SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Myungmoon Phar (South Korea)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Myungmoon Phar is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – geopolitical disruptions, increasing commodity prices, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, there is backlash against globalization, technology disruption, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing energy prices,
cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Myungmoon Phar can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Myungmoon Phar, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Myungmoon Phar 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 Myungmoon Phar can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Myungmoon Phar
2. Improving business portfolio management of Myungmoon Phar
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in South Korea
4. Making a Biotechnology & Drugs sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Myungmoon Phar
Strengths of Myungmoon Phar | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Myungmoon Phar are -
Analytics focus
– Myungmoon Phar 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 Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
High brand equity
– Myungmoon Phar has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Myungmoon Phar to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Organizational Resilience of Myungmoon Phar
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Myungmoon Phar does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Myungmoon Phar are driving operational speed, building greater agility, and keeping the organization nimble to compete with new competitors. It helps are organization to ideate new ideas, and execute them swiftly in the marketplace.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Myungmoon Phar in Biotechnology & Drugs industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Ability to lead change in Biotechnology & Drugs
– Myungmoon Phar is one of the leading players in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry in South Korea. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry in South Korea but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Myungmoon Phar in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Myungmoon Phar is one of the leading players in the Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Biotechnology & Drugs industry
– Myungmoon Phar has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Myungmoon Phar to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Myungmoon Phar to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Myungmoon Phar has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Myungmoon Phar staying ahead in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Learning organization
- Myungmoon Phar 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 Myungmoon Phar is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Myungmoon Phar emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Myungmoon Phar 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
– Myungmoon Phar is present in almost all the verticals within the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This has provided Myungmoon Phar 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.
Weaknesses of Myungmoon Phar | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Myungmoon Phar are -
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of South Korea, Myungmoon Phar needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Myungmoon Phar has high operating costs in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Myungmoon Phar lucrative customers.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Myungmoon Phar, in the dynamic environment of Biotechnology & Drugs industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Myungmoon Phar has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Myungmoon Phar is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, but Myungmoon Phar needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Myungmoon Phar to focus more on services in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Myungmoon Phar 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Myungmoon Phar 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry using digital technology.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Myungmoon Phar has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry over the last five years. Myungmoon Phar 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 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 Myungmoon Phar supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Myungmoon Phar is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Myungmoon Phar vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Myungmoon Phar has some of the most successful models in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Myungmoon Phar should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Myungmoon Phar is one of the leading players in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry in last five years.
Employees’ less understanding of Myungmoon Phar strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Myungmoon Phar 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.
Myungmoon Phar Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Myungmoon Phar are -
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Myungmoon Phar 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
– Myungmoon Phar 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. Myungmoon Phar can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Myungmoon Phar to increase its market reach. Myungmoon Phar 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Biotechnology & Drugs industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Myungmoon Phar 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
– Myungmoon Phar can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Myungmoon Phar in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Myungmoon Phar 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Myungmoon Phar 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 Myungmoon Phar to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Myungmoon Phar is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Myungmoon Phar can utilize new technology in the field of Biotechnology & Drugs industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Myungmoon Phar has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This can help Myungmoon Phar to build a more holistic ecosystem for Myungmoon Phar products in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Myungmoon Phar 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry.
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 Myungmoon Phar 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.
Threats Myungmoon Phar External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Myungmoon Phar are -
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Myungmoon Phar may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Biotechnology & Drugs sector.
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 Myungmoon Phar.
Regulatory challenges
– Myungmoon Phar 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry regulations.
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 dependence on third party suppliers
– Myungmoon Phar 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Myungmoon Phar 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry and other sectors.
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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Myungmoon Phar 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 Myungmoon Phar prominent markets.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Biotechnology & Drugs industry are lowering. It can presents Myungmoon Phar with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Biotechnology & Drugs sector.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Myungmoon Phar 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 Biotechnology & Drugs 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. Myungmoon Phar 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Myungmoon Phar has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Myungmoon Phar needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Environmental challenges
– Myungmoon Phar 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. Myungmoon Phar can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Myungmoon Phar Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Myungmoon Phar 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 Myungmoon Phar 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 Myungmoon Phar 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 Myungmoon Phar 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 Myungmoon Phar needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
