Alam Maritim Res (ALMT) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Oil Well Services & Equipment
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Alam Maritim Res (Malaysia)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Alam Maritim Res is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, wage bills are increasing, there is backlash against globalization, technology disruption, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, there is increasing trade war between United States & China,
increasing commodity prices, increasing energy prices, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Alam Maritim Res can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Alam Maritim Res, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Alam Maritim Res 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 Alam Maritim Res can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Alam Maritim Res
2. Improving business portfolio management of Alam Maritim Res
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Malaysia
4. Making a Oil Well Services & Equipment sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Alam Maritim Res
Strengths of Alam Maritim Res | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Alam Maritim Res are -
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Alam Maritim Res has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Alam Maritim Res staying ahead in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Training and development
– Alam Maritim Res has one of the best training and development program in Energy 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Alam Maritim Res has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Alam Maritim Res 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
– Alam Maritim Res has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Alam Maritim Res to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Alam Maritim Res to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Strong track record of project management in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
– Alam Maritim Res is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Innovation driven organization
– Alam Maritim Res is one of the most innovative firm in Oil Well Services & Equipment sector.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Alam Maritim Res 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Alam Maritim Res comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Alam Maritim Res has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Alam Maritim Res have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
High brand equity
– Alam Maritim Res has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Alam Maritim Res to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Diverse revenue streams
– Alam Maritim Res is present in almost all the verticals within the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. This has provided Alam Maritim Res 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.
Organizational Resilience of Alam Maritim Res
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Alam Maritim Res does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Weaknesses of Alam Maritim Res | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Alam Maritim Res are -
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Alam Maritim Res has high operating costs in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Alam Maritim Res lucrative customers.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Malaysia, Alam Maritim Res needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Alam Maritim Res is just above the Oil Well Services & 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Alam Maritim Res has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry over the last five years. Alam Maritim Res 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 bargaining power of channel partners in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Malaysia, Alam Maritim Res 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment industry.
Skills based hiring in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Alam Maritim Res 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Alam Maritim Res is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry, but Alam Maritim Res needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Alam Maritim Res to focus more on services in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry, Alam Maritim Res 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Alam Maritim Res is one of the leading players in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry in last five years.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Alam Maritim Res 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment industry using digital technology.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Alam Maritim Res needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Alam Maritim Res can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Alam Maritim Res is planning to shift buying processes online.
Alam Maritim Res Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Alam Maritim Res are -
Leveraging digital technologies
– Alam Maritim Res 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Alam Maritim Res 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. Alam Maritim Res 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
– Alam Maritim Res can develop new processes and procedures in Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Alam Maritim Res can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Oil Well Services & 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Alam Maritim Res 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 Alam Maritim Res 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
– Alam Maritim Res 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Alam Maritim Res can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Oil Well Services & 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Alam Maritim Res in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Alam Maritim Res can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Alam Maritim Res operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Oil Well Services & Equipment sector.
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. Alam Maritim Res can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Alam Maritim Res has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Oil Well Services & Equipment sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Alam Maritim Res to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Alam Maritim Res to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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 Alam Maritim Res 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Alam Maritim Res in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. Now Alam Maritim Res can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Threats Alam Maritim Res External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Alam Maritim Res are -
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Alam Maritim Res 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 Alam Maritim Res prominent markets.
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. Alam Maritim Res needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Alam Maritim Res is facing in Oil Well Services & Equipment sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Environmental challenges
– Alam Maritim Res 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. Alam Maritim Res can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry.
Regulatory challenges
– Alam Maritim Res 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment industry regulations.
Increasing wage structure of Alam Maritim Res
– 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 Alam Maritim Res.
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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Alam Maritim Res 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment industry and other sectors.
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 Alam Maritim Res.
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 Alam Maritim Res in the Oil Well Services & Equipment sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Oil Well Services & Equipment industry are lowering. It can presents Alam Maritim Res with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Oil Well Services & Equipment sector.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Alam Maritim Res has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Alam Maritim Res needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Alam Maritim Res in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. The Oil Well Services & 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Alam Maritim Res Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Alam Maritim Res 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 Alam Maritim Res 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 Alam Maritim Res 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 Alam Maritim Res 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 Alam Maritim Res needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.