SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Kolmar Holding (South Korea)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Kolmar Holding is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, technology disruption, increasing commodity prices, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, geopolitical disruptions, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies,
challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing energy prices, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Kolmar Holding can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Kolmar Holding, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Kolmar Holding 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 Kolmar Holding can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Kolmar Holding
2. Improving business portfolio management of Kolmar Holding
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in South Korea
4. Making a Personal & Household Prods. sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Kolmar Holding
Strengths of Kolmar Holding | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Kolmar Holding are -
Ability to recruit top talent
– Kolmar Holding is one of the leading players in the Personal & Household Prods. industry in South Korea. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in South Korea. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Organizational Resilience of Kolmar Holding
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Kolmar Holding does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
High brand equity
– Kolmar Holding has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Kolmar Holding to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Kolmar Holding in Personal & Household Prods. industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Kolmar Holding has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Kolmar Holding staying ahead in the Personal & Household Prods. industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Kolmar Holding comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Personal & Household Prods. 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Kolmar Holding is present in almost all the verticals within the Personal & Household Prods. industry. This has provided Kolmar Holding 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.
Analytics focus
– Kolmar Holding 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 Personal & Household Prods. industry. The technology infrastructure of South Korea 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.
Digital Transformation in Personal & Household Prods. industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Kolmar Holding digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Kolmar Holding 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
– Kolmar Holding has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Personal & Household Prods. industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Kolmar Holding have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Innovation driven organization
– Kolmar Holding is one of the most innovative firm in Personal & Household Prods. sector.
Strong track record of project management in the Personal & Household Prods. industry
– Kolmar Holding is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Weaknesses of Kolmar Holding | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Kolmar Holding are -
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Kolmar Holding is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Personal & Household Prods. industry, but Kolmar Holding needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Kolmar Holding to focus more on services in the Personal & Household Prods. industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Personal & Household Prods. industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in South Korea, Kolmar Holding 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 Personal & Household Prods. industry.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of South Korea, Kolmar Holding needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
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 Kolmar Holding supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Kolmar Holding is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Kolmar Holding vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Personal & Household Prods. industry, Kolmar Holding needs to come up with a strategy to reduce the workers concern regarding automation. Without a clear strategy, it could lead to disruption and uncertainty within the organization.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Kolmar Holding is one of the leading players in the Personal & Household Prods. industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Personal & Household Prods. industry in last five years.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Kolmar Holding needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Personal & Household Prods. industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Kolmar Holding can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Kolmar Holding is planning to shift buying processes online.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Kolmar Holding has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Personal & Household Prods. industry over the last five years. Kolmar Holding 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Kolmar Holding has high operating costs in the Personal & Household Prods. industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Kolmar Holding lucrative customers.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Kolmar Holding, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Personal & Household Prods. industry. But it has very little resources allocation to manage the risks emerging from events such as natural disasters, climate change, melting of permafrost, tacking the rise of artificial intelligence, opportunities and threats emerging from commercialization of space etc.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Kolmar Holding has some of the most successful models in the Personal & Household Prods. industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Kolmar Holding should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Kolmar Holding Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Kolmar Holding are -
Developing new processes and practices
– Kolmar Holding can develop new processes and procedures in Personal & Household Prods. industry using technology such as automation using artificial intelligence, real time transportation and products tracking, 3D modeling for concept development and new products pilot testing etc.
Buying journey improvements
– Kolmar Holding can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Personal & Household Prods. 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Kolmar Holding has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Personal & Household Prods. industry. This can help Kolmar Holding to build a more holistic ecosystem for Kolmar Holding products in the Personal & Household Prods. industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Personal & Household Prods. industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Kolmar Holding 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. Kolmar Holding 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Kolmar Holding is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Kolmar Holding can utilize new technology in the field of Personal & Household Prods. industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Kolmar Holding to increase its market reach. Kolmar Holding 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.
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. Kolmar Holding can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Kolmar Holding 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Personal & Household Prods. industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Kolmar Holding can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Kolmar Holding 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Kolmar Holding can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Kolmar Holding has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Personal & Household Prods. sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Kolmar Holding to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Kolmar Holding to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Kolmar Holding in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Personal & Household Prods. industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Threats Kolmar Holding External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Kolmar Holding are -
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Kolmar Holding is facing in Personal & Household Prods. sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Regulatory challenges
– Kolmar Holding 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 Personal & Household Prods. industry regulations.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Kolmar Holding has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Personal & Household Prods. industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Kolmar Holding needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Personal & Household Prods. 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Kolmar Holding in Personal & Household Prods. industry. The Personal & Household Prods. industry is already at various protected from local competition in China, with the rise of trade war the protection levels may go up. This presents a clear threat of current business model in Chinese market.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Kolmar Holding 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 Personal & Household Prods. industry.
Instability in the European markets
– European Union markets are facing three big challenges post Covid – expanded balance sheets, Brexit related business disruption, and aggressive Russia looking to distract the existing security mechanism. Kolmar Holding 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 Personal & Household Prods. industry are lowering. It can presents Kolmar Holding with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Personal & Household Prods. sector.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Kolmar Holding 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 Kolmar Holding prominent markets.
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 Kolmar Holding.
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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Kolmar Holding may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Personal & Household Prods. sector.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Personal & Household Prods. industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Kolmar Holding can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Kolmar Holding Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Kolmar Holding 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 Kolmar Holding 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 Kolmar Holding 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 Kolmar Holding 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 Kolmar Holding needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
