Case Study Description of Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada
An immigrant entrepreneur created Hi-Bridge Consulting Corporation, a company that imported and distributed alcoholic products in Canada, among other activities. In 2009, the entrepreneur brought Yanjing beer to Canada from China, even though the Chinese brewery did not have an articulated international expansion strategy in Canada at the time. Despite numerous challenges in the Canadian beer market, the entrepreneur made significant headway. However, six years after the product's introduction, she understood that many Canadian consumers were still not aware of Yanjing beer and that she needed to find an effective way to increase its market share. Kimberley Howard and William Wei are affiliated with Grant MacEwan College.
Authors :: Kimberley Howard, William Wei, Kaijin Nie
Swot Analysis of "Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada" written by Kimberley Howard, William Wei, Kaijin Nie includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Yanjing Beer facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada casestudy better are - – digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, technology disruption, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models,
increasing energy prices, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Yanjing Beer, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Yanjing Beer 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 Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Yanjing Beer
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 Yanjing Beer
Strengths Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Yanjing Beer in Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada Harvard Business Review case study are -
Ability to lead change in Sales & Marketing field
– Yanjing Beer is one of the leading players in its industry. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in its segment but also across the whole industry. The ability to lead change has enabled Yanjing Beer in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Yanjing Beer in the sector have low bargaining power. Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Yanjing Beer to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Organizational Resilience of Yanjing Beer
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Yanjing Beer does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Yanjing Beer 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Yanjing Beer in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Yanjing Beer has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in, as mentioned in case study Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Sales & Marketing industry
– Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Yanjing Beer to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Yanjing Beer to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Yanjing Beer 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 Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Strong track record of project management
– Yanjing Beer is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
High brand equity
– Yanjing Beer has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Yanjing Beer to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Training and development
– Yanjing Beer has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada 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.
Weaknesses Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada are -
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Yanjing Beer 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Yanjing Beer 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 - Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Need for greater diversity
– Yanjing Beer has taken concrete steps on diversity, equity, and inclusion. But the efforts so far has resulted in limited success. It needs to expand the recruitment and selection process to hire more people from the minorities and underprivileged background.
Lack of clear differentiation of Yanjing Beer products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Yanjing Beer needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Kimberley Howard, William Wei, Kaijin Nie suggests that, Yanjing Beer 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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada, it seems that the employees of Yanjing Beer don’t have comprehensive understanding of the firm’s strategy. This is reflected in number of promotional campaigns over the last few years that had mixed messaging and competing priorities. Some of the strategic activities and services promoted in the promotional campaigns were not consistent with the organization’s strategy.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Yanjing Beer 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada, in the dynamic environment Yanjing Beer has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Yanjing Beer has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada that the firm needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department in the case Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Yanjing Beer is planning to shift buying processes online.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada, 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada HBR case study mentions - Yanjing Beer takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the industry in last five years.
Opportunities Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada | 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 Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada are -
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 Yanjing Beer in the consumer business. Now Yanjing Beer can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
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 Yanjing Beer 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Yanjing Beer to increase its market reach. Yanjing Beer 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Yanjing Beer 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Sales & Marketing industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Yanjing Beer can take advantage of these changes in consumer behavior to build a far more efficient business model. For example consumer regular ordering of products can reduce both last mile delivery costs and market penetration costs. Yanjing Beer can further use this consumer data to build better customer loyalty, provide better products and service collection, and improve the value proposition in inflationary times.
Developing new processes and practices
– Yanjing Beer can develop new processes and procedures in Sales & Marketing industry using technology such as automation using artificial intelligence, real time transportation and products tracking, 3D modeling for concept development and new products pilot testing etc.
Manufacturing automation
– Yanjing Beer can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Sales & Marketing segment. It can use CAD and 3D printing to build a quick prototype and pilot testing products. It can leverage automation using machine learning and artificial intelligence to do faster production at lowers costs, and it can leverage the growth in satellite and tracking technologies to improve inventory management, transportation, and shipping.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Yanjing Beer has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Yanjing Beer to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada case study. Yanjing Beer can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Loyalty marketing
– Yanjing Beer 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Yanjing Beer 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 Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Yanjing Beer to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Yanjing Beer to conduct training and development for its employees across the world. This will result in not only reducing the cost of training but also help employees in different part of the world to integrate with the headquarter work culture, ethos, and standards.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Yanjing Beer can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Yanjing Beer 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.
Threats Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada are -
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Yanjing Beer has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Sales & Marketing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Yanjing Beer needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Sales & Marketing sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada, Yanjing Beer 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 .
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Sales & Marketing field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Yanjing Beer can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Regulatory challenges
– Yanjing Beer needs to prepare for regulatory challenges as consumer protection groups and other pressure groups are vigorously advocating for more regulations on big business - to reduce inequality, to create a level playing field, to product data privacy and consumer privacy, to reduce the influence of big money on democratic institutions, etc. This can lead to significant changes in the Sales & Marketing industry regulations.
New competition
– After the dotcom bust of 2001, financial crisis of 2008-09, the business formation in US economy had declined. But in 2020 alone, there are more than 1.5 million new business applications in United States. This can lead to greater competition for Yanjing Beer in the Sales & Marketing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Yanjing Beer 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.
Backlash against dominant players
– US Congress and other legislative arms of the government are getting tough on big business especially technology companies. The digital arm of Yanjing Beer business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Yanjing Beer
– 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 Yanjing Beer.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Yanjing Beer 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Yanjing Beer with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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. Yanjing Beer needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Sales & Marketing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Yanjing Beer is facing in Sales & Marketing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada 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 Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada 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 Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada 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 Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada 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 Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Bringing Yanjing Beer to Canada 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 Yanjing Beer needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.