SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Suheung Capsul (South Korea)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Suheung Capsul is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing household debt because of falling income levels, wage bills are increasing, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, geopolitical disruptions, increasing energy prices, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%,
supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Suheung Capsul can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Suheung Capsul, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Suheung Capsul 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 Suheung Capsul can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Suheung Capsul
2. Improving business portfolio management of Suheung Capsul
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in South Korea
4. Making a Chemical Manufacturing sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Suheung Capsul
Strengths of Suheung Capsul | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Suheung Capsul are -
Highly skilled collaborators
– Suheung Capsul has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Chemical Manufacturing industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Suheung Capsul have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Suheung Capsul comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Chemical Manufacturing 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.
Organizational Resilience of Suheung Capsul
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Suheung Capsul does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Innovation driven organization
– Suheung Capsul is one of the most innovative firm in Chemical Manufacturing sector.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Chemical Manufacturing industry
– Suheung Capsul has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Suheung Capsul to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Chemical Manufacturing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Suheung Capsul to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Analytics focus
– Suheung Capsul 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 Chemical Manufacturing 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Suheung Capsul in Chemical Manufacturing industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Diverse revenue streams
– Suheung Capsul is present in almost all the verticals within the Chemical Manufacturing industry. This has provided Suheung Capsul 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.
Training and development
– Suheung Capsul has one of the best training and development program in Basic Materials industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in – employees retention, in-house promotion, loyalty, new venture initiation, lack of conflict, and high level of both employees and customer engagement.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Suheung Capsul has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Suheung Capsul 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.
High brand equity
– Suheung Capsul has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Suheung Capsul to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Suheung Capsul is one of the leading players in the Chemical Manufacturing 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.
Weaknesses of Suheung Capsul | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Suheung Capsul are -
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 Suheung Capsul supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Suheung Capsul is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Suheung Capsul vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Chemical Manufacturing industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in South Korea, Suheung Capsul 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Suheung Capsul 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Suheung Capsul, in the dynamic environment of Chemical Manufacturing industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Suheung Capsul has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High dependence on Suheung Capsul ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Suheung Capsul still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Chemical Manufacturing industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Suheung Capsul has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Suheung Capsul has some of the most successful models in the Chemical Manufacturing industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Suheung Capsul should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Suheung Capsul is one of the leading players in the Chemical Manufacturing industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Chemical Manufacturing industry in last five years.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Suheung Capsul is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Chemical Manufacturing industry, but Suheung Capsul needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Suheung Capsul to focus more on services in the Chemical Manufacturing industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Skills based hiring in Chemical Manufacturing industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Suheung Capsul has created an environment where the organization is dominated by functional specialists rather than management generalist. This has resulted into product oriented approach rather than marketing oriented approach or consumers oriented approach.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Suheung Capsul needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Chemical Manufacturing industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Suheung Capsul can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Suheung Capsul is planning to shift buying processes online.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Suheung Capsul, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Chemical Manufacturing 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.
Suheung Capsul Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Suheung Capsul are -
Developing new processes and practices
– Suheung Capsul can develop new processes and procedures in Chemical Manufacturing 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.
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 Suheung Capsul to reconfigure its entire business model. For example it can used blockchain based technologies to reduce piracy of its products in the big markets such as China. Secondly it can use the popularity of e-commerce in various developing markets to build a Direct to Customer business model rather than the current Channel Heavy distribution network.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Suheung Capsul 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, Suheung Capsul is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Suheung Capsul can utilize new technology in the field of Chemical Manufacturing industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Loyalty marketing
– Suheung Capsul 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Suheung Capsul 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry.
Buying journey improvements
– Suheung Capsul can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Chemical Manufacturing 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Suheung Capsul to increase its market reach. Suheung Capsul 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Chemical Manufacturing industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Suheung Capsul 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. Suheung Capsul 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Suheung Capsul 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. Suheung Capsul can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Chemical Manufacturing industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Suheung Capsul in the Chemical Manufacturing industry. Now Suheung Capsul 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Suheung Capsul can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Threats Suheung Capsul External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Suheung Capsul are -
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Suheung Capsul has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Chemical Manufacturing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Suheung Capsul needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Chemical Manufacturing 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Suheung Capsul is facing in Chemical Manufacturing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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 Suheung Capsul business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Suheung Capsul may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Chemical Manufacturing sector.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Suheung Capsul 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry and other sectors.
Regulatory challenges
– Suheung Capsul 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry regulations.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Suheung Capsul 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.
Environmental challenges
– Suheung Capsul 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. Suheung Capsul can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Chemical Manufacturing industry.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Suheung Capsul 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 Suheung Capsul 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.
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. Suheung Capsul needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Chemical Manufacturing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Chemical Manufacturing industry are lowering. It can presents Suheung Capsul with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Chemical Manufacturing sector.
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 Suheung Capsul in the Chemical Manufacturing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Suheung Capsul Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Suheung Capsul 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 Suheung Capsul 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 Suheung Capsul 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 Suheung Capsul 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 Suheung Capsul needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
