Genki Sushi Co Ltd (9828) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Restaurants
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Genki Sushi Co Ltd (Japan)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Genki Sushi Co Ltd is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing household debt because of falling income levels, there is backlash against globalization, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models,
geopolitical disruptions, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Genki Sushi Co Ltd
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Genki Sushi Co Ltd can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Genki Sushi Co Ltd, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Genki Sushi 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.
SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix
SWOT analysis of Genki Sushi Co Ltd can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Genki Sushi Co Ltd
2. Improving business portfolio management of Genki Sushi Co Ltd
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Japan
4. Making a Restaurants sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Genki Sushi Co Ltd
Strengths of Genki Sushi Co Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Genki Sushi Co Ltd are -
Training and development
– Genki Sushi Co Ltd has one of the best training and development program in Services 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Genki Sushi Co Ltd in the Services sector have low bargaining power. Genki Sushi Co Ltd has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Genki Sushi Co Ltd to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Digital Transformation in Restaurants industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Genki Sushi Co Ltd digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Genki Sushi 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Genki Sushi Co Ltd comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Restaurants 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.
Organizational Resilience of Genki Sushi Co Ltd
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Genki Sushi Co Ltd does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Innovation driven organization
– Genki Sushi Co Ltd is one of the most innovative firm in Restaurants sector.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Genki Sushi Co Ltd has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Restaurants industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Genki Sushi Co Ltd have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Genki Sushi 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Genki Sushi 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Genki Sushi Co Ltd is present in almost all the verticals within the Restaurants industry. This has provided Genki Sushi 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Restaurants industry
– Genki Sushi Co Ltd has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Genki Sushi Co Ltd to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Restaurants industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Genki Sushi Co Ltd to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Genki Sushi Co Ltd has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Genki Sushi Co Ltd staying ahead in the Restaurants industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Weaknesses of Genki Sushi Co Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Genki Sushi Co Ltd are -
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Genki Sushi Co Ltd, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Restaurants 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Genki Sushi Co Ltd is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Genki Sushi Co Ltd to provide better information regarding Restaurants 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 Genki Sushi Co Ltd is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Restaurants industry, but Genki Sushi Co Ltd needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Genki Sushi Co Ltd to focus more on services in the Restaurants industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Genki Sushi Co Ltd has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Restaurants industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Genki Sushi Co Ltd has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Restaurants industry over the last five years. Genki Sushi Co Ltd even though has strong showing on digital transformation primary two stages, it has struggled to capitalize the power of digital transformation in marketing efforts and new venture efforts.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Genki Sushi Co Ltd 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 Restaurants industry using digital technology.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Genki Sushi Co Ltd, in the dynamic environment of Restaurants industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Genki Sushi Co Ltd has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Need for greater diversity
– Genki Sushi 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Genki Sushi Co Ltd needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Restaurants industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Genki Sushi Co Ltd can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Genki Sushi Co Ltd is planning to shift buying processes online.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Genki Sushi Co Ltd has some of the most successful models in the Restaurants industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Genki Sushi Co Ltd should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Genki Sushi Co Ltd has high operating costs in the Restaurants industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Genki Sushi Co Ltd lucrative customers.
Genki Sushi Co Ltd Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Genki Sushi Co Ltd are -
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Restaurants industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Genki Sushi Co Ltd in the Restaurants industry. Now Genki Sushi Co Ltd can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Genki Sushi 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 Genki Sushi 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Genki Sushi Co 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Genki Sushi Co 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 Restaurants industry.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Restaurants industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Genki Sushi 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Restaurants industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Genki Sushi Co Ltd 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. Genki Sushi Co Ltd 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Genki Sushi Co Ltd can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Genki Sushi Co Ltd operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Restaurants sector.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Genki Sushi Co 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Genki Sushi Co Ltd has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Restaurants industry. This can help Genki Sushi Co Ltd to build a more holistic ecosystem for Genki Sushi Co Ltd products in the Restaurants industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Genki Sushi 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 Genki Sushi Co Ltd to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Manufacturing automation
– Genki Sushi Co Ltd can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Restaurants 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Genki Sushi Co Ltd can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Restaurants 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Genki Sushi Co Ltd can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Threats Genki Sushi Co Ltd External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Genki Sushi Co Ltd 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. Genki Sushi Co Ltd needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Restaurants industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Restaurants industry are lowering. It can presents Genki Sushi Co Ltd with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Restaurants sector.
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 Genki Sushi Co Ltd in the Restaurants sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Genki Sushi Co Ltd has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Restaurants industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Genki Sushi Co Ltd needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Restaurants 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Genki Sushi Co Ltd 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 Restaurants industry regulations.
Increasing wage structure of Genki Sushi 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 Genki Sushi Co Ltd.
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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Genki Sushi 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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Restaurants industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Genki Sushi 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Genki Sushi Co Ltd in Restaurants industry. The Restaurants 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.
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 Genki Sushi Co Ltd business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Genki Sushi Co 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 Genki Sushi Co Ltd prominent markets.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Genki Sushi Co Ltd is facing in Restaurants sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Genki Sushi Co Ltd Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Genki Sushi 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 Genki Sushi 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 Genki Sushi 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 Genki Sushi 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 Genki Sushi Co Ltd needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.