Silver Dragon Res (SDRG) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Silver Dragon Res (United States)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Silver Dragon Res is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing energy prices, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, geopolitical disruptions, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing commodity prices, increasing transportation and logistics costs, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Silver Dragon Res

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Silver Dragon Res can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Silver Dragon Res, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Silver Dragon Res 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.

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SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix

SWOT analysis of Silver Dragon Res can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Silver Dragon Res
2. Improving business portfolio management of Silver Dragon Res
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Gold & Silver sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Silver Dragon Res

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Strengths of Silver Dragon Res | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of Silver Dragon Res are -

Innovation driven organization

– Silver Dragon Res is one of the most innovative firm in Gold & Silver sector.

Highly skilled collaborators

– Silver Dragon Res has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Gold & Silver industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Silver Dragon Res have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.

Successful track record of launching new products

– Silver Dragon Res has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Silver Dragon Res 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.

Analytics focus

– Silver Dragon Res 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 Gold & Silver industry. The technology infrastructure of United States 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.

Ability to lead change in Gold & Silver

– Silver Dragon Res is one of the leading players in the Gold & Silver industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Gold & Silver industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Silver Dragon Res in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.

Digital Transformation in Gold & Silver industry

- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Silver Dragon Res digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Silver Dragon Res 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.

Effective Research and Development (R&D)

– Silver Dragon Res has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Silver Dragon Res staying ahead in the Gold & Silver industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.

Organizational Resilience of Silver Dragon Res

– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Silver Dragon Res does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.

Strong track record of project management in the Gold & Silver industry

– Silver Dragon Res is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.

Learning organization

- Silver Dragon Res 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 Silver Dragon Res is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Silver Dragon Res emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.

Training and development

– Silver Dragon Res has one of the best training and development program in Basic Materials 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.

Diverse revenue streams

– Silver Dragon Res is present in almost all the verticals within the Gold & Silver industry. This has provided Silver Dragon Res 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.

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Weaknesses of Silver Dragon Res | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of Silver Dragon Res are -

Compensation and incentives

– The revenue per employee of Silver Dragon Res is just above the Gold & Silver 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.

Slow decision making process

– As mentioned earlier in the report, Silver Dragon Res has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Gold & Silver industry over the last five years. Silver Dragon Res 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.

Products dominated business model

– Even though Silver Dragon Res has some of the most successful models in the Gold & Silver industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Silver Dragon Res should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.

Need for greater diversity

– Silver Dragon Res 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.

Increasing silos among functional specialists

– The organizational structure of Silver Dragon Res is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Gold & Silver industry, but Silver Dragon Res needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Silver Dragon Res to focus more on services in the Gold & Silver industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.

Employees’ less understanding of Silver Dragon Res strategy

– From the outside it seems that the employees of Silver Dragon Res 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 Silver Dragon Res products

– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Silver Dragon Res needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.

Interest costs

– Compare to the competition, Silver Dragon Res 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.

High operating costs

– Compare to the competitors, Silver Dragon Res has high operating costs in the Gold & Silver industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Silver Dragon Res lucrative customers.

High cash cycle compare to competitors

Silver Dragon Res has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Gold & Silver industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.

High bargaining power of channel partners in Gold & Silver industry

– because of the regulatory requirements in United States, Silver Dragon Res 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 Gold & Silver industry.

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Silver Dragon Res Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of Silver Dragon Res are -

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 Silver Dragon Res 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.

Finding new ways to collaborate

– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Gold & Silver industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Silver Dragon Res can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.

Low interest rates

– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Silver Dragon Res 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, Silver Dragon Res can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Silver Dragon Res operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Gold & Silver sector.

Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities

– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Silver Dragon Res 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 Silver Dragon Res to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Silver Dragon Res in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Gold & Silver industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.

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. Silver Dragon Res can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.

Learning at scale

– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Silver Dragon Res 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.

Developing new processes and practices

– Silver Dragon Res can develop new processes and procedures in Gold & Silver 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.

Building a culture of innovation

– managers at Silver Dragon Res 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 Gold & Silver industry.

Creating value in data economy

– The success of analytics program of Silver Dragon Res has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Gold & Silver industry. This can help Silver Dragon Res to build a more holistic ecosystem for Silver Dragon Res products in the Gold & Silver industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.

Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains

– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Silver Dragon Res 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 Silver Dragon Res to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.

Reforming the budgeting process

- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Silver Dragon Res can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.

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Threats Silver Dragon Res External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of Silver Dragon Res are -

Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution

– Silver Dragon Res has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Gold & Silver industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Silver Dragon Res needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Gold & Silver 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.

Stagnating economy with rate increase

– Silver Dragon Res 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 Gold & Silver industry.

High dependence on third party suppliers

– Silver Dragon Res 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.

Trade war between China and United States

– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Silver Dragon Res in Gold & Silver industry. The Gold & Silver 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.

Barriers of entry lowering

– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Gold & Silver industry are lowering. It can presents Silver Dragon Res with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Gold & Silver sector.

Shortening product life cycle

– it is one of the major threat that Silver Dragon Res is facing in Gold & Silver sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.

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 Silver Dragon Res.

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.

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. Silver Dragon Res 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.

Easy access to finance

– Easy access to finance in Gold & Silver industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Silver Dragon Res can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.

Learning curve for new practices

– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Silver Dragon Res may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Gold & Silver sector.

Consumer confidence and its impact on Silver Dragon Res 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 Gold & Silver industry and other sectors.

Regulatory challenges

– Silver Dragon Res 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 Gold & Silver industry regulations.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Silver Dragon Res Template, Example

Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Silver Dragon Res 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 Silver Dragon Res 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 Silver Dragon Res 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 Silver Dragon Res 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 Silver Dragon Res needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.

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