Asia Knight (ASKN) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Fabricated Plastic & Rubber
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Asia Knight (Malaysia)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Asia Knight is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – technology disruption, increasing energy prices, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic ,
customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Asia Knight can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Asia Knight, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Asia Knight 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 Asia Knight can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Asia Knight
2. Improving business portfolio management of Asia Knight
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Malaysia
4. Making a Fabricated Plastic & Rubber sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Asia Knight
Strengths of Asia Knight | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Asia Knight are -
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Asia Knight comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Asia Knight is one of the leading players in the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry in Malaysia. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Malaysia. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Asia Knight 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.
Training and development
– Asia Knight has one of the best training and development program in Basic Materials 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Asia Knight in Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Asia Knight has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Asia Knight staying ahead in the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry
– Asia Knight has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Asia Knight to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Asia Knight to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Learning organization
- Asia Knight 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 Asia Knight is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Asia Knight emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Asia Knight has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Asia Knight 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry
– Asia Knight is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Organizational Resilience of Asia Knight
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Asia Knight does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Analytics focus
– Asia Knight 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 Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry. The technology infrastructure of Malaysia 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.
Weaknesses of Asia Knight | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Asia Knight are -
Skills based hiring in Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Asia Knight 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Asia Knight has high operating costs in the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Asia Knight lucrative customers.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Asia Knight 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Asia Knight is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry, but Asia Knight needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Asia Knight to focus more on services in the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Lack of clear differentiation of Asia Knight products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Asia Knight needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High dependence on Asia Knight ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Asia Knight still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Asia Knight has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Asia Knight, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry. But it has very little resources allocation to manage the risks emerging from events such as natural disasters, climate change, melting of permafrost, tacking the rise of artificial intelligence, opportunities and threats emerging from commercialization of space etc.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Malaysia, Asia Knight needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Asia Knight has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber 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 Asia Knight supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Asia Knight is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Asia Knight vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Asia Knight has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry over the last five years. Asia Knight 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.
Asia Knight Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Asia Knight are -
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Asia Knight can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Buying journey improvements
– Asia Knight can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Asia Knight can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Asia Knight operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Fabricated Plastic & Rubber sector.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Asia Knight 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 Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Asia Knight 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. Asia Knight 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Asia Knight can develop new processes and procedures in Fabricated Plastic & Rubber 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Asia Knight 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.
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 Asia Knight 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Asia Knight is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Asia Knight can utilize new technology in the field of Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Asia Knight 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Asia Knight has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Fabricated Plastic & Rubber sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Asia Knight to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Asia Knight 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 Asia Knight can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Asia Knight 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 Asia Knight to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Threats Asia Knight External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Asia Knight are -
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. Asia Knight needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Asia Knight in Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry. The Fabricated Plastic & Rubber 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 acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Asia Knight has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Asia Knight needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber 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 Asia Knight business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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 Asia Knight in the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry are lowering. It can presents Asia Knight with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Fabricated Plastic & Rubber sector.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Asia Knight may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Fabricated Plastic & Rubber sector.
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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Fabricated Plastic & Rubber industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Asia Knight can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Asia Knight 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 Asia Knight is facing in Fabricated Plastic & Rubber sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Asia Knight 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 Fabricated Plastic & Rubber 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Asia Knight Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Asia Knight 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 Asia Knight 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 Asia Knight 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 Asia Knight 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 Asia Knight needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.