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Ricoh (RICO) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Ricoh (United Kingdom)


Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Ricoh is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, there is backlash against globalization, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing energy prices, increasing transportation and logistics costs, wage bills are increasing, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, etc



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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Ricoh


SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Ricoh can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Ricoh, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Ricoh 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 Ricoh can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Ricoh
2. Improving business portfolio management of Ricoh
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United Kingdom
4. Making a Office Equipment sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Ricoh




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

The strengths of Ricoh are -

Sustainable margins compare to other players in Office Equipment industry

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

Highly skilled collaborators

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

Learning organization

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

Strong track record of project management in the Office Equipment industry

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

Superior customer experience

– The customer experience strategy of Ricoh in Office Equipment industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.

Analytics focus

– Ricoh 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 Office Equipment industry. The technology infrastructure of United Kingdom 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.

Ability to lead change in Office Equipment

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

Cross disciplinary teams

– Horizontal connected teams at the Ricoh 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.

Diverse revenue streams

– Ricoh is present in almost all the verticals within the Office Equipment industry. This has provided Ricoh 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 Office Equipment industry

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

Low bargaining power of suppliers

– Suppliers of Ricoh in the Technology sector have low bargaining power. Ricoh has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Ricoh to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.

Successful track record of launching new products

– Ricoh has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Ricoh 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.



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Net Promoter Score



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

The weaknesses of Ricoh are -

Slow to strategic competitive environment developments

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

High dependence on Ricoh ‘s star products

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

High bargaining power of channel partners in Office Equipment industry

– because of the regulatory requirements in United Kingdom, Ricoh 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 Office Equipment industry.

Slow decision making process

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

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 Ricoh supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Ricoh is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Ricoh vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.

High cash cycle compare to competitors

Ricoh has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Office Equipment industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.

Skills based hiring in Office Equipment industry

– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Ricoh 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.

Workers concerns about automation

– As automation is fast increasing in the Office Equipment industry, Ricoh 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.

Compensation and incentives

– The revenue per employee of Ricoh is just above the Office Equipment 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.

Increasing silos among functional specialists

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

Employees’ less understanding of Ricoh strategy

– From the outside it seems that the employees of Ricoh 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.




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


The opportunities of Ricoh are -

Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Office Equipment industry

– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Ricoh in the Office Equipment industry. Now Ricoh can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.

Loyalty marketing

– Ricoh 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.

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 Ricoh 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.

Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities

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

Low interest rates

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

Buying journey improvements

– Ricoh can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Office Equipment 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.

Building a culture of innovation

– managers at Ricoh 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 Office Equipment industry.

Creating value in data economy

– The success of analytics program of Ricoh has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Office Equipment industry. This can help Ricoh to build a more holistic ecosystem for Ricoh products in the Office Equipment industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, 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, Ricoh can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Ricoh operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Office Equipment sector.

Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19

– consumer behavior has changed in the Office Equipment industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Ricoh 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. Ricoh 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.

Learning at scale

– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Ricoh 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

– Ricoh can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Office Equipment 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.

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. Ricoh can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.




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


The threats of Ricoh are -

High dependence on third party suppliers

– Ricoh 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.

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 Ricoh in the Office Equipment sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

Increasing wage structure of Ricoh

– 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 Ricoh.

Environmental challenges

– Ricoh 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. Ricoh can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Office Equipment industry.

Barriers of entry lowering

– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Office Equipment industry are lowering. It can presents Ricoh with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Office Equipment sector.

Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins

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

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 Ricoh.

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. Ricoh needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Office Equipment industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.

Shortening product life cycle

– it is one of the major threat that Ricoh is facing in Office Equipment sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.

Trade war between China and United States

– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Ricoh in Office Equipment industry. The Office Equipment 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.

Learning curve for new practices

– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Ricoh may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Office Equipment 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. Ricoh 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.

Regulatory challenges

– Ricoh 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 Office Equipment industry regulations.




Weighted SWOT Analysis of Ricoh Template, Example


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



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