Versatile Creative Bhd (VSTL) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Paper & Paper Products
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Versatile Creative Bhd (Malaysia)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Versatile Creative Bhd is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, technology disruption, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing transportation and logistics costs, wage bills are increasing, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing energy prices,
increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, there is backlash against globalization, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Versatile Creative Bhd
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Versatile Creative Bhd can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Versatile Creative Bhd, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Versatile Creative Bhd 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 Versatile Creative Bhd can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Versatile Creative Bhd
2. Improving business portfolio management of Versatile Creative Bhd
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Malaysia
4. Making a Paper & Paper Products sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Versatile Creative Bhd
Strengths of Versatile Creative Bhd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Versatile Creative Bhd are -
Training and development
– Versatile Creative Bhd 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 Versatile Creative Bhd in Paper & Paper Products industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Paper & Paper Products industry
– Versatile Creative Bhd has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Versatile Creative Bhd to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Paper & Paper Products industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Versatile Creative Bhd to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Ability to lead change in Paper & Paper Products
– Versatile Creative Bhd is one of the leading players in the Paper & Paper Products industry in Malaysia. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Paper & Paper Products industry in Malaysia but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Versatile Creative Bhd in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Versatile Creative Bhd has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Versatile Creative Bhd staying ahead in the Paper & Paper Products industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Versatile Creative Bhd is one of the leading players in the Paper & Paper Products 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 Versatile Creative Bhd 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.
Analytics focus
– Versatile Creative Bhd 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 Paper & Paper Products 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Paper & Paper Products industry
– Versatile Creative Bhd is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Versatile Creative Bhd has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Versatile Creative Bhd 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.
Learning organization
- Versatile Creative Bhd 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 Versatile Creative Bhd is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Versatile Creative Bhd emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Versatile Creative Bhd 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.
Weaknesses of Versatile Creative Bhd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Versatile Creative Bhd are -
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Malaysia, Versatile Creative Bhd needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Lack of clear differentiation of Versatile Creative Bhd products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Versatile Creative Bhd needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Versatile Creative Bhd is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Versatile Creative Bhd to provide better information regarding Paper & Paper Products products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High dependence on Versatile Creative Bhd ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Versatile Creative Bhd still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Paper & Paper Products industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Versatile Creative Bhd has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Versatile Creative Bhd has some of the most successful models in the Paper & Paper Products industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Versatile Creative Bhd should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
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 Versatile Creative Bhd supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Versatile Creative Bhd is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Versatile Creative Bhd vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Versatile Creative Bhd, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Paper & Paper Products 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.
Employees’ less understanding of Versatile Creative Bhd strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Versatile Creative Bhd 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Versatile Creative Bhd has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Paper & Paper Products industry over the last five years. Versatile Creative Bhd 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Versatile Creative Bhd is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Paper & Paper Products industry, but Versatile Creative Bhd needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Versatile Creative Bhd to focus more on services in the Paper & Paper Products industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Versatile Creative Bhd is one of the leading players in the Paper & Paper Products industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Paper & Paper Products industry in last five years.
Versatile Creative Bhd Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Versatile Creative Bhd 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 Versatile Creative Bhd 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 Versatile Creative Bhd in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Paper & Paper Products industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Versatile Creative Bhd is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Versatile Creative Bhd can utilize new technology in the field of Paper & Paper Products industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Loyalty marketing
– Versatile Creative Bhd 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Versatile Creative Bhd to increase its market reach. Versatile Creative Bhd will be able to reach out to new customers. Secondly 5G will also provide technology framework to build new tools and products that can help more immersive consumer experience and faster consumer journey.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Versatile Creative Bhd can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Paper & Paper Products industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Versatile Creative Bhd 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. Versatile Creative Bhd 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Versatile Creative Bhd has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Paper & Paper Products industry. This can help Versatile Creative Bhd to build a more holistic ecosystem for Versatile Creative Bhd products in the Paper & Paper Products industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Paper & Paper Products industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Versatile Creative Bhd in the Paper & Paper Products industry. Now Versatile Creative Bhd can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
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. Versatile Creative Bhd can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Paper & Paper Products industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Versatile Creative Bhd can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Versatile Creative Bhd can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Versatile Creative Bhd operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Paper & Paper Products sector.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Versatile Creative Bhd 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 Paper & Paper Products industry.
Threats Versatile Creative Bhd External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Versatile Creative Bhd are -
Consumer confidence and its impact on Versatile Creative Bhd 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 Paper & Paper Products industry and other sectors.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Versatile Creative Bhd 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 Versatile Creative Bhd prominent markets.
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 Versatile Creative Bhd in the Paper & Paper Products sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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.
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. Versatile Creative Bhd 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.
Environmental challenges
– Versatile Creative Bhd 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. Versatile Creative Bhd can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Paper & Paper Products 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. Versatile Creative Bhd needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Paper & Paper Products industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Versatile Creative Bhd may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Paper & Paper Products sector.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Versatile Creative Bhd in Paper & Paper Products industry. The Paper & Paper Products 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.
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 Versatile Creative Bhd.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Versatile Creative Bhd is facing in Paper & Paper Products sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Paper & Paper Products industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Versatile Creative Bhd can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Regulatory challenges
– Versatile Creative Bhd 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 Paper & Paper Products industry regulations.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Versatile Creative Bhd Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Versatile Creative Bhd 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 Versatile Creative Bhd 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 Versatile Creative Bhd 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 Versatile Creative Bhd 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 Versatile Creative Bhd needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.