Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Innovation & Entrepreneurship
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong
Tom Barnes, executive director of Asiasports Ltd., was evaluating several options for growth for the sports management company. Asiasports' principal sports properties were the South China Ice Hockey League and the World Ice Hockey 5's tournament, both based in Hong Kong. Among the alternatives available: Barnes could develop hockey in other countries in Southeast Asia, he could acquire new sports properties, or he could expand into in-line hockey promotion in Hong Kong.
Swot Analysis of "Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong" written by Andrew Delios includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Hockey Asiasports facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, International business, Strategic planning and Innovation & Entrepreneurship.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong casestudy better are - – customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, wage bills are increasing, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models,
banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Hockey Asiasports, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Hockey Asiasports 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 Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Hockey Asiasports
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Innovation & Entrepreneurship field.
4. Making a Innovation & Entrepreneurship topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Hockey Asiasports
Strengths Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Hockey Asiasports in Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong Harvard Business Review case study are -
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Hockey Asiasports 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Hockey Asiasports is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Hockey Asiasports is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Digital Transformation in Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Hockey Asiasports digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Hockey Asiasports has successfully integrated the four key components of digital transformation – digital integration in processes, digital integration in marketing and customer relationship management, digital integration into the value chain, and using technology to explore new products and market opportunities.
Learning organization
- Hockey Asiasports 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 Hockey Asiasports is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Strong track record of project management
– Hockey Asiasports is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Hockey Asiasports 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 Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Hockey Asiasports 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 Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Training and development
– Hockey Asiasports has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Hockey Asiasports is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Hockey Asiasports in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Hockey Asiasports has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Hockey Asiasports has effective processes in place that helps in exploring new product needs, doing quick pilot testing, and then launching the products quickly using its extensive distribution network.
Weaknesses Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong are -
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Hockey Asiasports 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Hockey Asiasports 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Hockey Asiasports is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment. Hockey Asiasports needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Hockey Asiasports to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong 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 Hockey Asiasports 's lucrative customers.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Andrew Delios suggests that, Hockey Asiasports 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Hockey Asiasports products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Hockey Asiasports needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Hockey Asiasports 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 - Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong HBR case study mentions - Hockey Asiasports 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Hockey Asiasports 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Hockey Asiasports has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the industry over the last five years. Hockey Asiasports even though has strong showing on digital transformation primary two stages, it has struggled to capitalize the power of digital transformation in marketing efforts and new venture efforts.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Hockey Asiasports is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Opportunities Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong | 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 Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong are -
Developing new processes and practices
– Hockey Asiasports can develop new processes and procedures in Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Hockey Asiasports has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Hockey Asiasports to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong case study. Hockey Asiasports can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Hockey Asiasports is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong case study suggests that firm can utilize new technology to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Buying journey improvements
– Hockey Asiasports can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Hockey Asiasports 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Hockey Asiasports can make experimentation a productive activity and build a culture of innovation using approaches such as – mining transaction data, A/B testing of websites and selling platforms, engaging potential customers over various needs, and building on small ideas in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Hockey Asiasports to increase its market reach. Hockey Asiasports 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Hockey Asiasports 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Hockey Asiasports can build a diversified supply chain model across various countries in - South East Asia, India, and other parts of the world. This reconfiguration of global supply chain can help, as suggested in case study, Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Manufacturing automation
– Hockey Asiasports can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Hockey Asiasports can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Hockey Asiasports 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 Hockey Asiasports to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Hockey Asiasports 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.
Threats Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong are -
Increasing wage structure of Hockey Asiasports
– 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 Hockey Asiasports.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Hockey Asiasports can face downward pressure on margins from increasing competition from international players. The international players have stable revenue in their home market and can use those resources to penetrate prominent markets illustrated in HBR case study Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong .
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. Hockey Asiasports needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Hockey Asiasports 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.
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 Hockey Asiasports business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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 Hockey Asiasports in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector and impact the bottomline 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 Hockey Asiasports in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. The Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Environmental challenges
– Hockey Asiasports 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. Hockey Asiasports can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry.
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. Hockey Asiasports 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.
Aging population
– As the populations of most advanced economies are aging, it will lead to high social security costs, higher savings among population, and lower demand for goods and services in the economy. The household savings in US, France, UK, Germany, and Japan are growing faster than predicted because of uncertainty caused by pandemic.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Hockey Asiasports is facing in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Hockey Asiasports has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Hockey Asiasports needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Hockey Asiasports 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong 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 Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong 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 Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong 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 Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong 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 Asiasports: Hockey Night in Hong Kong 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 Hockey Asiasports needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.