Elaborated SWOT Analysis of Cigna – An American Multinational Managed Healthcare & Insurance

Quick Stats on Cigna

Founder	CG & INA
Year Founded	1982
Origin	The United States
No. of Employees	70,000+
Company Type	Public
Market Cap	$75.781 Billion (2022)
Annual Revenue	$160.401 Billion (2020)
Net Income/ Profit	$8.489 Billion (2020)

 

Products & Services by Cigna

• Healthcare services
• Healthcare insurance
• Life insurance
• PBM

Competitors of Cigna

Cigna competes on a global level with many other Healthcare Insurance Companies. The top 5 competitors of Cigna are:

• Aetna
• United Health Group
• Humana
• Anthem
• CVS Caremark

Now that we understand the company’s core business, let’s delve into the SWOT analysis of Cigna.

SWOT Analysis of Cigna

A SWOT analysis determines the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of a company. It is a proven management paradigm that allows Cigna to benchmark its business and performance against that of its competitors and the industry as a whole.

This is a great tool for identifying where the business is doing well, where it is failing, developing countermeasures, and determining how the business can grow.

To better understand the SWOT Analysis of Cigna, refer to the infographics image below

Now first let’s begin with the strengths of the company from the SWOT analysis of Cigna.

Strengths of Cigna

The unique skills of a company that gives it an edge in gaining more market share, attracting more customers, and maximizing profits are known as its strengths. The following are Cigna’s strengths:

• Reputation & Brand Name: Cigna is the most well established firm in its industry. It is the world’s largest insurance company which serves more than 30 countries with its main customer base of more than 180 Million in the United States,  North America, Europe, Asia and the Middle East.
• Focus on Social Schemes: Cigna Life Insurance has long been a supporter of global health plans typically including medical, dental, behavioral and disability. With a variety of world-class services, it leads the industry in health protection and dental plans.
• Awards & Recognitions: The company has been awarded Gartner & 1to1 Customer Experience Excellence in 2009 for demonstrating a clear customer relationship strategy and an unrivalled level of excellence in delivering the customer experience. Following the 2010 JD Power award.
• Highly Skilled Workforce: Successful training and learning programmes have resulted in a highly competent workforce. They are not just highly skilled but also driven to achieve greater success.
• Affordable Insurance: Cigna insurance company is the market leader and serves the people in the United States with insurance that is low in rates but with superior benefits.
• Financial Position: Cigna has a very strong financial position in the market with consecutive profits over the years along with accumulated profit reserves which can be utilised for future expenditures or marketing activities.
• High Level of Customer Satisfaction: Cigna has gained trust of more than a million clients and has a very strong customer relationship management team through which they keep their current customers very satisfied and also enjoy a good brand equity status among potential customers.
• Strong Supplier Community: It has built a culture among suppliers where the suppliers not only promote the company’s services but also invest in training the consulting team to explain to the client how he/she can extract the maximum benefits out of the insurance services.

Weaknesses of Cigna

Weaknesses are the areas Cigna can work upon. Some of Cigna’s weaknesses are:

• Research & Development: Cigna has a good share of expenditure on the research and development department but it is spending way less than a few of the players within the industry which have benefitted as a result of their innovative products.
• Diversity in the Workforce: The local workers contribute to the majority of the workforce at Cigna making it difficult for outsiders to adjust and hence resulting in the loss of talent.
• Need for Investment in Technology: Cigna does not spend much on new technologies. Given the scope of the company’s expansion and the various locations into which it aspires to expand, Cigna must invest more in technology to integrate processes.
• Public Relation & Lobbying: The company’s grassroots participants committed the practice of creating fake blogs by interested groups, e.g. health insurance companies due to which Cigna got filed against lobbying from the year 2005 to 2009.
• Low Market Share: Although the company has its significant presence in more than 30 countries including the United States, the insurance company is not known to many people due to the company’s low share in the market.

Opportunities for Cigna 

Opportunities are uncontrollable external circumstances that a person may be able to take advantage of. These external factors could give the company an advantage in the marketplace. Opportunities for Cigna are:

• Possibilities in the Online World: Clients’ increasing acceptance of online services will allow Cigna Group to offer innovative services to customers in the Insurance (Life) market.
• Social Media: Over the years the number of active users on social media channels has increased and with this Cigna can make use of its social media handles to promote its products, interact with customers and even provide after-sale services.

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• Future of Insurance Company: Global life premium insurance growth is predicted to rebound to 3% with increased risk awareness owing to COVID-19 and global economic recovery set to accelerate the demand for life insurance products. 
• Future Trends: The next 10 years will see the insurance industry moving from traditional to more customer-centric products. In the post-pandemic era, due to personalized services, the products are given based on information collected from external sources and devices.
• Shift From Protection To Prevention: There is a general trend toward risk prevention rather than risk mitigation, which indicates that insurance companies should concentrate on risk prevention rather than risk mitigation.

Threats to Cigna

Threats are those factors that have the potential to provide harm to the organisation in any form. The threats of Cigna are as follows:

• Gig Economy: Most organized companies across the world offer group insurance. Various online-based and reputed companies like Fiverr, Amazon Mechanical Turk, and others have entered the ‘freelancer’ population who work without any formal company allegiance. This has resulted in an enormous loss for the insurance companies.
• Competition: Since insurance was privatized, Cigna has lost its luster and now confronts intense competition from private insurance businesses that have given the industry a new lease on life.
• Changes in Government: Because fiscal and monetary factors vary with each new government, tactics must be altered correspondingly. This results in a slew of issues.

This ends our elaborated SWOT analysis of Cigna. Let us conclude our learning below.