Cronex (215570) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Fish/Livestock
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Cronex (South Korea)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Cronex is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – wage bills are increasing, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, there is backlash against globalization, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing transportation and logistics costs,
competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Cronex can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Cronex, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Cronex 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 Cronex can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Cronex
2. Improving business portfolio management of Cronex
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in South Korea
4. Making a Fish/Livestock sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Cronex
Strengths of Cronex | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Cronex are -
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Cronex 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.
Training and development
– Cronex has one of the best training and development program in Consumer/Non-Cyclical 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
– Cronex has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Cronex 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Fish/Livestock industry
– Cronex has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Cronex to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Fish/Livestock industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Cronex to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Cronex in the Consumer/Non-Cyclical sector have low bargaining power. Cronex has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Cronex to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Organizational Resilience of Cronex
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Cronex does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Diverse revenue streams
– Cronex is present in almost all the verticals within the Fish/Livestock industry. This has provided Cronex 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Cronex comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Fish/Livestock 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Cronex is one of the leading players in the Fish/Livestock 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.
Digital Transformation in Fish/Livestock industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Cronex digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Cronex 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Cronex 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.
High brand equity
– Cronex has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Cronex to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Weaknesses of Cronex | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Cronex are -
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Cronex 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Cronex is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Cronex to provide better information regarding Fish/Livestock products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Cronex, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Fish/Livestock 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Cronex has high operating costs in the Fish/Livestock industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Cronex lucrative customers.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Cronex is just above the Fish/Livestock 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 Fish/Livestock industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Cronex 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Cronex, in the dynamic environment of Fish/Livestock industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Cronex has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Need for greater diversity
– Cronex has taken concrete steps on diversity, equity, and inclusion. But the efforts so far has resulted in limited success. It needs to expand the recruitment and selection process to hire more people from the minorities and underprivileged background.
Employees’ less understanding of Cronex strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Cronex 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Cronex products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Cronex needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Fish/Livestock industry, Cronex 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.
Cronex Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Cronex are -
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Cronex to increase its market reach. Cronex 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, Cronex 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Cronex 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Cronex in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Fish/Livestock industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Buying journey improvements
– Cronex can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Fish/Livestock 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Cronex has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Fish/Livestock sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Cronex to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Cronex to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Cronex 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 Fish/Livestock industry.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Fish/Livestock industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Cronex 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. Cronex 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Fish/Livestock industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Cronex in the Fish/Livestock industry. Now Cronex can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Cronex can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Manufacturing automation
– Cronex can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Fish/Livestock sector. It can use CAD and 3D printing to build a quick prototype and pilot testing products. It can leverage automation using machine learning and artificial intelligence to do faster production at lowers costs, and it can leverage the growth in satellite and tracking technologies to improve inventory management, transportation, and shipping.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Cronex can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Cronex operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Fish/Livestock sector.
Loyalty marketing
– Cronex 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 Cronex External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Cronex 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Cronex 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 Cronex prominent markets.
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. Cronex needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Fish/Livestock industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Fish/Livestock industry are lowering. It can presents Cronex with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Fish/Livestock sector.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Cronex 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 Fish/Livestock industry.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Fish/Livestock industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Cronex can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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 Cronex business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Cronex in Fish/Livestock industry. The Fish/Livestock 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.
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 Cronex in the Fish/Livestock sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Cronex has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Fish/Livestock industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Cronex needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Fish/Livestock 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 Cronex is facing in Fish/Livestock sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Cronex may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Fish/Livestock sector.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Cronex 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Cronex Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Cronex 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 Cronex 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 Cronex 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 Cronex 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 Cronex needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.