BRC Asia Ltd (BRCA) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for BRC Asia Ltd (Singapore)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , BRC Asia Ltd is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing transportation and logistics costs, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, wage bills are increasing, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, geopolitical disruptions, increasing commodity prices, there is backlash against globalization, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of BRC Asia Ltd

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that BRC Asia Ltd can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the BRC Asia Ltd, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which BRC Asia Ltd 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.

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SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix

SWOT analysis of BRC Asia Ltd can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of BRC Asia Ltd
2. Improving business portfolio management of BRC Asia Ltd
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Singapore
4. Making a Construction Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of BRC Asia Ltd

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Strengths of BRC Asia Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of BRC Asia Ltd are -

Low bargaining power of suppliers

– Suppliers of BRC Asia Ltd in the Capital Goods sector have low bargaining power. BRC Asia Ltd has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps BRC Asia Ltd to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.

Sustainable margins compare to other players in Construction Services industry

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

High brand equity

– BRC Asia Ltd has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled BRC Asia Ltd to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.

Highly skilled collaborators

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

Innovation driven organization

– BRC Asia Ltd is one of the most innovative firm in Construction Services sector.

Successful track record of launching new products

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

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

Operational resilience

– The operational resilience strategy of BRC Asia Ltd comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Construction Services industry, building diversified operations across different geographies so that disruption in one part of the world doesn’t impact the overall performance of the firm, and integrating the various business operations and processes through its digital transformation drive.

Analytics focus

– BRC Asia Ltd 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 Construction Services 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.

Effective Research and Development (R&D)

– BRC Asia Ltd has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – BRC Asia Ltd staying ahead in the Construction Services industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.

Diverse revenue streams

– BRC Asia Ltd is present in almost all the verticals within the Construction Services industry. This has provided BRC Asia Ltd 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.

Ability to lead change in Construction Services

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

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Weaknesses of BRC Asia Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of BRC Asia Ltd are -

Capital Spending Reduction

– Even during the low interest decade, BRC Asia Ltd 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 Construction Services industry using digital technology.

Employees’ less understanding of BRC Asia Ltd strategy

– From the outside it seems that the employees of BRC Asia Ltd 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.

Ability to respond to the competition

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

High operating costs

– Compare to the competitors, BRC Asia Ltd has high operating costs in the Construction Services industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract BRC Asia Ltd lucrative customers.

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

Lack of clear differentiation of BRC Asia Ltd products

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

High cash cycle compare to competitors

BRC Asia Ltd has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Construction Services industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.

Low market penetration in new markets

– Outside its home market of Singapore, BRC Asia Ltd needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.

Interest costs

– Compare to the competition, BRC Asia Ltd 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.

Aligning sales with marketing

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

Slow to strategic competitive environment developments

– As BRC Asia Ltd is one of the leading players in the Construction Services industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Construction Services industry in last five years.

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BRC Asia Ltd Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of BRC Asia Ltd are -

Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities

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

Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains

– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, BRC Asia Ltd 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 BRC Asia Ltd 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

– BRC Asia Ltd can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Construction Services 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.

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 BRC Asia Ltd to reconfigure its entire business model. For example it can used blockchain based technologies to reduce piracy of its products in the big markets such as China. Secondly it can use the popularity of e-commerce in various developing markets to build a Direct to Customer business model rather than the current Channel Heavy distribution network.

Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Construction Services industry

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

Learning at scale

– Online learning technologies has now opened space for BRC Asia Ltd 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.

Reforming the budgeting process

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

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for BRC Asia Ltd in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Construction Services industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.

Low interest rates

– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, BRC Asia Ltd 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.

Loyalty marketing

– BRC Asia Ltd has focused on building a highly responsive customer relationship management platform. This platform is built on in-house data and driven by analytics and artificial intelligence. The customer analytics can help the organization to fine tune its loyalty marketing efforts, increase the wallet share of the organization, reduce wastage on mainstream advertising spending, build better pricing strategies using personalization, etc.

Manufacturing automation

– BRC Asia Ltd can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Construction Services 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.

Leveraging digital technologies

– BRC Asia Ltd 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.

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. BRC Asia Ltd can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.

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Threats BRC Asia Ltd External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of BRC Asia Ltd are -

Consumer confidence and its impact on BRC Asia Ltd 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 Construction Services industry and other sectors.

Environmental challenges

– BRC Asia Ltd 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. BRC Asia Ltd can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Construction Services industry.

Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins

– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, BRC Asia Ltd 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 BRC Asia Ltd 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 BRC Asia Ltd in the Construction Services sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

Regulatory challenges

– BRC Asia Ltd 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 Construction Services industry regulations.

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 BRC Asia Ltd.

Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution

– BRC Asia Ltd has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Construction Services industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, BRC Asia Ltd needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Construction Services 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.

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

– BRC Asia Ltd 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 Construction Services industry.

Easy access to finance

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

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.

High dependence on third party suppliers

– BRC Asia Ltd 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.

Trade war between China and United States

– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for BRC Asia Ltd in Construction Services industry. The Construction Services 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.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of BRC Asia Ltd Template, Example

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

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