SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Sales & Marketing
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future
SUNDAY Communications was one of six mobile phone service providers facing fierce competition in a small market of 6.7 million population in Hong Kong. The company had pursued an aggressive marketing and branding strategy since its establishment in 1994. However, after six years, it was still struggling to make a profit. With the imminent granting of 3G licenses in early 2001, the company is hard-pressed to formulate a viable strategy that will enable it to capitalize on its brand image and reposition itself in the mobile phone industry.
Swot Analysis of "SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future" written by Velma Lee, Pauline Ng, Elsie Choi includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Sunday Phone facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Customers, Pricing and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future casestudy better are - – increasing transportation and logistics costs, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, there is increasing trade war between United States & China,
technology disruption, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Sunday Phone, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Sunday Phone operates in.
According to Harvard Business Review, 75% of the managers use SWOT analysis for various purposes such as – evaluating current scenario, strategic planning, new venture feasibility, personal growth goals, new market entry, Go To market strategies, portfolio management and strategic trade-off assessment, organizational restructuring, etc.
SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix
SWOT analysis of SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Sunday Phone
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Sales & Marketing field.
4. Making a Sales & Marketing topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Sunday Phone
Strengths SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Sunday Phone in SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future Harvard Business Review case study are -
Diverse revenue streams
– Sunday Phone is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future case study a diverse revenue stream that has helped it to survive disruptions such as global pandemic in Covid-19, financial disruption of 2008, and supply chain disruption of 2021.
Organizational Resilience of Sunday Phone
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Sunday Phone does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Sunday Phone has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive segment. Secondly the value chain collaborators of the firm in SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
High brand equity
– Sunday Phone has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Sunday Phone to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Sunday Phone are driving operational speed, building greater agility, and keeping the organization nimble to compete with new competitors. It helps are organization to ideate new ideas, and execute them swiftly in the marketplace.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Sales & Marketing industry
– SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Sunday Phone to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Sunday Phone to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Sunday Phone in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Innovation driven organization
– Sunday Phone is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Training and development
– Sunday Phone has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future Harvard Business Review case study by analyzing – employees retention, in-house promotion, loyalty, new venture initiation, lack of conflict, and high level of both employees and customer engagement.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future Harvard Business Review case study comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the industry, building diversified operations across different geographies so that disruption in one part of the world doesn’t impact the overall performance of the firm, and integrating the various business operations and processes through its digital transformation drive.
Learning organization
- Sunday Phone is a learning organization. It has inculcated three key characters of learning organization in its processes and operations – exploration, creativity, and expansiveness. The work place at Sunday Phone is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Sunday Phone in the sector have low bargaining power. SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Sunday Phone to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Weaknesses SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future are -
Lack of clear differentiation of Sunday Phone products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Sunday Phone needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Sunday Phone has created an environment where the organization is dominated by functional specialists rather than management generalist. This has resulted into product oriented approach rather than marketing oriented approach or consumers oriented approach.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Sunday Phone has not been able to do capital spending to the tune of the competition. This has resulted into fewer innovations and company facing stiff competition from both existing competitors and new entrants who are disrupting the industry using digital technology.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future HBR case study still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Sunday Phone has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future has high operating costs in the. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Sunday Phone 's lucrative customers.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Sunday Phone has some of the most successful products in the industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. firm in the HBR case study - SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Sunday Phone is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Sales & Marketing segment. Sunday Phone needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Sunday Phone to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Velma Lee, Pauline Ng, Elsie Choi suggests that, Sunday Phone is facing high bargaining power of the channel partners. So far it has not able to streamline the operations to reduce the bargaining power of the value chain partners in the industry.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Sunday Phone needs to come up with a strategy to reduce the workers concern regarding automation. Without a clear strategy, it could lead to disruption and uncertainty within the organization.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Sunday Phone has borrowed money from the capital market at higher rates. It needs to restructure the interest payment and costs so that it can compete better and improve profitability.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Sales & Marketing strategy. But it has very little resources allocation to manage the risks emerging from events such as natural disasters, climate change, melting of permafrost, tacking the rise of artificial intelligence, opportunities and threats emerging from commercialization of space etc.
Opportunities SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities highlighted in the Harvard Business Review case study SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future are -
Leveraging digital technologies
– Sunday Phone can leverage digital technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning to automate the production process, customer analytics to get better insights into consumer behavior, realtime digital dashboards to get better sales tracking, logistics and transportation, product tracking, etc.
Reconfiguring business model
– The expansion of digital payment system, the bringing down of international transactions costs using Bitcoin and other blockchain based currencies, etc can help Sunday Phone to reconfigure its entire business model. For example it can used blockchain based technologies to reduce piracy of its products in the big markets such as China. Secondly it can use the popularity of e-commerce in various developing markets to build a Direct to Customer business model rather than the current Channel Heavy distribution network.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Sunday Phone has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in the sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled, as illustrated in the Harvard case study SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Sunday Phone to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Sunday Phone to expand its talent hiring zone. According to McKinsey Global Institute, 20% of the high end workforce in fields such as finance, information technology, can continously work from remote local post Covid-19. This presents a really great opportunity for Sunday Phone to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Sunday Phone to increase its market reach. Sunday Phone will be able to reach out to new customers. Secondly 5G will also provide technology framework to build new tools and products that can help more immersive consumer experience and faster consumer journey.
Buying journey improvements
– Sunday Phone can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future suggest that firm can provide automated chats to help consumers solve their own problems, provide online suggestions to get maximum out of the products and services, and help consumers to build a community where they can interact with each other to develop new features and uses.
Loyalty marketing
– Sunday Phone has focused on building a highly responsive customer relationship management platform. This platform is built on in-house data and driven by analytics and artificial intelligence. The customer analytics can help the organization to fine tune its loyalty marketing efforts, increase the wallet share of the organization, reduce wastage on mainstream advertising spending, build better pricing strategies using personalization, etc.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Sunday Phone can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Sunday Phone has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Sunday Phone to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future case study. Sunday Phone can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Sunday Phone in the consumer business. Now Sunday Phone can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Sunday Phone can still utilize the low interest rates to borrow money for capital investment. Secondly it can also use the increase of government spending in infrastructure projects to get new business.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Sunday Phone in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Sales & Marketing segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Sunday Phone can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Sunday Phone operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Sales & Marketing sector.
Threats SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future are -
Environmental challenges
– Sunday Phone needs to have a robust strategy against the disruptions arising from climate change and energy requirements. EU has identified it as key priority area and spending 30% of its 880 billion Euros European post Covid-19 recovery funds on green technology. Sunday Phone can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Sunday Phone high dependence on third party suppliers can disrupt its processes and delivery mechanism. For example -the current troubles of car makers because of chip shortage is because the chip companies started producing chips for electronic companies rather than car manufacturers.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future, Sunday Phone may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Sales & Marketing .
Increasing wage structure of Sunday Phone
– Post Covid-19 there is a sharp increase in the wages especially in the jobs that require interaction with people. The increasing wages can put downward pressure on the margins of Sunday Phone.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Sunday Phone demand
– There is a high probability of declining consumer confidence, given – high inflammation rate, rise of gig economy, lower job stability, increasing cost of living, higher interest rates, and aging demography. All the factors contribute to people saving higher rate of their income, resulting in lower consumer demand in the industry and other sectors.
Capital market disruption
– During the Covid-19, Dow Jones has touched record high. The valuations of a number of companies are way beyond their existing business model potential. This can lead to capital market correction which can put a number of suppliers, collaborators, value chain partners in great financial difficulty. It will directly impact the business of Sunday Phone.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Sunday Phone can face lack of demand in the market place because of Fed actions to reduce inflation. This can lead to sluggish growth in the economy, lower demands, lower investments, higher borrowing costs, and consolidation in the field.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Sunday Phone is facing in Sales & Marketing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Instability in the European markets
– European Union markets are facing three big challenges post Covid – expanded balance sheets, Brexit related business disruption, and aggressive Russia looking to distract the existing security mechanism. Sunday Phone will face different problems in different parts of Europe. For example it will face inflationary pressures in UK, France, and Germany, balance sheet expansion and demand challenges in Southern European countries, and geopolitical instability in the Eastern Europe.
High level of anxiety and lack of motivation
– the Great Resignation in United States is the sign of broader dissatisfaction among the workforce in United States. Sunday Phone needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Sales & Marketing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Technology disruption because of hacks, piracy etc
– The colonial pipeline illustrated, how vulnerable modern organization are to international hackers, miscreants, and disruptors. The cyber security interruption, data leaks, etc can seriously jeopardize the future growth of the organization.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Sunday Phone in the Sales & Marketing industry. The Sales & Marketing industry is already at various protected from local competition in China, with the rise of trade war the protection levels may go up. This presents a clear threat of current business model in Chinese market.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Sunday Phone with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers in the HBR case study SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future needs to zero down on the relative importance of each factor mentioned in the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants.
We can provide the relative importance to each factor by assigning relative weights. Weighted SWOT analysis process is a three stage process –
First stage for doing weighted SWOT analysis of the case study SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future is to rank the strengths and weaknesses of the organization. This will help you to assess the most important strengths and weaknesses of the firm and which one of the strengths and weaknesses mentioned in the initial lists are marginal and can be left out.
Second stage for conducting weighted SWOT analysis of the Harvard case study SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future is to give probabilities to the external strategic factors thus better understanding the opportunities and threats arising out of macro environment changes and developments.
Third stage of constructing weighted SWOT analysis of SUNDAY Communications Ltd.: A Marketing Strategy for a Wireless Future is to provide strategic recommendations includes – joining likelihood of external strategic factors such as opportunities and threats to the internal strategic factors – strengths and weaknesses. You should start with external factors as they will provide the direction of the overall industry. Secondly by joining probabilities with internal strategic factors can help the company not only strategic fit but also the most probably strategic trade-off that Sunday Phone needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.