SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Sewon Cellonte (South Korea)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Sewon Cellonte is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , there is backlash against globalization, increasing commodity prices, increasing energy prices, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google,
wage bills are increasing, increasing transportation and logistics costs, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Sewon Cellonte can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Sewon Cellonte, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Sewon Cellonte 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 Sewon Cellonte can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Sewon Cellonte
2. Improving business portfolio management of Sewon Cellonte
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in South Korea
4. Making a Containers & Packaging sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Sewon Cellonte
Strengths of Sewon Cellonte | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Sewon Cellonte are -
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Sewon Cellonte in Containers & Packaging industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Sewon Cellonte is one of the leading players in the Containers & Packaging 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.
Training and development
– Sewon Cellonte 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Sewon Cellonte has built up over years in its products and services combo offer has resulted in high retention of customers, lower marketing costs, and greater ability of the firm to focus on its customers.
Diverse revenue streams
– Sewon Cellonte is present in almost all the verticals within the Containers & Packaging industry. This has provided Sewon Cellonte 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
– Sewon Cellonte has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Sewon Cellonte to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Sewon Cellonte in the Basic Materials sector have low bargaining power. Sewon Cellonte has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Sewon Cellonte to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Learning organization
- Sewon Cellonte 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 Sewon Cellonte is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Sewon Cellonte emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Sewon Cellonte has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Sewon Cellonte staying ahead in the Containers & Packaging industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Sewon Cellonte has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Containers & Packaging industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Sewon Cellonte have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Containers & Packaging industry
– Sewon Cellonte has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Sewon Cellonte to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Containers & Packaging industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Sewon Cellonte to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Strong track record of project management in the Containers & Packaging industry
– Sewon Cellonte 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 Sewon Cellonte | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Sewon Cellonte are -
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Sewon Cellonte has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Containers & Packaging industry over the last five years. Sewon Cellonte 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Sewon Cellonte is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Containers & Packaging industry, but Sewon Cellonte needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Sewon Cellonte to focus more on services in the Containers & Packaging industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of South Korea, Sewon Cellonte needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Employees’ less understanding of Sewon Cellonte strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Sewon Cellonte 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 Sewon Cellonte, in the dynamic environment of Containers & Packaging industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Sewon Cellonte has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Sewon Cellonte is one of the leading players in the Containers & Packaging industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Containers & Packaging industry in last five years.
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 Sewon Cellonte supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Sewon Cellonte is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Sewon Cellonte vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
High dependence on Sewon Cellonte ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Sewon Cellonte still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Containers & Packaging industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Sewon Cellonte has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Sewon Cellonte 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 Containers & Packaging industry using digital technology.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Containers & Packaging industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in South Korea, Sewon Cellonte 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 Containers & Packaging industry.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Sewon Cellonte, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Containers & Packaging 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.
Sewon Cellonte Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Sewon Cellonte are -
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Sewon Cellonte has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Containers & Packaging sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Sewon Cellonte to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Sewon Cellonte to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Sewon Cellonte is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Sewon Cellonte can utilize new technology in the field of Containers & Packaging industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Containers & Packaging industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Sewon Cellonte 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. Sewon Cellonte 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.
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 Sewon Cellonte 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Sewon Cellonte 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 Sewon Cellonte to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Sewon Cellonte 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Sewon Cellonte 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Containers & Packaging industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Sewon Cellonte can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Buying journey improvements
– Sewon Cellonte can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Containers & Packaging 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Sewon Cellonte can develop new processes and procedures in Containers & Packaging 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Sewon Cellonte 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 Containers & Packaging industry.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Sewon Cellonte can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Loyalty marketing
– Sewon Cellonte 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.
Threats Sewon Cellonte External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Sewon Cellonte are -
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.
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. Sewon Cellonte 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.
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 Sewon Cellonte business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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 Sewon Cellonte in the Containers & Packaging sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Sewon Cellonte 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 Containers & Packaging industry and other sectors.
Environmental challenges
– Sewon Cellonte 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. Sewon Cellonte can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Containers & Packaging industry.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Sewon Cellonte is facing in Containers & Packaging sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Sewon Cellonte has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Containers & Packaging industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Sewon Cellonte needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Containers & Packaging sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Containers & Packaging industry are lowering. It can presents Sewon Cellonte with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Containers & Packaging sector.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Sewon Cellonte may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Containers & Packaging sector.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Sewon Cellonte 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.
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 Sewon Cellonte.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Sewon Cellonte 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 Containers & Packaging industry.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Sewon Cellonte Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Sewon Cellonte 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 Sewon Cellonte 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 Sewon Cellonte 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 Sewon Cellonte 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 Sewon Cellonte needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.