SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Fuso Pharmaceutical (Japan)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Fuso Pharmaceutical is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing transportation and logistics costs, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic ,
increasing energy prices, increasing commodity prices, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Fuso Pharmaceutical
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Fuso Pharmaceutical can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Fuso Pharmaceutical, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Fuso Pharmaceutical 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 Fuso Pharmaceutical can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Fuso Pharmaceutical
2. Improving business portfolio management of Fuso Pharmaceutical
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Japan
4. Making a Biotechnology & Drugs sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Fuso Pharmaceutical
Strengths of Fuso Pharmaceutical | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Fuso Pharmaceutical are -
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Fuso Pharmaceutical in the Healthcare sector have low bargaining power. Fuso Pharmaceutical has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Fuso Pharmaceutical to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Fuso Pharmaceutical has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Biotechnology & Drugs industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Fuso Pharmaceutical have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Ability to lead change in Biotechnology & Drugs
– Fuso Pharmaceutical is one of the leading players in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry in Japan. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry in Japan but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Fuso Pharmaceutical in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Digital Transformation in Biotechnology & Drugs industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Fuso Pharmaceutical digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Fuso Pharmaceutical 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.
Organizational Resilience of Fuso Pharmaceutical
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Fuso Pharmaceutical does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Diverse revenue streams
– Fuso Pharmaceutical is present in almost all the verticals within the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This has provided Fuso Pharmaceutical 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Fuso Pharmaceutical has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Fuso Pharmaceutical staying ahead in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Fuso Pharmaceutical in Biotechnology & Drugs industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Innovation driven organization
– Fuso Pharmaceutical is one of the most innovative firm in Biotechnology & Drugs sector.
Strong track record of project management in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry
– Fuso Pharmaceutical is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Fuso Pharmaceutical is one of the leading players in the Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
High brand equity
– Fuso Pharmaceutical has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Fuso Pharmaceutical to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Weaknesses of Fuso Pharmaceutical | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Fuso Pharmaceutical are -
Employees’ less understanding of Fuso Pharmaceutical strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Fuso Pharmaceutical 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Fuso Pharmaceutical is just above the Biotechnology & Drugs industry average. It needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Fuso Pharmaceutical has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry over the last five years. Fuso Pharmaceutical 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Fuso Pharmaceutical, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Japan, Fuso Pharmaceutical needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Lack of clear differentiation of Fuso Pharmaceutical products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Fuso Pharmaceutical needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Fuso Pharmaceutical 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry using digital technology.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Fuso Pharmaceutical is one of the leading players in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry in last five years.
High dependence on Fuso Pharmaceutical ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Fuso Pharmaceutical still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Biotechnology & Drugs industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Fuso Pharmaceutical has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Fuso Pharmaceutical is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, but Fuso Pharmaceutical needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Fuso Pharmaceutical to focus more on services in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Skills based hiring in Biotechnology & Drugs industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Fuso Pharmaceutical 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.
Fuso Pharmaceutical Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Fuso Pharmaceutical are -
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Fuso Pharmaceutical 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. Fuso Pharmaceutical 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Fuso Pharmaceutical in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Fuso Pharmaceutical is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Fuso Pharmaceutical can utilize new technology in the field of Biotechnology & Drugs industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Fuso Pharmaceutical has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This can help Fuso Pharmaceutical to build a more holistic ecosystem for Fuso Pharmaceutical products in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Fuso Pharmaceutical has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Biotechnology & Drugs sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Fuso Pharmaceutical to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Fuso Pharmaceutical to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Loyalty marketing
– Fuso Pharmaceutical 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
– Fuso Pharmaceutical can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Biotechnology & Drugs industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Fuso Pharmaceutical can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
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. Fuso Pharmaceutical can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Fuso Pharmaceutical to increase its market reach. Fuso Pharmaceutical 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Fuso Pharmaceutical 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.
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 Fuso Pharmaceutical 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Fuso Pharmaceutical 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry.
Threats Fuso Pharmaceutical External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Fuso Pharmaceutical are -
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Fuso Pharmaceutical 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
– Fuso Pharmaceutical has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Fuso Pharmaceutical needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Fuso Pharmaceutical 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry and other sectors.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Fuso Pharmaceutical 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry.
Capital market disruption
– During the Covid-19, Dow Jones has touched record high. The valuations of a number of companies are way beyond their existing business model potential. This can lead to capital market correction which can put a number of suppliers, collaborators, value chain partners in great financial difficulty. It will directly impact the business of Fuso Pharmaceutical.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Biotechnology & Drugs industry are lowering. It can presents Fuso Pharmaceutical with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Biotechnology & Drugs sector.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Fuso Pharmaceutical in Biotechnology & Drugs industry. The Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Fuso Pharmaceutical is facing in Biotechnology & Drugs sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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. Fuso Pharmaceutical needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Regulatory challenges
– Fuso Pharmaceutical 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry regulations.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Fuso Pharmaceutical may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Biotechnology & Drugs sector.
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 Fuso Pharmaceutical business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Fuso Pharmaceutical Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Fuso Pharmaceutical 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 Fuso Pharmaceutical 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 Fuso Pharmaceutical 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 Fuso Pharmaceutical 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 Fuso Pharmaceutical needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
