Onoken Co Ltd (7414) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Misc. Fabricated Products
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Onoken Co Ltd (Japan)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Onoken Co Ltd is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing energy prices, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, wage bills are increasing, geopolitical disruptions, increasing transportation and logistics costs,
central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Onoken Co Ltd can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Onoken Co Ltd, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Onoken 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 Onoken Co Ltd can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Onoken Co Ltd
2. Improving business portfolio management of Onoken Co Ltd
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Japan
4. Making a Misc. Fabricated Products sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Onoken Co Ltd
Strengths of Onoken Co Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Onoken Co Ltd are -
Ability to lead change in Misc. Fabricated Products
– Onoken Co Ltd is one of the leading players in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry in Japan. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry in Japan but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Onoken Co Ltd in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
High brand equity
– Onoken Co Ltd has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Onoken Co Ltd to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Onoken Co Ltd is one of the leading players in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry in Japan. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Japan. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Onoken Co Ltd has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Onoken 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.
Organizational Resilience of Onoken Co Ltd
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Onoken Co Ltd does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Misc. Fabricated Products industry
– Onoken Co Ltd has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Onoken Co Ltd to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Onoken Co Ltd to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Diverse revenue streams
– Onoken Co Ltd is present in almost all the verticals within the Misc. Fabricated Products industry. This has provided Onoken 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Onoken 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry
– Onoken Co 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.
Learning organization
- Onoken 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 Onoken Co Ltd is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Onoken Co Ltd emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Onoken Co Ltd in the Basic Materials sector have low bargaining power. Onoken Co Ltd has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Onoken Co Ltd to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Analytics focus
– Onoken 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 Misc. Fabricated Products 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.
Weaknesses of Onoken Co Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Onoken Co Ltd are -
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Onoken Co Ltd has high operating costs in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Onoken Co Ltd lucrative customers.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Onoken Co Ltd has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Misc. Fabricated Products 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, Onoken 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Onoken Co Ltd, in the dynamic environment of Misc. Fabricated Products industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Onoken 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
– Onoken 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Onoken Co Ltd is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry, but Onoken Co Ltd needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Onoken Co Ltd to focus more on services in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
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 Onoken Co Ltd supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Onoken Co Ltd is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Onoken Co Ltd vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Onoken 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 Misc. Fabricated Products industry over the last five years. Onoken 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Onoken Co Ltd needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Onoken Co Ltd can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Onoken Co Ltd is planning to shift buying processes online.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Onoken Co Ltd is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Onoken Co Ltd to provide better information regarding Misc. Fabricated Products products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Misc. Fabricated Products industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Japan, Onoken Co 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 Misc. Fabricated Products industry.
Onoken Co Ltd Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Onoken Co Ltd are -
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Misc. Fabricated Products industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Onoken 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Onoken Co Ltd to increase its market reach. Onoken Co Ltd will be able to reach out to new customers. Secondly 5G will also provide technology framework to build new tools and products that can help more immersive consumer experience and faster consumer journey.
Manufacturing automation
– Onoken Co Ltd can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Misc. Fabricated Products 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Onoken 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. Onoken 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Onoken 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Onoken Co Ltd is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Onoken Co Ltd can utilize new technology in the field of Misc. Fabricated Products 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 Onoken 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 Misc. Fabricated Products industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Onoken Co Ltd has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Misc. Fabricated Products industry. This can help Onoken Co Ltd to build a more holistic ecosystem for Onoken Co Ltd products in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Onoken Co Ltd can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Onoken Co Ltd operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Misc. Fabricated Products sector.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Onoken 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Onoken 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 Misc. Fabricated Products industry.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Misc. Fabricated Products industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Onoken Co Ltd in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry. Now Onoken Co Ltd can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Buying journey improvements
– Onoken Co Ltd can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Misc. Fabricated Products 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.
Threats Onoken Co Ltd External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Onoken Co Ltd are -
Environmental challenges
– Onoken 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. Onoken Co Ltd can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Onoken Co Ltd has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Onoken Co Ltd needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Misc. Fabricated Products 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.
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. Onoken Co Ltd needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Misc. Fabricated Products industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Onoken Co Ltd business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Onoken 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 Onoken Co Ltd.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Onoken Co Ltd in Misc. Fabricated Products industry. The Misc. Fabricated Products 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 Onoken Co Ltd is facing in Misc. Fabricated Products sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Regulatory challenges
– Onoken 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 Misc. Fabricated Products industry regulations.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Onoken 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 Onoken Co 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Onoken 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 Misc. Fabricated Products industry.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Misc. Fabricated Products industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Onoken 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Misc. Fabricated Products industry are lowering. It can presents Onoken Co Ltd with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Misc. Fabricated Products sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Onoken Co Ltd Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Onoken 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 Onoken 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 Onoken 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 Onoken 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 Onoken Co Ltd needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.