Ubiquoss (264450) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Communications Equipment
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Ubiquoss (South Korea)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Ubiquoss is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing commodity prices, there is increasing trade war between United States & China,
there is backlash against globalization, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Ubiquoss can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Ubiquoss, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Ubiquoss 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 Ubiquoss can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Ubiquoss
2. Improving business portfolio management of Ubiquoss
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in South Korea
4. Making a Communications Equipment sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Ubiquoss
Strengths of Ubiquoss | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Ubiquoss are -
Ability to recruit top talent
– Ubiquoss is one of the leading players in the Communications Equipment 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Ubiquoss in Communications Equipment industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Ubiquoss has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Ubiquoss 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Ubiquoss is present in almost all the verticals within the Communications Equipment industry. This has provided Ubiquoss 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Ubiquoss has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Ubiquoss staying ahead in the Communications Equipment industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Communications Equipment industry
– Ubiquoss has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Ubiquoss to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Communications Equipment industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Ubiquoss to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Ubiquoss in the Technology sector have low bargaining power. Ubiquoss has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Ubiquoss to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Training and development
– Ubiquoss has one of the best training and development program in Technology 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Communications Equipment industry
– Ubiquoss is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Innovation driven organization
– Ubiquoss is one of the most innovative firm in Communications Equipment sector.
Organizational Resilience of Ubiquoss
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Ubiquoss does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Digital Transformation in Communications Equipment industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Ubiquoss digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Ubiquoss 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.
Weaknesses of Ubiquoss | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Ubiquoss are -
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Ubiquoss has high operating costs in the Communications Equipment industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Ubiquoss lucrative customers.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Ubiquoss has some of the most successful models in the Communications Equipment industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Ubiquoss should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Ubiquoss, in the dynamic environment of Communications Equipment industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Ubiquoss has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of South Korea, Ubiquoss 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 Ubiquoss supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Ubiquoss is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Ubiquoss vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Ubiquoss is just above the Communications 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.
Skills based hiring in Communications Equipment industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Ubiquoss 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.
High dependence on Ubiquoss ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Ubiquoss still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Communications Equipment industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Ubiquoss has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Employees’ less understanding of Ubiquoss strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Ubiquoss 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Ubiquoss is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Communications Equipment industry, but Ubiquoss needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Ubiquoss to focus more on services in the Communications Equipment industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Ubiquoss is one of the leading players in the Communications Equipment industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Communications Equipment industry in last five years.
Ubiquoss Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Ubiquoss are -
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Ubiquoss 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 Communications Equipment industry.
Loyalty marketing
– Ubiquoss 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Ubiquoss 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Ubiquoss has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Communications Equipment sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Ubiquoss to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Ubiquoss to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Communications Equipment industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Ubiquoss 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
– Ubiquoss 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. Ubiquoss can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Ubiquoss 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 Ubiquoss to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Ubiquoss to increase its market reach. Ubiquoss 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Ubiquoss can still utilize the low interest rates to borrow money for capital investment. Secondly it can also use the increase of government spending in infrastructure projects to get new business.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Ubiquoss can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Ubiquoss operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Communications Equipment sector.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Ubiquoss can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Communications Equipment industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Ubiquoss 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. Ubiquoss 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.
Threats Ubiquoss External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Ubiquoss are -
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.
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.
Environmental challenges
– Ubiquoss 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. Ubiquoss can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Communications Equipment industry.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Ubiquoss may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Communications Equipment sector.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Ubiquoss has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Communications Equipment industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Ubiquoss needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Communications 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Ubiquoss 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 Communications Equipment industry regulations.
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. Ubiquoss 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Ubiquoss 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 Communications Equipment industry and other sectors.
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. Ubiquoss needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Communications Equipment industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Ubiquoss 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 Ubiquoss prominent markets.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Ubiquoss in Communications Equipment industry. The Communications 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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Communications Equipment industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Ubiquoss can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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 Ubiquoss.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Ubiquoss Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Ubiquoss 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 Ubiquoss 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 Ubiquoss 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 Ubiquoss 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 Ubiquoss needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.