SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Transwind Infrastructures (India)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Transwind Infrastructures is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – technology disruption, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, there is increasing trade war between United States & China,
increasing transportation and logistics costs, there is backlash against globalization, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Transwind Infrastructures
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Transwind Infrastructures can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Transwind Infrastructures, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Transwind Infrastructures 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 Transwind Infrastructures can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Transwind Infrastructures
2. Improving business portfolio management of Transwind Infrastructures
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in India
4. Making a sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Transwind Infrastructures
Strengths of Transwind Infrastructures | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Transwind Infrastructures are -
Sustainable margins compare to other players in industry
– Transwind Infrastructures has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Transwind Infrastructures to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Transwind Infrastructures to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Transwind Infrastructures 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.
High brand equity
– Transwind Infrastructures has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Transwind Infrastructures to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Transwind Infrastructures 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Transwind Infrastructures has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Transwind Infrastructures staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Digital Transformation in industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Transwind Infrastructures digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Transwind Infrastructures 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Transwind Infrastructures in the sector have low bargaining power. Transwind Infrastructures has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Transwind Infrastructures to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Transwind Infrastructures has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Transwind Infrastructures have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Strong track record of project management in the industry
– Transwind Infrastructures is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Transwind Infrastructures is one of the leading players in the industry in India. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in India. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Organizational Resilience of Transwind Infrastructures
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Transwind Infrastructures does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Ability to lead change in
– Transwind Infrastructures is one of the leading players in the industry in India. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the industry in India but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Transwind Infrastructures in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Weaknesses of Transwind Infrastructures | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Transwind Infrastructures are -
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Transwind Infrastructures 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Transwind Infrastructures products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Transwind Infrastructures needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Skills based hiring in industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Transwind Infrastructures 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the industry, Transwind Infrastructures 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.
High dependence on Transwind Infrastructures ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Transwind Infrastructures still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Transwind Infrastructures has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Need for greater diversity
– Transwind Infrastructures 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Transwind Infrastructures has some of the most successful models in the industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Transwind Infrastructures should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High bargaining power of channel partners in industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in India, Transwind Infrastructures 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Transwind Infrastructures is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the industry, but Transwind Infrastructures needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Transwind Infrastructures to focus more on services in the industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Transwind Infrastructures has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Transwind Infrastructures, in the dynamic environment of industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Transwind Infrastructures has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Transwind Infrastructures Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Transwind Infrastructures are -
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Transwind Infrastructures has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in industry. This can help Transwind Infrastructures to build a more holistic ecosystem for Transwind Infrastructures products in the industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Developing new processes and practices
– Transwind Infrastructures can develop new processes and procedures in 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Transwind Infrastructures is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Transwind Infrastructures can utilize new technology in the field of industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Transwind Infrastructures 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. Transwind Infrastructures 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Transwind Infrastructures 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 industry.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Transwind Infrastructures 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 Transwind Infrastructures to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Transwind Infrastructures 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Transwind Infrastructures 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.
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 Transwind Infrastructures 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 Transwind Infrastructures 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 Transwind Infrastructures to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Manufacturing automation
– Transwind Infrastructures can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in sector. 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Transwind Infrastructures 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 Transwind Infrastructures in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Threats Transwind Infrastructures External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Transwind Infrastructures are -
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Transwind Infrastructures is facing in sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Regulatory challenges
– Transwind Infrastructures 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 industry regulations.
Environmental challenges
– Transwind Infrastructures 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. Transwind Infrastructures can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the industry.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Transwind Infrastructures in industry. The 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 Transwind Infrastructures
– 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 Transwind Infrastructures.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to industry are lowering. It can presents Transwind Infrastructures with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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 Transwind Infrastructures.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Transwind Infrastructures 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 Transwind Infrastructures prominent markets.
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.
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 Transwind Infrastructures in the sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Transwind Infrastructures 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
– Transwind Infrastructures 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Transwind Infrastructures Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Transwind Infrastructures 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 Transwind Infrastructures 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 Transwind Infrastructures 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 Transwind Infrastructures 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 Transwind Infrastructures needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.