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 – customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , technology disruption, wage bills are increasing, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies,
talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, geopolitical disruptions, 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 -
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.
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.
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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Sino Energy Intl in the Consumer Cyclical sector have low bargaining power. Sino Energy Intl has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Sino Energy Intl to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
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.
High brand equity
– Sino Energy Intl has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Sino Energy Intl to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Sino Energy Intl has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Sino Energy Intl 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Sino Energy Intl has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Footwear industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Sino Energy Intl have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Sino Energy Intl has built up over years in its products and services combo offer has resulted in high retention of customers, lower marketing costs, and greater ability of the firm to focus on its customers.
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.
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.
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 -
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Sino Energy Intl is just above the Footwear industry average. It needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
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.
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.
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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Hong Kong, Sino Energy Intl needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
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.
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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Sino Energy Intl has some of the most successful models in the Footwear industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Sino Energy Intl should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Sino Energy Intl has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Footwear industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Footwear industry, Sino Energy Intl 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.
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 -
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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Sino Energy Intl 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 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Sino Energy Intl can develop new processes and procedures in Footwear 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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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 Sino Energy Intl 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.
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.
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.
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.
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 -
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.
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.
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 Sino Energy Intl.
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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Sino Energy Intl has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Footwear industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Sino Energy Intl needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Footwear 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.
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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Sino Energy Intl may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Footwear sector.
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. Sino Energy Intl 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.
Environmental challenges
– Sino Energy Intl 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. Sino Energy Intl can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Footwear industry.
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.
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.
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.
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.