Sino Energy Intl (1096) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Footwear
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Sino Energy Intl (Hong Kong)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Sino Energy Intl is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing commodity prices, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, there is backlash against globalization,
wage bills are increasing, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Sino Energy Intl can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Sino Energy Intl, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Sino Energy Intl 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 Sino Energy Intl can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Sino Energy Intl
2. Improving business portfolio management of Sino Energy Intl
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Hong Kong
4. Making a Footwear sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Sino Energy Intl
Strengths of Sino Energy Intl | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Sino Energy Intl are -
Training and development
– Sino Energy Intl has one of the best training and development program in Consumer Cyclical industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in – employees retention, in-house promotion, loyalty, new venture initiation, lack of conflict, and high level of both employees and customer engagement.
Strong track record of project management in the Footwear industry
– Sino Energy Intl is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Sino Energy Intl comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Footwear 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Footwear industry
– Sino Energy Intl has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Sino Energy Intl to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Footwear industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Sino Energy Intl to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Sino Energy Intl has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Sino Energy Intl staying ahead in the Footwear industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Sino Energy Intl in Footwear industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Sino Energy Intl 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Sino Energy Intl is one of the most innovative firm in Footwear sector.
Learning organization
- Sino Energy Intl 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 Sino Energy Intl is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Sino Energy Intl emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Digital Transformation in Footwear industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Sino Energy Intl digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Sino Energy Intl 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.
Organizational Resilience of Sino Energy Intl
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Sino Energy Intl does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Diverse revenue streams
– Sino Energy Intl is present in almost all the verticals within the Footwear industry. This has provided Sino Energy Intl 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.
Weaknesses of Sino Energy Intl | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Sino Energy Intl are -
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Sino Energy Intl needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Footwear industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Sino Energy Intl can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Sino Energy Intl is planning to shift buying processes online.
Employees’ less understanding of Sino Energy Intl strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Sino Energy Intl 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.
High dependence on existing supply chain
– The disruption in the global supply chains because of the Covid-19 pandemic and blockage of the Suez Canal illustrated the fragile nature of Sino Energy Intl supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Sino Energy Intl is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Sino Energy Intl vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Sino Energy Intl is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Footwear industry, but Sino Energy Intl needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Sino Energy Intl to focus more on services in the Footwear industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Sino Energy Intl 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 Footwear industry using digital technology.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Sino Energy Intl has high operating costs in the Footwear industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Sino Energy Intl lucrative customers.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Sino Energy Intl is one of the leading players in the Footwear industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Footwear industry in last five years.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Sino Energy Intl is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Sino Energy Intl to provide better information regarding Footwear products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Sino Energy Intl, in the dynamic environment of Footwear industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Sino Energy Intl has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Sino Energy Intl, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Footwear industry. 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Footwear industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Hong Kong, Sino Energy Intl 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 Footwear industry.
Sino Energy Intl Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Sino Energy Intl are -
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Sino Energy Intl 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 Footwear industry.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Sino Energy Intl 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 Sino Energy Intl to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Sino Energy Intl to increase its market reach. Sino Energy Intl 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Sino Energy Intl 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 Sino Energy Intl to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Sino Energy Intl is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Sino Energy Intl can utilize new technology in the field of Footwear industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Sino Energy Intl 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 Footwear industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Sino Energy Intl 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. Sino Energy Intl 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Sino Energy Intl 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 Sino Energy Intl in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Footwear industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Sino Energy Intl 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Footwear industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Sino Energy Intl can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Buying journey improvements
– Sino Energy Intl can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Footwear industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. It 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.
Identify volunteer opportunities
– Covid-19 has impacted working population in two ways – it has led to people soul searching about their professional choices, resulting in mass resignation. Secondly it has encouraged people to do things that they are passionate about. This has opened opportunities for businesses to build volunteer oriented socially driven projects. Sino Energy Intl can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Threats Sino Energy Intl External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Sino Energy Intl are -
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. Sino Energy Intl needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Footwear industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Sino Energy Intl in the Footwear sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Sino Energy Intl is facing in Footwear sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Sino Energy Intl in Footwear industry. The Footwear 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.
Increasing wage structure of Sino Energy Intl
– 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 Sino Energy Intl.
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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Sino Energy Intl 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 Sino Energy Intl prominent markets.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Sino Energy Intl 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 Footwear industry and other sectors.
Regulatory challenges
– Sino Energy Intl 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 Footwear industry regulations.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Footwear industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Sino Energy Intl can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Sino Energy Intl 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.
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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Sino Energy Intl 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 Footwear industry.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Sino Energy Intl Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Sino Energy Intl 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 Sino Energy Intl 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 Sino Energy Intl 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 Sino Energy Intl 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 Sino Energy Intl needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
