logly (6579) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Computer Services
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for logly (Japan)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , logly is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing commodity prices, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing energy prices,
challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, 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 logly can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the logly, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which logly 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 logly can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of logly
2. Improving business portfolio management of logly
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Japan
4. Making a Computer Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of logly
Strengths of logly | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of logly are -
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– logly has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – logly staying ahead in the Computer Services industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Organizational Resilience of logly
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing logly does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of logly in the Technology sector have low bargaining power. logly has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps logly to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Ability to recruit top talent
– logly is one of the leading players in the Computer Services 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
– logly has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled logly to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of logly in Computer Services industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Learning organization
- logly 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 logly is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at logly emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Analytics focus
– logly 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 Computer Services 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– logly has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Computer Services industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of logly have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that logly 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.
Digital Transformation in Computer Services industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For logly digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. logly 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– logly has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. logly 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.
Weaknesses of logly | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of logly are -
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, logly has high operating costs in the Computer Services industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract logly lucrative customers.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Japan, logly needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, logly 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 Computer Services industry using digital technology.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, logly 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of logly products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, logly needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As logly is one of the leading players in the Computer Services industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Computer Services industry in last five years.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of logly, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Computer Services 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.
Employees’ less understanding of logly strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of logly 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Computer Services industry, logly needs to come up with a strategy to reduce the workers concern regarding automation. Without a clear strategy, it could lead to disruption and uncertainty within the organization.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that logly needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Computer Services industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at logly can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as logly is planning to shift buying processes online.
High dependence on logly ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of logly still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Computer Services industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though logly has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
logly Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of logly are -
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help logly to increase its market reach. logly 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, logly can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that logly operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Computer Services sector.
Developing new processes and practices
– logly can develop new processes and procedures in Computer Services industry using technology such as automation using artificial intelligence, real time transportation and products tracking, 3D modeling for concept development and new products pilot testing etc.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– logly has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Computer Services sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled logly to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help logly to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects logly can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Buying journey improvements
– logly can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Computer Services 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Computer Services industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. logly 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. logly 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.
Loyalty marketing
– logly 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, logly 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for logly 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.
Manufacturing automation
– logly can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Computer Services 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, logly is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. logly can utilize new technology in the field of Computer Services industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, 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 logly 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.
Threats logly External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of logly are -
Consumer confidence and its impact on logly 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 Computer Services industry and other sectors.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that logly is facing in Computer Services sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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.
Regulatory challenges
– logly 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 Computer Services industry regulations.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Computer Services industry are lowering. It can presents logly with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Computer Services sector.
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. logly needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Computer Services industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 logly in the Computer Services sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Computer Services industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. logly 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 logly in Computer Services industry. The Computer Services 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.
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. logly 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– logly has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Computer Services industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, logly needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Computer Services 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.
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 logly.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, logly 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 logly prominent markets.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of logly Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at logly 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 logly 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 logly 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 logly 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 logly needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
