SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Riken Technos Corp (Japan)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Riken Technos Corp is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing commodity prices, increasing energy prices, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings,
wage bills are increasing, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Riken Technos Corp
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Riken Technos Corp can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Riken Technos Corp, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Riken Technos Corp 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 Riken Technos Corp can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Riken Technos Corp
2. Improving business portfolio management of Riken Technos Corp
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Japan
4. Making a Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Riken Technos Corp
Strengths of Riken Technos Corp | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Riken Technos Corp are -
Successful track record of launching new products
– Riken Technos Corp has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Riken Technos Corp 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
- Riken Technos Corp 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 Riken Technos Corp is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Riken Technos Corp emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Strong track record of project management in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry
– Riken Technos Corp is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Analytics focus
– Riken Technos Corp 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 Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Riken Technos Corp 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.
Training and development
– Riken Technos Corp has one of the best training and development program in Basic Materials 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Riken Technos Corp is present in almost all the verticals within the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry. This has provided Riken Technos Corp 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Riken Technos Corp is one of the most innovative firm in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber sector.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Riken Technos Corp 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Riken Technos Corp in the Basic Materials sector have low bargaining power. Riken Technos Corp has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Riken Technos Corp to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry
– Riken Technos Corp has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Riken Technos Corp to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Riken Technos Corp to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Riken Technos Corp is one of the leading players in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber 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.
Weaknesses of Riken Technos Corp | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Riken Technos Corp are -
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Riken Technos Corp needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Riken Technos Corp can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Riken Technos Corp is planning to shift buying processes online.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Riken Technos Corp, in the dynamic environment of Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Riken Technos Corp has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Riken Technos Corp is one of the leading players in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry in last five years.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Riken Technos Corp has some of the most successful models in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Riken Technos Corp should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Skills based hiring in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Riken Technos Corp has created an environment where the organization is dominated by functional specialists rather than management generalist. This has resulted into product oriented approach rather than marketing oriented approach or consumers oriented approach.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Riken Technos Corp has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Employees’ less understanding of Riken Technos Corp strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Riken Technos Corp 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.
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 Riken Technos Corp supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Riken Technos Corp is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Riken Technos Corp vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Riken Technos Corp is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry, but Riken Technos Corp needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Riken Technos Corp to focus more on services in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High dependence on Riken Technos Corp ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Riken Technos Corp still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Riken Technos Corp has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Japan, Riken Technos Corp 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 Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry.
Riken Technos Corp Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Riken Technos Corp are -
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Riken Technos Corp to increase its market reach. Riken Technos Corp 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.
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. Riken Technos Corp can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Loyalty marketing
– Riken Technos Corp 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Riken Technos Corp can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber 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 Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Riken Technos Corp 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. Riken Technos Corp 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Riken Technos Corp has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Riken Technos Corp to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Riken Technos Corp to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Riken Technos Corp 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 Riken Technos Corp in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Riken Technos Corp is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Riken Technos Corp can utilize new technology in the field of Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Riken Technos Corp 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 Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Riken Technos Corp has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry. This can help Riken Technos Corp to build a more holistic ecosystem for Riken Technos Corp products in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Buying journey improvements
– Riken Technos Corp can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Riken Technos Corp 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.
Threats Riken Technos Corp External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Riken Technos Corp are -
Consumer confidence and its impact on Riken Technos Corp 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 Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry and other sectors.
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 Riken Technos Corp in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Regulatory challenges
– Riken Technos Corp 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 Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry regulations.
Environmental challenges
– Riken Technos Corp 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. Riken Technos Corp can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Riken Technos Corp in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry. The Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber 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 Riken Technos Corp business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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. Riken Technos Corp 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Riken Technos Corp is facing in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Riken Technos Corp 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Riken Technos Corp has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Riken Technos Corp needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber 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.
Technology disruption because of hacks, piracy etc
– The colonial pipeline illustrated, how vulnerable modern organization are to international hackers, miscreants, and disruptors. The cyber security interruption, data leaks, etc can seriously jeopardize the future growth of the organization.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Riken Technos Corp can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Riken Technos Corp 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 Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Riken Technos Corp Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Riken Technos Corp 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 Riken Technos Corp 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 Riken Technos Corp 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 Riken Technos Corp 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 Riken Technos Corp needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
