Matson (MATX) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Water Transportation
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Matson (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Matson is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – wage bills are increasing, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, technology disruption, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs,
increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, 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 Matson can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Matson, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Matson 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 Matson can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Matson
2. Improving business portfolio management of Matson
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Water Transportation sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Matson
Strengths of Matson | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Matson are -
Innovation driven organization
– Matson is one of the most innovative firm in Water Transportation sector.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Matson 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.
Digital Transformation in Water Transportation industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Matson digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Matson 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.
Organizational Resilience of Matson
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Matson 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 Matson 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Water Transportation industry
– Matson is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Matson has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Matson 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 Water Transportation industry
– Matson has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Matson to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Water Transportation industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Matson to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Matson has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Matson staying ahead in the Water Transportation industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Matson has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Water Transportation industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Matson have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Ability to lead change in Water Transportation
– Matson is one of the leading players in the Water Transportation industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Water Transportation industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Matson 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
– Matson is one of the leading players in the Water Transportation industry in United States. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in United States. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Weaknesses of Matson | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Matson are -
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Matson 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 decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Matson has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Water Transportation industry over the last five years. Matson 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 Matson supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Matson is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Matson vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Matson is one of the leading players in the Water Transportation industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Water Transportation industry in last five years.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Matson, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Water Transportation 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Matson needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Need for greater diversity
– Matson 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Matson products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Matson needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Matson 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 Water Transportation industry using digital technology.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Matson has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Water Transportation industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Employees’ less understanding of Matson strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Matson 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.
Matson Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Matson are -
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Matson 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 Water Transportation industry.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Matson 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 Matson to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Matson has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Water Transportation sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Matson to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Matson to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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 Matson 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Matson 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Matson to increase its market reach. Matson 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.
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. Matson can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Loyalty marketing
– Matson 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Matson 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Matson can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Matson operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Water Transportation sector.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Matson 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Matson can develop new processes and procedures in Water Transportation 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Matson can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Water Transportation 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.
Threats Matson External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Matson are -
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Matson is facing in Water Transportation sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Regulatory challenges
– Matson 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 Water Transportation industry regulations.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Matson 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 Water Transportation industry and other sectors.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Matson has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Water Transportation industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Matson needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Water Transportation 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.
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 Matson.
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. Matson 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.
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 Matson in the Water Transportation sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Increasing wage structure of Matson
– 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 Matson.
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. Matson needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Water Transportation industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Matson 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Water Transportation industry are lowering. It can presents Matson with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Water Transportation sector.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Matson in Water Transportation industry. The Water Transportation 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.
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 Matson business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Matson Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Matson 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 Matson 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 Matson 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 Matson 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 Matson needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.