Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, geopolitical disruptions, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, technology disruption, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models,
increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing energy prices, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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 Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd
2. Improving business portfolio management of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Japan
4. Making a Food Processing sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd
Strengths of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd are -
Highly skilled collaborators
– Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Food Processing industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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.
Analytics focus
– Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd is putting a lot of focus on utilizing the power of analytics in business decision making. This has put it among the leading players in the Food Processing industry. The technology infrastructure of Japan is also helping it to harness the power of analytics for – marketing optimization, demand forecasting, customer relationship management, inventory management, information sharing across the value chain etc.
Innovation driven organization
– Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd is one of the most innovative firm in Food Processing sector.
Training and development
– Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd has one of the best training and development program in Consumer/Non-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 Food Processing industry
– Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Digital Transformation in Food Processing industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd in Food Processing industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Food Processing industry
– Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Food Processing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
High brand equity
– Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Food Processing 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.
Weaknesses of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd are -
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Food Processing industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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.
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 Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Food Processing industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Japan, Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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 Food Processing industry.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Food Processing industry, Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd is just above the Food Processing 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.
Employees’ less understanding of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd has some of the most successful models in the Food Processing industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd is one of the leading players in the Food Processing industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Food Processing industry in last five years.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Japan, Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Food Processing 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.
Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd are -
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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 Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Food Processing industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Food Processing 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Food Processing sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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 Food Processing industry.
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. Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd can utilize new technology in the field of Food Processing industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Food Processing industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Food Processing industry. This can help Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd to build a more holistic ecosystem for Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd products in the Food Processing industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Threats Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd are -
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Food Processing 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. Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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 Food Processing industry and other sectors.
Increasing wage structure of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd
– 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 Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd in Food Processing industry. The Food Processing 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd is facing in Food Processing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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 Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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.
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 Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd.
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 Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd in the Food Processing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Food Processing industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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
– Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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.
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. Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Food Processing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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 Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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 Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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 Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd 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 Toyo Suisan Kaisha Ltd needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.