Cheetah (CETH) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Cheetah (Malaysia)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Cheetah is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, there is backlash against globalization, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing transportation and logistics costs, wage bills are increasing, etc

---

---

---

---

Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Cheetah

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

---

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

The strengths of Cheetah are -

Successful track record of launching new products

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

Highly skilled collaborators

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

Ability to lead change in Recreational Products

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

Sustainable margins compare to other players in Recreational Products industry

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

Learning organization

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

Training and development

– Cheetah has one of the best training and development program in Consumer Cyclical 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.

Strong track record of project management in the Recreational Products industry

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

Digital Transformation in Recreational Products industry

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

Organizational Resilience of Cheetah

– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Cheetah does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.

Cross disciplinary teams

– Horizontal connected teams at the Cheetah 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.

Ability to recruit top talent

– Cheetah is one of the leading players in the Recreational 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 Cheetah 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.

---

---

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

The weaknesses of Cheetah are -

Ability to respond to the competition

– As the decision making is very deliberative at Cheetah, in the dynamic environment of Recreational Products industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Cheetah has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.

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

Slow decision making process

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

Lack of clear differentiation of Cheetah products

– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Cheetah needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.

High dependence on Cheetah ‘s star products

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

Workers concerns about automation

– As automation is fast increasing in the Recreational Products industry, Cheetah 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 Cheetah is one of the leading players in the Recreational Products industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Recreational Products industry in last five years.

Low market penetration in new markets

– Outside its home market of Malaysia, Cheetah needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.

Need for greater diversity

– Cheetah has taken concrete steps on diversity, equity, and inclusion. But the efforts so far has resulted in limited success. It needs to expand the recruitment and selection process to hire more people from the minorities and underprivileged background.

Increasing silos among functional specialists

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

Aligning sales with marketing

– From the outside it seems that Cheetah needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Recreational Products industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Cheetah can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Cheetah is planning to shift buying processes online.

---

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

The opportunities of Cheetah are -

Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities

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

Finding new ways to collaborate

– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Recreational Products industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Cheetah can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.

Reforming the budgeting process

- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Cheetah can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.

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 Cheetah 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.

Manufacturing automation

– Cheetah can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Recreational Products 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.

Loyalty marketing

– Cheetah 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.

Increase in government spending

– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Cheetah can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Cheetah operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Recreational Products sector.

Better consumer reach

– The expansion of the 5G network will help Cheetah to increase its market reach. Cheetah 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.

Creating value in data economy

– The success of analytics program of Cheetah has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Recreational Products industry. This can help Cheetah to build a more holistic ecosystem for Cheetah products in the Recreational Products industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.

Leveraging digital technologies

– Cheetah 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 Recreational Products industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Cheetah 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. Cheetah 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.

Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Recreational Products industry

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

Using analytics as competitive advantage

– Cheetah has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Recreational Products sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Cheetah to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Cheetah to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.

---

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

The threats of Cheetah are -

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 Cheetah.

Technology disruption because of hacks, piracy etc

– The colonial pipeline illustrated, how vulnerable modern organization are to international hackers, miscreants, and disruptors. The cyber security interruption, data leaks, etc can seriously jeopardize the future growth of the organization.

Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution

– Cheetah has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Recreational Products industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Cheetah needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Recreational Products 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.

Environmental challenges

– Cheetah 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. Cheetah can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Recreational Products industry.

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. Cheetah 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.

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 Cheetah in the Recreational Products sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

Easy access to finance

– Easy access to finance in Recreational Products industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Cheetah can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.

Trade war between China and United States

– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Cheetah in Recreational Products industry. The Recreational 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.

Stagnating economy with rate increase

– Cheetah 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 Recreational Products industry.

Consumer confidence and its impact on Cheetah 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 Recreational Products industry and other sectors.

Increasing wage structure of Cheetah

– 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 Cheetah.

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.

Regulatory challenges

– Cheetah 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 Recreational Products industry regulations.

---

Weighted SWOT Analysis of Cheetah Template, Example

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

--- ---