T.Hasegawa Co Ltd (4958) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for T.Hasegawa Co Ltd (Japan)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , T.Hasegawa Co Ltd is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – there is backlash against globalization, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing energy prices, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, technology disruption, geopolitical disruptions, increasing transportation and logistics costs, wage bills are increasing, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that T.Hasegawa Co Ltd can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the T.Hasegawa Co Ltd, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which T.Hasegawa Co 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.

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SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix

SWOT analysis of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd
2. Improving business portfolio management of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Japan
4. Making a Chemical Manufacturing sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd

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Strengths of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd are -

Low bargaining power of suppliers

– Suppliers of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd in the Basic Materials sector have low bargaining power. T.Hasegawa Co Ltd has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps T.Hasegawa Co Ltd to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.

Analytics focus

– T.Hasegawa Co 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 Chemical Manufacturing 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.

Successful track record of launching new products

– T.Hasegawa Co Ltd has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. T.Hasegawa Co 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.

Learning organization

- T.Hasegawa Co Ltd 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 T.Hasegawa Co Ltd is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at T.Hasegawa Co Ltd emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.

High brand equity

– T.Hasegawa Co Ltd has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled T.Hasegawa Co Ltd to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.

Diverse revenue streams

– T.Hasegawa Co Ltd is present in almost all the verticals within the Chemical Manufacturing industry. This has provided T.Hasegawa Co Ltd 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.

Digital Transformation in Chemical Manufacturing industry

- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For T.Hasegawa Co Ltd digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. T.Hasegawa Co 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.

Cross disciplinary teams

– Horizontal connected teams at the T.Hasegawa Co 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.

Ability to lead change in Chemical Manufacturing

– T.Hasegawa Co Ltd is one of the leading players in the Chemical Manufacturing industry in Japan. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Chemical Manufacturing industry in Japan but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled T.Hasegawa Co Ltd in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.

Organizational Resilience of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd

– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing T.Hasegawa Co Ltd does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.

High switching costs

– The high switching costs that T.Hasegawa Co Ltd 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.

Innovation driven organization

– T.Hasegawa Co Ltd is one of the most innovative firm in Chemical Manufacturing sector.

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Weaknesses of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd are -

Slow to harness new channels of communication

– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, T.Hasegawa Co Ltd is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help T.Hasegawa Co Ltd to provide better information regarding Chemical Manufacturing products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.

Increasing silos among functional specialists

– The organizational structure of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Chemical Manufacturing industry, but T.Hasegawa Co Ltd needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help T.Hasegawa Co Ltd to focus more on services in the Chemical Manufacturing industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.

Ability to respond to the competition

– As the decision making is very deliberative at T.Hasegawa Co Ltd, in the dynamic environment of Chemical Manufacturing industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. T.Hasegawa Co Ltd has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.

Interest costs

– Compare to the competition, T.Hasegawa Co 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.

Aligning sales with marketing

– From the outside it seems that T.Hasegawa Co Ltd needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Chemical Manufacturing industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at T.Hasegawa Co Ltd can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as T.Hasegawa Co Ltd is planning to shift buying processes online.

Employees’ less understanding of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd strategy

– From the outside it seems that the employees of T.Hasegawa Co 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 T.Hasegawa Co Ltd has some of the most successful models in the Chemical Manufacturing industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. T.Hasegawa Co Ltd should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.

Need for greater diversity

– T.Hasegawa Co Ltd 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.

Low market penetration in new markets

– Outside its home market of Japan, T.Hasegawa Co Ltd needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.

High dependence on T.Hasegawa Co Ltd ‘s star products

– The top 2 products and services of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Chemical Manufacturing industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though T.Hasegawa Co Ltd has relatively successful track record of launching new products.

Slow to strategic competitive environment developments

– As T.Hasegawa Co Ltd is one of the leading players in the Chemical Manufacturing industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Chemical Manufacturing industry in last five years.

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T.Hasegawa Co Ltd Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd are -

Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities

– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for T.Hasegawa Co Ltd 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 T.Hasegawa Co Ltd to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.

Loyalty marketing

– T.Hasegawa Co 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.

Creating value in data economy

– The success of analytics program of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Chemical Manufacturing industry. This can help T.Hasegawa Co Ltd to build a more holistic ecosystem for T.Hasegawa Co Ltd products in the Chemical Manufacturing industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.

Developing new processes and practices

– T.Hasegawa Co Ltd can develop new processes and procedures in Chemical Manufacturing 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.

Buying journey improvements

– T.Hasegawa Co Ltd can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Chemical Manufacturing 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.

Redefining models of collaboration and team work

– As explained in the weaknesses section, T.Hasegawa Co Ltd is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. T.Hasegawa Co Ltd can utilize new technology in the field of Chemical Manufacturing industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.

Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains

– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, T.Hasegawa Co 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 T.Hasegawa Co 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.

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 T.Hasegawa Co Ltd 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.

Increase in government spending

– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, T.Hasegawa Co Ltd can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that T.Hasegawa Co Ltd operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Chemical Manufacturing sector.

Finding new ways to collaborate

– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Chemical Manufacturing industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. T.Hasegawa Co Ltd can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.

Learning at scale

– Online learning technologies has now opened space for T.Hasegawa Co Ltd 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.

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for T.Hasegawa Co 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.

Using analytics as competitive advantage

– T.Hasegawa Co Ltd has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Chemical Manufacturing sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled T.Hasegawa Co Ltd to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help T.Hasegawa Co Ltd to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.

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Threats T.Hasegawa Co Ltd External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd are -

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. T.Hasegawa Co 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.

Increasing wage structure of T.Hasegawa Co 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 T.Hasegawa Co Ltd.

Barriers of entry lowering

– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Chemical Manufacturing industry are lowering. It can presents T.Hasegawa Co Ltd with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Chemical Manufacturing sector.

High dependence on third party suppliers

– T.Hasegawa Co 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.

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 T.Hasegawa Co Ltd in the Chemical Manufacturing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

Shortening product life cycle

– it is one of the major threat that T.Hasegawa Co Ltd is facing in Chemical Manufacturing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.

Environmental challenges

– T.Hasegawa Co Ltd 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. T.Hasegawa Co Ltd can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Chemical Manufacturing industry.

Consumer confidence and its impact on T.Hasegawa Co 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry and other sectors.

Trade war between China and United States

– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for T.Hasegawa Co Ltd in Chemical Manufacturing industry. The Chemical Manufacturing 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.

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. T.Hasegawa Co Ltd needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Chemical Manufacturing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.

Stagnating economy with rate increase

– T.Hasegawa Co Ltd 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry.

Easy access to finance

– Easy access to finance in Chemical Manufacturing industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. T.Hasegawa Co Ltd can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.

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 T.Hasegawa Co Ltd business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of T.Hasegawa Co Ltd Template, Example

Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at T.Hasegawa Co 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 T.Hasegawa Co 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 T.Hasegawa Co 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 T.Hasegawa Co 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 T.Hasegawa Co Ltd needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.

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