SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Capitaland Mall (Singapore)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Capitaland Mall is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing energy prices, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, geopolitical disruptions, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%,
increasing transportation and logistics costs, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Capitaland Mall can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Capitaland Mall, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Capitaland Mall 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 Capitaland Mall can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Capitaland Mall
2. Improving business portfolio management of Capitaland Mall
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Singapore
4. Making a Real Estate Operations sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Capitaland Mall
Strengths of Capitaland Mall | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Capitaland Mall are -
Digital Transformation in Real Estate Operations industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Capitaland Mall digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Capitaland Mall 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.
High brand equity
– Capitaland Mall has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Capitaland Mall to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Capitaland Mall 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Real Estate Operations industry
– Capitaland Mall has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Capitaland Mall to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Real Estate Operations industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Capitaland Mall to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Learning organization
- Capitaland Mall 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 Capitaland Mall is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Capitaland Mall emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Capitaland Mall has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Capitaland Mall staying ahead in the Real Estate Operations industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Capitaland Mall in Real Estate Operations industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Organizational Resilience of Capitaland Mall
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Capitaland Mall does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Capitaland Mall is one of the leading players in the Real Estate Operations industry in Singapore. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Singapore. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Ability to lead change in Real Estate Operations
– Capitaland Mall is one of the leading players in the Real Estate Operations industry in Singapore. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Real Estate Operations industry in Singapore but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Capitaland Mall in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Strong track record of project management in the Real Estate Operations industry
– Capitaland Mall 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
– Capitaland Mall is one of the most innovative firm in Real Estate Operations sector.
Weaknesses of Capitaland Mall | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Capitaland Mall are -
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Capitaland Mall, in the dynamic environment of Real Estate Operations industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Capitaland Mall has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Capitaland Mall is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Real Estate Operations industry, but Capitaland Mall needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Capitaland Mall to focus more on services in the Real Estate Operations industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Lack of clear differentiation of Capitaland Mall products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Capitaland Mall needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Singapore, Capitaland Mall needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Capitaland Mall 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.
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 Capitaland Mall supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Capitaland Mall is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Capitaland Mall vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Capitaland Mall has high operating costs in the Real Estate Operations industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Capitaland Mall lucrative customers.
Need for greater diversity
– Capitaland Mall 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Real Estate Operations industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Singapore, Capitaland Mall 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 Real Estate Operations industry.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Capitaland Mall has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Real Estate Operations industry over the last five years. Capitaland Mall 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Capitaland Mall 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 Real Estate Operations industry using digital technology.
Capitaland Mall Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Capitaland Mall 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 Capitaland Mall 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Capitaland Mall 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Capitaland Mall is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Capitaland Mall can utilize new technology in the field of Real Estate Operations industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Capitaland Mall has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Real Estate Operations sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Capitaland Mall to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Capitaland Mall to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Capitaland Mall 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Capitaland Mall in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Real Estate Operations industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Capitaland Mall 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 Capitaland Mall to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Buying journey improvements
– Capitaland Mall can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Real Estate Operations 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Real Estate Operations industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Capitaland Mall 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. Capitaland Mall 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 Real Estate Operations industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Capitaland Mall in the Real Estate Operations industry. Now Capitaland Mall can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Capitaland Mall has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Real Estate Operations industry. This can help Capitaland Mall to build a more holistic ecosystem for Capitaland Mall products in the Real Estate Operations industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Real Estate Operations industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Capitaland Mall can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
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. Capitaland Mall can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Threats Capitaland Mall External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Capitaland Mall are -
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 Capitaland Mall business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Capitaland Mall
– 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 Capitaland Mall.
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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Real Estate Operations industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Capitaland Mall can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Capitaland Mall has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Real Estate Operations industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Capitaland Mall needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Real Estate Operations 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Capitaland Mall 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 Real Estate Operations industry and other sectors.
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. Capitaland Mall 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Real Estate Operations industry are lowering. It can presents Capitaland Mall with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Real Estate Operations sector.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Capitaland Mall is facing in Real Estate Operations sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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 Capitaland Mall.
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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Capitaland Mall 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 Real Estate Operations industry.
Regulatory challenges
– Capitaland Mall 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 Real Estate Operations industry regulations.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Capitaland Mall Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Capitaland Mall 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 Capitaland Mall 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 Capitaland Mall 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 Capitaland Mall 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 Capitaland Mall needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.