SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Advanced Holdings Ltd (Singapore)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Advanced Holdings Ltd is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – there is backlash against globalization, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing commodity prices, geopolitical disruptions, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing transportation and logistics costs,
increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Advanced Holdings Ltd
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Advanced Holdings Ltd can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Advanced Holdings Ltd, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Advanced Holdings 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.
SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix
SWOT analysis of Advanced Holdings Ltd can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Advanced Holdings Ltd
2. Improving business portfolio management of Advanced Holdings Ltd
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Singapore
4. Making a Oil Well Services & Equipment sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Advanced Holdings Ltd
Strengths of Advanced Holdings Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Advanced Holdings Ltd are -
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Advanced Holdings Ltd comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
– Advanced Holdings Ltd is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Advanced Holdings Ltd in the Energy sector have low bargaining power. Advanced Holdings Ltd has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Advanced Holdings Ltd to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
– Advanced Holdings Ltd has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Advanced Holdings Ltd to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Advanced Holdings Ltd to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Advanced Holdings Ltd has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Advanced Holdings Ltd staying ahead in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Analytics focus
– Advanced Holdings 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment 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
– Advanced Holdings Ltd is present in almost all the verticals within the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. This has provided Advanced Holdings 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.
High brand equity
– Advanced Holdings Ltd has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Advanced Holdings Ltd to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Advanced Holdings Ltd is one of the leading players in the Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Digital Transformation in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Advanced Holdings Ltd digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Advanced Holdings Ltd 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Advanced Holdings Ltd has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Advanced Holdings Ltd have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Organizational Resilience of Advanced Holdings Ltd
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Advanced Holdings Ltd does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Weaknesses of Advanced Holdings Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Advanced Holdings Ltd are -
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Advanced Holdings Ltd has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Advanced Holdings Ltd is one of the leading players in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry in last five years.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Advanced Holdings Ltd has high operating costs in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Advanced Holdings Ltd lucrative customers.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Advanced Holdings 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment industry using digital technology.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry, Advanced Holdings Ltd 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Advanced Holdings Ltd is just above the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry average. It needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
High dependence on Advanced Holdings Ltd ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Advanced Holdings Ltd still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Advanced Holdings Ltd has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Advanced Holdings Ltd is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Advanced Holdings Ltd to provide better information regarding Oil Well Services & Equipment products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Advanced Holdings Ltd has some of the most successful models in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Advanced Holdings Ltd should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High dependence on existing supply chain
– The disruption in the global supply chains because of the Covid-19 pandemic and blockage of the Suez Canal illustrated the fragile nature of Advanced Holdings Ltd supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Advanced Holdings Ltd is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Advanced Holdings Ltd vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Advanced Holdings Ltd needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Advanced Holdings Ltd can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Advanced Holdings Ltd is planning to shift buying processes online.
Advanced Holdings Ltd Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Advanced Holdings Ltd are -
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Advanced Holdings Ltd is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Advanced Holdings Ltd can utilize new technology in the field of Oil Well Services & Equipment industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
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 Advanced Holdings 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Advanced Holdings Ltd in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. Now Advanced Holdings Ltd can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Buying journey improvements
– Advanced Holdings Ltd can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Advanced Holdings Ltd can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Advanced Holdings 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 Advanced Holdings 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Advanced Holdings Ltd can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Advanced Holdings Ltd 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. Advanced Holdings Ltd 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Advanced Holdings Ltd can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Advanced Holdings Ltd to increase its market reach. Advanced Holdings Ltd 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Advanced Holdings Ltd can make experimentation a productive activity and build a culture of innovation using approaches such as – mining transaction data, A/B testing of websites and selling platforms, engaging potential customers over various needs, and building on small ideas in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Advanced Holdings 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 Advanced Holdings Ltd to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Advanced Holdings Ltd has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Oil Well Services & Equipment sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Advanced Holdings Ltd to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Advanced Holdings Ltd to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Threats Advanced Holdings Ltd External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Advanced Holdings Ltd 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 Advanced Holdings Ltd.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Advanced Holdings Ltd may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Oil Well Services & Equipment sector.
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. Advanced Holdings Ltd will face different problems in different parts of Europe. For example it will face inflationary pressures in UK, France, and Germany, balance sheet expansion and demand challenges in Southern European countries, and geopolitical instability in the Eastern Europe.
Environmental challenges
– Advanced Holdings 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. Advanced Holdings Ltd can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry.
High level of anxiety and lack of motivation
– the Great Resignation in United States is the sign of broader dissatisfaction among the workforce in United States. Advanced Holdings Ltd needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Advanced Holdings 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment industry.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Oil Well Services & Equipment industry are lowering. It can presents Advanced Holdings Ltd with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Oil Well Services & Equipment sector.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Advanced Holdings 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 Advanced Holdings Ltd prominent markets.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Advanced Holdings Ltd in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. The Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
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 Advanced Holdings Ltd business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Advanced Holdings Ltd has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Advanced Holdings Ltd needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
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.
Regulatory challenges
– Advanced Holdings 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment industry regulations.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Advanced Holdings Ltd Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Advanced Holdings 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 Advanced Holdings 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 Advanced Holdings 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 Advanced Holdings 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 Advanced Holdings Ltd needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.