Pentair works in three primary segments, or strategic business units: Water and Fluid Solutions, Technical Solutions, and Valves and Controls. As such, each of these areas presents unique business opportunities that can be explored via the BCG Matrix. First, Pentair is currently the global leader in the transport and treatment of water as well as the largest global valve company. This presents opportunities that fall into both the star and the question mark category. Currently Pentair has the capacity to reach four-plus billion middle class agents, globally, demonstrating an area of high market share overall, further, as demand increases in developing countries, there is potential for high market growth, making it a star area of development for the Pentair brand. However, unfortunately, there is often not the infrastructure to readily deliver such products and technical solutions to the people in these developing markets, as such, serious R&D needs to be invested in determining how best to reach these markets, and to determine in what countries it is feasible, and in what countries it is not. This means that, in the developing nations at least, it presents as a question mark. This development is in keeping with the brand’s smart capital deployment strategy, which seeks to approach question marks in a way that is “aggressive but achievable” (Pentair, 2013). Specifically, at current, the market in China in these areas presents as a cash cow. Despite the brand’s strong market shares, growth in that sector remains slow. However, because of the size and potential in the market, the brand still deems development in that sector as important (Pentair, 2013). Further, thinking vertically, the Food and Beverage industry is a question mark because despite the fact that it accounts for only 6% of the brand’s total market sales, it has the highest total growth rate at 8% (Pentair, 2013). In contrast, infrastructure and technology development are a dog area for Pentair, as it represents only 13% of the company’s sales and suffered a flat growth rate in recent review (Hogan, 2013).
References:
Hogan, R. (2013). Pentair: Differentiated Growth Presentation. The Pentair Investor and Analyst Event Retrieved from http://phx.corporateir.net/External.File?item=UGFyZW50SUQ9MjExMzA1fENoaWxkSUQ9LTF8VHlwZT0z&t=1
