Ningbo Zhoushan Port (601018) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Ningbo Zhoushan Port (China)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Ningbo Zhoushan Port is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing energy prices, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, technology disruption, etc

---

---

---

---

Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Ningbo Zhoushan Port

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Ningbo Zhoushan Port can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Ningbo Zhoushan Port, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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 Ningbo Zhoushan Port can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Ningbo Zhoushan Port
2. Improving business portfolio management of Ningbo Zhoushan Port
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Misc. Transportation sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Ningbo Zhoushan Port

---

Strengths of Ningbo Zhoushan Port | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of Ningbo Zhoushan Port are -

Successful track record of launching new products

– Ningbo Zhoushan Port has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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.

Operational resilience

– The operational resilience strategy of Ningbo Zhoushan Port comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Misc. Transportation 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.

Superior customer experience

– The customer experience strategy of Ningbo Zhoushan Port in Misc. Transportation industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.

High brand equity

– Ningbo Zhoushan Port has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Ningbo Zhoushan Port to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.

Innovation driven organization

– Ningbo Zhoushan Port is one of the most innovative firm in Misc. Transportation sector.

Cross disciplinary teams

– Horizontal connected teams at the Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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 Misc. Transportation industry

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

Analytics focus

– Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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 Misc. Transportation industry. The technology infrastructure of China 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.

Effective Research and Development (R&D)

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

Learning organization

- Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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 Ningbo Zhoushan Port is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Ningbo Zhoushan Port emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.

Highly skilled collaborators

– Ningbo Zhoushan Port has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Misc. Transportation industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Ningbo Zhoushan Port have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.

Ability to recruit top talent

– Ningbo Zhoushan Port is one of the leading players in the Misc. Transportation 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.

---

---

Weaknesses of Ningbo Zhoushan Port | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of Ningbo Zhoushan Port are -

Employees’ less understanding of Ningbo Zhoushan Port strategy

– From the outside it seems that the employees of Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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.

High bargaining power of channel partners in Misc. Transportation industry

– because of the regulatory requirements in China, Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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 Misc. Transportation industry.

Capital Spending Reduction

– Even during the low interest decade, Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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 Misc. Transportation industry using digital technology.

Products dominated business model

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

Slow to harness new channels of communication

– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Ningbo Zhoushan Port is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Ningbo Zhoushan Port to provide better information regarding Misc. Transportation products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.

Workers concerns about automation

– As automation is fast increasing in the Misc. Transportation industry, Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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.

High dependence on Ningbo Zhoushan Port ‘s star products

– The top 2 products and services of Ningbo Zhoushan Port still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Misc. Transportation industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Ningbo Zhoushan Port has relatively successful track record of launching new products.

Low market penetration in new markets

– Outside its home market of China, Ningbo Zhoushan Port needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.

Skills based hiring in Misc. Transportation industry

– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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 Ningbo Zhoushan Port, in the dynamic environment of Misc. Transportation industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Ningbo Zhoushan Port has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.

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 Ningbo Zhoushan Port supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Ningbo Zhoushan Port is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Ningbo Zhoushan Port vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.

---

Ningbo Zhoushan Port Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of Ningbo Zhoushan Port are -

Redefining models of collaboration and team work

– As explained in the weaknesses section, Ningbo Zhoushan Port is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Ningbo Zhoushan Port can utilize new technology in the field of Misc. Transportation industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.

Loyalty marketing

– Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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.

Developing new processes and practices

– Ningbo Zhoushan Port can develop new processes and procedures in Misc. 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.

Building a culture of innovation

– managers at Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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 Misc. Transportation industry.

Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19

– consumer behavior has changed in the Misc. Transportation industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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. Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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.

Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities

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

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 Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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 Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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.

Increase in government spending

– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Ningbo Zhoushan Port can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Ningbo Zhoushan Port operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Misc. Transportation sector.

Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains

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

Leveraging digital technologies

– Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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.

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. Ningbo Zhoushan Port can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.

Reforming the budgeting process

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

---

Threats Ningbo Zhoushan Port External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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.

High dependence on third party suppliers

– Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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.

Increasing wage structure of Ningbo Zhoushan Port

– 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 Ningbo Zhoushan Port.

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. Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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.

Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins

– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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 Ningbo Zhoushan Port prominent markets.

Stagnating economy with rate increase

– Ningbo Zhoushan Port 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 Misc. Transportation industry.

Learning curve for new practices

– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Ningbo Zhoushan Port may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Misc. Transportation sector.

Shortening product life cycle

– it is one of the major threat that Ningbo Zhoushan Port is facing in Misc. Transportation 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 Ningbo Zhoushan Port.

Environmental challenges

– Ningbo Zhoushan Port needs to have a robust strategy against the disruptions arising from climate change and energy requirements. EU has identified it as key priority area and spending 30% of its 880 billion Euros European post Covid-19 recovery funds on green technology. Ningbo Zhoushan Port can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Misc. Transportation industry.

Barriers of entry lowering

– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Misc. Transportation industry are lowering. It can presents Ningbo Zhoushan Port with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Misc. 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 Ningbo Zhoushan Port in the Misc. Transportation sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution

– Ningbo Zhoushan Port has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Misc. Transportation industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Ningbo Zhoushan Port needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Misc. 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.

---

Weighted SWOT Analysis of Ningbo Zhoushan Port Template, Example

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

--- ---