SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Ascendas Hospitality (Singapore)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Ascendas Hospitality is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – technology disruption, increasing commodity prices, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies,
banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Ascendas Hospitality
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Ascendas Hospitality can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Ascendas Hospitality, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Ascendas Hospitality 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 Ascendas Hospitality can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Ascendas Hospitality
2. Improving business portfolio management of Ascendas Hospitality
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 Ascendas Hospitality
Strengths of Ascendas Hospitality | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Ascendas Hospitality are -
Analytics focus
– Ascendas Hospitality 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 Real Estate Operations industry. The technology infrastructure of Singapore 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Ascendas Hospitality is present in almost all the verticals within the Real Estate Operations industry. This has provided Ascendas Hospitality 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Ascendas Hospitality 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Ascendas Hospitality has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Ascendas Hospitality 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.
Organizational Resilience of Ascendas Hospitality
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Ascendas Hospitality does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Ascendas Hospitality has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Real Estate Operations industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Ascendas Hospitality have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
High brand equity
– Ascendas Hospitality has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Ascendas Hospitality to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Real Estate Operations industry
– Ascendas Hospitality has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Ascendas Hospitality to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Real Estate Operations industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Ascendas Hospitality to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Digital Transformation in Real Estate Operations industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Ascendas Hospitality digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Ascendas Hospitality 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Real Estate Operations industry
– Ascendas Hospitality 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
– Ascendas Hospitality has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Ascendas Hospitality 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Ascendas Hospitality 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.
Weaknesses of Ascendas Hospitality | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Ascendas Hospitality are -
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Ascendas Hospitality 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. Ascendas Hospitality 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Ascendas Hospitality 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.
Employees’ less understanding of Ascendas Hospitality strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Ascendas Hospitality 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Real Estate Operations industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Singapore, Ascendas Hospitality 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Ascendas Hospitality has some of the most successful models in the Real Estate Operations industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Ascendas Hospitality should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High dependence on Ascendas Hospitality ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Ascendas Hospitality still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Real Estate Operations industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Ascendas Hospitality has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Ascendas Hospitality is one of the leading players in the Real Estate Operations industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Real Estate Operations industry in last five years.
Need for greater diversity
– Ascendas Hospitality 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 operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Ascendas Hospitality 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 Ascendas Hospitality lucrative customers.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Ascendas Hospitality has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Real Estate Operations industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Ascendas Hospitality needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Real Estate Operations industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Ascendas Hospitality can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Ascendas Hospitality is planning to shift buying processes online.
Ascendas Hospitality Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Ascendas Hospitality are -
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Ascendas Hospitality 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 Ascendas Hospitality to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Ascendas Hospitality to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Ascendas Hospitality 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 Ascendas Hospitality to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
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. Ascendas Hospitality 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. Ascendas Hospitality 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Ascendas Hospitality 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Ascendas Hospitality 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, Ascendas Hospitality is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Ascendas Hospitality 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.
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 Ascendas Hospitality in the Real Estate Operations industry. Now Ascendas Hospitality can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
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. Ascendas Hospitality can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
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 Ascendas Hospitality 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Ascendas Hospitality can still utilize the low interest rates to borrow money for capital investment. Secondly it can also use the increase of government spending in infrastructure projects to get new business.
Manufacturing automation
– Ascendas Hospitality can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Real Estate Operations 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Ascendas Hospitality can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Ascendas Hospitality operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Real Estate Operations sector.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Ascendas Hospitality has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Real Estate Operations industry. This can help Ascendas Hospitality to build a more holistic ecosystem for Ascendas Hospitality products in the Real Estate Operations industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Threats Ascendas Hospitality External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Ascendas Hospitality are -
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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Ascendas Hospitality is facing in Real Estate Operations sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Ascendas Hospitality has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Real Estate Operations industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Ascendas Hospitality 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Real Estate Operations industry are lowering. It can presents Ascendas Hospitality 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Ascendas Hospitality high dependence on third party suppliers can disrupt its processes and delivery mechanism. For example -the current troubles of car makers because of chip shortage is because the chip companies started producing chips for electronic companies rather than car manufacturers.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Ascendas Hospitality 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Ascendas Hospitality 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.
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 Ascendas Hospitality in the Real Estate Operations sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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. Ascendas Hospitality needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Real Estate Operations industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Increasing wage structure of Ascendas Hospitality
– 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 Ascendas Hospitality.
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 Ascendas Hospitality.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Ascendas Hospitality 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 Ascendas Hospitality prominent markets.
Technology disruption because of hacks, piracy etc
– The colonial pipeline illustrated, how vulnerable modern organization are to international hackers, miscreants, and disruptors. The cyber security interruption, data leaks, etc can seriously jeopardize the future growth of the organization.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Ascendas Hospitality Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Ascendas Hospitality 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 Ascendas Hospitality 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 Ascendas Hospitality 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 Ascendas Hospitality 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 Ascendas Hospitality needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.