Liveplex (50120) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Textiles - Non Apparel
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Liveplex (South Korea)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Liveplex is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, technology disruption, increasing transportation and logistics costs, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, wage bills are increasing, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation,
competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Liveplex can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Liveplex, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Liveplex 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 Liveplex can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Liveplex
2. Improving business portfolio management of Liveplex
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in South Korea
4. Making a Textiles - Non Apparel sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Liveplex
Strengths of Liveplex | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Liveplex are -
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Liveplex comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Textiles - Non Apparel 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Liveplex in the Consumer Cyclical sector have low bargaining power. Liveplex has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Liveplex to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Innovation driven organization
– Liveplex is one of the most innovative firm in Textiles - Non Apparel sector.
Digital Transformation in Textiles - Non Apparel industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Liveplex digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Liveplex 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Liveplex 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Liveplex has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Textiles - Non Apparel industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Liveplex have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Liveplex has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Liveplex 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
– Liveplex is present in almost all the verticals within the Textiles - Non Apparel industry. This has provided Liveplex 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.
Ability to lead change in Textiles - Non Apparel
– Liveplex is one of the leading players in the Textiles - Non Apparel industry in South Korea. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Textiles - Non Apparel industry in South Korea but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Liveplex in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Organizational Resilience of Liveplex
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Liveplex does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Liveplex has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Liveplex staying ahead in the Textiles - Non Apparel industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Learning organization
- Liveplex 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 Liveplex is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Liveplex emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Weaknesses of Liveplex | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Liveplex are -
High bargaining power of channel partners in Textiles - Non Apparel industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in South Korea, Liveplex 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 Textiles - Non Apparel industry.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Liveplex has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Textiles - Non Apparel industry over the last five years. Liveplex 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Textiles - Non Apparel industry, Liveplex 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.
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 Liveplex supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Liveplex is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Liveplex vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Liveplex 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Liveplex is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Textiles - Non Apparel industry, but Liveplex needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Liveplex to focus more on services in the Textiles - Non Apparel industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Liveplex is one of the leading players in the Textiles - Non Apparel industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Textiles - Non Apparel industry in last five years.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Liveplex, in the dynamic environment of Textiles - Non Apparel industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Liveplex has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Liveplex, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Textiles - Non Apparel 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.
Employees’ less understanding of Liveplex strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Liveplex 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Liveplex needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Textiles - Non Apparel industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Liveplex can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Liveplex is planning to shift buying processes online.
Liveplex Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Liveplex are -
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Liveplex can build a diversified supply chain model across various countries in - South East Asia, India, and other parts of the world. This reconfiguration of global supply chain can help Liveplex to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Textiles - Non Apparel industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Liveplex in the Textiles - Non Apparel industry. Now Liveplex can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Liveplex 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.
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 Liveplex 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Textiles - Non Apparel industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Liveplex 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. Liveplex 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Liveplex 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 Textiles - Non Apparel industry.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Liveplex 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
– Liveplex 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Liveplex can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Liveplex operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Textiles - Non Apparel sector.
Buying journey improvements
– Liveplex can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Textiles - Non Apparel 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Liveplex 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Liveplex has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Textiles - Non Apparel sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Liveplex to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Liveplex to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Liveplex 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 Liveplex to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Threats Liveplex External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Liveplex are -
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. Liveplex needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Textiles - Non Apparel industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Liveplex business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Liveplex 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.
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 Liveplex in the Textiles - Non Apparel sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Increasing wage structure of Liveplex
– Post Covid-19 there is a sharp increase in the wages especially in the jobs that require interaction with people. The increasing wages can put downward pressure on the margins of Liveplex.
Environmental challenges
– Liveplex 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. Liveplex can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Textiles - Non Apparel industry.
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 Liveplex.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Liveplex 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 Liveplex prominent markets.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Liveplex may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Textiles - Non Apparel sector.
Regulatory challenges
– Liveplex 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 Textiles - Non Apparel industry regulations.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Liveplex has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Textiles - Non Apparel industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Liveplex needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Textiles - Non Apparel 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.
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. Liveplex 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Liveplex 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 Textiles - Non Apparel industry.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Liveplex Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Liveplex 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 Liveplex 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 Liveplex 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 Liveplex 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 Liveplex needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
