landing. The aim is to create first telecom network of the moon and take hi resolution pictures of the moon. Another breakthrough of the firm is the opening of 5G Mobility Lab in Germany, which would enable the company to test the actual usage of 5G network in Europe. With such enhanced use of technology, the firm surely would attain a higher position in the telecommunications industry (10 of the most exciting technology projects in Vodafone, 2017).
Vodafone currently is looking to expand its operations in Finland, which is situated in Europe. Before taking this step, the firm needs to determine the external environment of the country that could affect the operations of the company.
EXTERNAL ENVIRONMENT OF FINLAND
Republic of Finland is located as a Nordic nation in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. Its boundaries touch Norway, the Baltic Sea, Russia and Sweden in North, South, East and West respectively. It is very important that Vodafone takes into consideration the factors that would impact its expansion i