SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Seanergy Maritime (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Seanergy Maritime is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , technology disruption, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing energy prices, increasing commodity prices,
increasing transportation and logistics costs, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Seanergy Maritime
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Seanergy Maritime can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Seanergy Maritime, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Seanergy Maritime 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 Seanergy Maritime can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Seanergy Maritime
2. Improving business portfolio management of Seanergy Maritime
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 Seanergy Maritime
Strengths of Seanergy Maritime | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Seanergy Maritime are -
Successful track record of launching new products
– Seanergy Maritime has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Seanergy Maritime 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Seanergy Maritime in the Transportation sector have low bargaining power. Seanergy Maritime has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Seanergy Maritime to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Water Transportation industry
– Seanergy Maritime has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Seanergy Maritime to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Water Transportation industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Seanergy Maritime to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Analytics focus
– Seanergy Maritime 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 Water Transportation 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Seanergy Maritime is present in almost all the verticals within the Water Transportation industry. This has provided Seanergy Maritime 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.
Organizational Resilience of Seanergy Maritime
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Seanergy Maritime does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Ability to lead change in Water Transportation
– Seanergy Maritime 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 Seanergy Maritime in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Seanergy Maritime 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Seanergy Maritime 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Seanergy Maritime in Water Transportation industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Seanergy Maritime 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 Seanergy Maritime have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Seanergy Maritime 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.
Weaknesses of Seanergy Maritime | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Seanergy Maritime are -
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Seanergy Maritime 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 cash cycle compare to competitors
Seanergy Maritime 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.
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 Seanergy Maritime supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Seanergy Maritime is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Seanergy Maritime vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Water Transportation industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in United States, Seanergy Maritime 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 Water Transportation industry.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Seanergy Maritime needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Lack of clear differentiation of Seanergy Maritime products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Seanergy Maritime needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Employees’ less understanding of Seanergy Maritime strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Seanergy Maritime 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Water Transportation industry, Seanergy Maritime 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Seanergy Maritime is just above the Water Transportation 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, Seanergy Maritime 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. Seanergy Maritime 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Seanergy Maritime 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.
Seanergy Maritime Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Seanergy Maritime are -
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Seanergy Maritime has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Water Transportation industry. This can help Seanergy Maritime to build a more holistic ecosystem for Seanergy Maritime products in the Water Transportation industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Seanergy Maritime 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Seanergy Maritime 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Water Transportation industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Seanergy Maritime 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. Seanergy Maritime 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Seanergy Maritime can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Seanergy Maritime operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Water Transportation sector.
Loyalty marketing
– Seanergy Maritime 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Seanergy Maritime to increase its market reach. Seanergy Maritime 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.
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 Seanergy Maritime 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Seanergy Maritime is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Seanergy Maritime can utilize new technology in the field of Water Transportation industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Seanergy Maritime can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Seanergy Maritime 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 Seanergy Maritime to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Seanergy Maritime 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 Seanergy Maritime to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Seanergy Maritime to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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. Seanergy Maritime can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Threats Seanergy Maritime External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Seanergy Maritime are -
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Seanergy Maritime 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.
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 Seanergy Maritime business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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. Seanergy Maritime needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Water Transportation industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Seanergy Maritime 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Water Transportation industry are lowering. It can presents Seanergy Maritime with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Water Transportation sector.
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. Seanergy Maritime 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
– Seanergy Maritime 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 Water Transportation industry.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Seanergy Maritime has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Water Transportation industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Seanergy Maritime 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Seanergy Maritime may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Water Transportation sector.
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 Seanergy Maritime in the Water Transportation sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Seanergy Maritime is facing in Water Transportation sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Seanergy Maritime
– 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 Seanergy Maritime.
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 Seanergy Maritime.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Seanergy Maritime Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Seanergy Maritime 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 Seanergy Maritime 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 Seanergy Maritime 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 Seanergy Maritime 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 Seanergy Maritime needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.