SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Guangzhou Baiyunshan (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Guangzhou Baiyunshan is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing energy prices, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing transportation and logistics costs, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic ,
central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Guangzhou Baiyunshan
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Guangzhou Baiyunshan can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Guangzhou Baiyunshan, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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 Guangzhou Baiyunshan can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Guangzhou Baiyunshan
2. Improving business portfolio management of Guangzhou Baiyunshan
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Biotechnology & Drugs sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Guangzhou Baiyunshan
Strengths of Guangzhou Baiyunshan | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Guangzhou Baiyunshan are -
Strong track record of project management in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry
– Guangzhou Baiyunshan is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Digital Transformation in Biotechnology & Drugs industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Guangzhou Baiyunshan digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Guangzhou Baiyunshan has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Biotechnology & Drugs industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Guangzhou Baiyunshan have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Training and development
– Guangzhou Baiyunshan has one of the best training and development program in Healthcare 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Guangzhou Baiyunshan in the Healthcare sector have low bargaining power. Guangzhou Baiyunshan has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Guangzhou Baiyunshan to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Guangzhou Baiyunshan comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
High brand equity
– Guangzhou Baiyunshan has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Guangzhou Baiyunshan to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Guangzhou Baiyunshan is one of the leading players in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry in China. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in China. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Diverse revenue streams
– Guangzhou Baiyunshan is present in almost all the verticals within the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This has provided Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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.
Learning organization
- Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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 Guangzhou Baiyunshan is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Guangzhou Baiyunshan emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Weaknesses of Guangzhou Baiyunshan | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Guangzhou Baiyunshan are -
Skills based hiring in Biotechnology & Drugs industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Guangzhou Baiyunshan has some of the most successful models in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Guangzhou Baiyunshan should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Guangzhou Baiyunshan is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Guangzhou Baiyunshan to provide better information regarding Biotechnology & Drugs products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Lack of clear differentiation of Guangzhou Baiyunshan products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Guangzhou Baiyunshan needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Employees’ less understanding of Guangzhou Baiyunshan strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Guangzhou Baiyunshan is one of the leading players in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry in last five years.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Guangzhou Baiyunshan, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Biotechnology & Drugs 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 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 Guangzhou Baiyunshan supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Guangzhou Baiyunshan is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Guangzhou Baiyunshan vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Biotechnology & Drugs industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in China, Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Guangzhou Baiyunshan is just above the Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Guangzhou Baiyunshan Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Guangzhou Baiyunshan are -
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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 Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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 Guangzhou Baiyunshan in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Biotechnology & Drugs industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Guangzhou Baiyunshan can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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 Guangzhou Baiyunshan to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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. Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Guangzhou Baiyunshan is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Guangzhou Baiyunshan can utilize new technology in the field of Biotechnology & Drugs industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry.
Manufacturing automation
– Guangzhou Baiyunshan can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Biotechnology & Drugs industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Guangzhou Baiyunshan in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. Now Guangzhou Baiyunshan can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Guangzhou Baiyunshan has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Biotechnology & Drugs sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Guangzhou Baiyunshan to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Guangzhou Baiyunshan to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Buying journey improvements
– Guangzhou Baiyunshan can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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.
Threats Guangzhou Baiyunshan External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Guangzhou Baiyunshan are -
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Guangzhou Baiyunshan may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Biotechnology & Drugs sector.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry and other sectors.
Increasing wage structure of Guangzhou Baiyunshan
– 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 Guangzhou Baiyunshan.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Guangzhou Baiyunshan in Biotechnology & Drugs industry. The Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Biotechnology & Drugs industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Guangzhou Baiyunshan can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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 Guangzhou Baiyunshan prominent markets.
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 Guangzhou Baiyunshan in the Biotechnology & Drugs sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Regulatory challenges
– Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry regulations.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Guangzhou Baiyunshan is facing in Biotechnology & Drugs sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Biotechnology & Drugs industry are lowering. It can presents Guangzhou Baiyunshan with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Biotechnology & Drugs 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. Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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.
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 Guangzhou Baiyunshan business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Guangzhou Baiyunshan Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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 Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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 Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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 Guangzhou Baiyunshan 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 Guangzhou Baiyunshan needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.