Chiikishinbunsha (2164) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Chiikishinbunsha (Japan)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Chiikishinbunsha 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%, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing transportation and logistics costs, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing energy prices, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, technology disruption, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Chiikishinbunsha

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Chiikishinbunsha can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Chiikishinbunsha, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Chiikishinbunsha 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.

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SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix

SWOT analysis of Chiikishinbunsha can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Chiikishinbunsha
2. Improving business portfolio management of Chiikishinbunsha
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Japan
4. Making a Printing & Publishing sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Chiikishinbunsha

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Strengths of Chiikishinbunsha | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of Chiikishinbunsha are -

Strong track record of project management in the Printing & Publishing industry

– Chiikishinbunsha is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.

Cross disciplinary teams

– Horizontal connected teams at the Chiikishinbunsha 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.

Organizational Resilience of Chiikishinbunsha

– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Chiikishinbunsha 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 Printing & Publishing industry

– Chiikishinbunsha has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Chiikishinbunsha to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Printing & Publishing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Chiikishinbunsha to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.

Diverse revenue streams

– Chiikishinbunsha is present in almost all the verticals within the Printing & Publishing industry. This has provided Chiikishinbunsha 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.

Digital Transformation in Printing & Publishing industry

- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Chiikishinbunsha digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Chiikishinbunsha 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.

Highly skilled collaborators

– Chiikishinbunsha has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Printing & Publishing industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Chiikishinbunsha have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.

Ability to lead change in Printing & Publishing

– Chiikishinbunsha is one of the leading players in the Printing & Publishing industry in Japan. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Printing & Publishing industry in Japan but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Chiikishinbunsha in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.

Training and development

– Chiikishinbunsha 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.

Learning organization

- Chiikishinbunsha 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 Chiikishinbunsha is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Chiikishinbunsha emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.

Innovation driven organization

– Chiikishinbunsha is one of the most innovative firm in Printing & Publishing sector.

High switching costs

– The high switching costs that Chiikishinbunsha 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.

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Weaknesses of Chiikishinbunsha | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of Chiikishinbunsha are -

Increasing silos among functional specialists

– The organizational structure of Chiikishinbunsha is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Printing & Publishing industry, but Chiikishinbunsha needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Chiikishinbunsha to focus more on services in the Printing & Publishing industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.

Products dominated business model

– Even though Chiikishinbunsha has some of the most successful models in the Printing & Publishing industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Chiikishinbunsha should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.

Compensation and incentives

– The revenue per employee of Chiikishinbunsha is just above the Printing & Publishing 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 to strategic competitive environment developments

– As Chiikishinbunsha is one of the leading players in the Printing & Publishing industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Printing & Publishing industry in last five years.

Capital Spending Reduction

– Even during the low interest decade, Chiikishinbunsha 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 Printing & Publishing industry using digital technology.

Slow decision making process

– As mentioned earlier in the report, Chiikishinbunsha has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Printing & Publishing industry over the last five years. Chiikishinbunsha 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.

Interest costs

– Compare to the competition, Chiikishinbunsha 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.

High operating costs

– Compare to the competitors, Chiikishinbunsha has high operating costs in the Printing & Publishing industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Chiikishinbunsha lucrative customers.

Aligning sales with marketing

– From the outside it seems that Chiikishinbunsha needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Printing & Publishing industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Chiikishinbunsha can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Chiikishinbunsha is planning to shift buying processes online.

High dependence on Chiikishinbunsha ‘s star products

– The top 2 products and services of Chiikishinbunsha still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Printing & Publishing industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Chiikishinbunsha has relatively successful track record of launching new products.

Workers concerns about automation

– As automation is fast increasing in the Printing & Publishing industry, Chiikishinbunsha 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.

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Chiikishinbunsha Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of Chiikishinbunsha are -

Low interest rates

– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Chiikishinbunsha 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.

Developing new processes and practices

– Chiikishinbunsha can develop new processes and procedures in Printing & Publishing 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

– Chiikishinbunsha has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Printing & Publishing sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Chiikishinbunsha to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Chiikishinbunsha to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.

Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains

– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Chiikishinbunsha 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 Chiikishinbunsha to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.

Loyalty marketing

– Chiikishinbunsha 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.

Increase in government spending

– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Chiikishinbunsha can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Chiikishinbunsha operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Printing & Publishing sector.

Leveraging digital technologies

– Chiikishinbunsha 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.

Better consumer reach

– The expansion of the 5G network will help Chiikishinbunsha to increase its market reach. Chiikishinbunsha 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.

Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities

– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Chiikishinbunsha 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 Chiikishinbunsha to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.

Buying journey improvements

– Chiikishinbunsha can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Printing & Publishing 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.

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Chiikishinbunsha in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Printing & Publishing industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.

Finding new ways to collaborate

– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Printing & Publishing industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Chiikishinbunsha 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 Printing & Publishing industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Chiikishinbunsha 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. Chiikishinbunsha 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.

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Threats Chiikishinbunsha External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of Chiikishinbunsha are -

Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution

– Chiikishinbunsha has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Printing & Publishing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Chiikishinbunsha needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Printing & Publishing 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.

Increasing wage structure of Chiikishinbunsha

– 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 Chiikishinbunsha.

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 Chiikishinbunsha.

Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins

– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Chiikishinbunsha 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 Chiikishinbunsha prominent markets.

Stagnating economy with rate increase

– Chiikishinbunsha 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 Printing & Publishing industry.

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.

Learning curve for new practices

– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Chiikishinbunsha may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Printing & Publishing 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 Chiikishinbunsha in the Printing & Publishing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

High dependence on third party suppliers

– Chiikishinbunsha 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.

Shortening product life cycle

– it is one of the major threat that Chiikishinbunsha is facing in Printing & Publishing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, 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. Chiikishinbunsha 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.

Trade war between China and United States

– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Chiikishinbunsha in Printing & Publishing industry. The Printing & Publishing 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 Chiikishinbunsha business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Chiikishinbunsha Template, Example

Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Chiikishinbunsha 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 Chiikishinbunsha 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 Chiikishinbunsha 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 Chiikishinbunsha 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 Chiikishinbunsha needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.

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