Yamashita Health Care (9265) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Medical Equipment & Supplies
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Yamashita Health Care (Japan)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Yamashita Health Care is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, geopolitical disruptions, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, wage bills are increasing, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, technology disruption,
banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Yamashita Health Care
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Yamashita Health Care can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Yamashita Health Care, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Yamashita Health Care 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 Yamashita Health Care can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Yamashita Health Care
2. Improving business portfolio management of Yamashita Health Care
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Japan
4. Making a Medical Equipment & Supplies sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Yamashita Health Care
Strengths of Yamashita Health Care | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Yamashita Health Care are -
Digital Transformation in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Yamashita Health Care digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Yamashita Health Care 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Yamashita Health Care is one of the most innovative firm in Medical Equipment & Supplies sector.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry
– Yamashita Health Care has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Yamashita Health Care to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Yamashita Health Care to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Yamashita Health Care 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 Yamashita Health Care
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Yamashita Health Care does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Yamashita Health Care in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Yamashita Health Care is one of the leading players in the Medical Equipment & Supplies 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Yamashita Health Care comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry, building diversified operations across different geographies so that disruption in one part of the world doesn’t impact the overall performance of the firm, and integrating the various business operations and processes through its digital transformation drive.
Strong track record of project management in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry
– Yamashita Health Care is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
High brand equity
– Yamashita Health Care has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Yamashita Health Care to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Yamashita Health Care in the Healthcare sector have low bargaining power. Yamashita Health Care has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Yamashita Health Care to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Training and development
– Yamashita Health Care has one of the best training and development program in Healthcare 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.
Weaknesses of Yamashita Health Care | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Yamashita Health Care are -
High bargaining power of channel partners in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Japan, Yamashita Health Care 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 Medical Equipment & Supplies industry.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Yamashita Health Care has some of the most successful models in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Yamashita Health Care should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Yamashita Health Care has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
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 Yamashita Health Care supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Yamashita Health Care is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Yamashita Health Care vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Yamashita Health Care is one of the leading players in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry in last five years.
Employees’ less understanding of Yamashita Health Care strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Yamashita Health Care 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Yamashita Health Care, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Medical Equipment & Supplies 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Yamashita Health Care has taken concrete steps on diversity, equity, and inclusion. But the efforts so far has resulted in limited success. It needs to expand the recruitment and selection process to hire more people from the minorities and underprivileged background.
Skills based hiring in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Yamashita Health Care 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Yamashita Health Care, in the dynamic environment of Medical Equipment & Supplies industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Yamashita Health Care has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Yamashita Health Care 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.
Yamashita Health Care Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Yamashita Health Care are -
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 Yamashita Health Care 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Yamashita Health Care in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Yamashita Health Care is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Yamashita Health Care can utilize new technology in the field of Medical Equipment & Supplies 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 Yamashita Health Care 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 Medical Equipment & Supplies industry.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Yamashita Health Care 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Yamashita Health Care has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. This can help Yamashita Health Care to build a more holistic ecosystem for Yamashita Health Care products in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Yamashita Health Care 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 Yamashita Health Care 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
– Yamashita Health Care 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Yamashita Health Care has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Medical Equipment & Supplies sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Yamashita Health Care to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Yamashita Health Care to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Yamashita Health Care can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Yamashita Health Care operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Medical Equipment & Supplies sector.
Manufacturing automation
– Yamashita Health Care can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Medical Equipment & Supplies 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Yamashita Health Care 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Yamashita Health Care 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. Yamashita Health Care 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.
Threats Yamashita Health Care External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Yamashita Health Care are -
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Yamashita Health Care is facing in Medical Equipment & Supplies sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Yamashita Health Care may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Medical Equipment & Supplies sector.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Yamashita Health Care in Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. The Medical Equipment & Supplies 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Yamashita Health Care has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Yamashita Health Care needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Medical Equipment & Supplies 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.
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 Yamashita Health Care business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Environmental challenges
– Yamashita Health Care 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. Yamashita Health Care can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry.
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. Yamashita Health Care needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Medical Equipment & Supplies industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Yamashita Health Care 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 Medical Equipment & Supplies industry and other sectors.
Increasing wage structure of Yamashita Health Care
– 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 Yamashita Health Care.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Medical Equipment & Supplies industry are lowering. It can presents Yamashita Health Care with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Medical Equipment & Supplies sector.
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. Yamashita Health Care 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.
Aging population
– As the populations of most advanced economies are aging, it will lead to high social security costs, higher savings among population, and lower demand for goods and services in the economy. The household savings in US, France, UK, Germany, and Japan are growing faster than predicted because of uncertainty caused by pandemic.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Yamashita Health Care Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Yamashita Health Care 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 Yamashita Health Care 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 Yamashita Health Care 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 Yamashita Health Care 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 Yamashita Health Care needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.