New Century Resources (NCZ) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Coal
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for New Century Resources (Australia)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , New Century Resources is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing commodity prices, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , geopolitical disruptions,
competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing transportation and logistics costs, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of New Century Resources
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that New Century Resources can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the New Century Resources, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which New Century Resources 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 New Century Resources can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of New Century Resources
2. Improving business portfolio management of New Century Resources
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Australia
4. Making a Coal sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of New Century Resources
Strengths of New Century Resources | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of New Century Resources are -
Learning organization
- New Century Resources 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 New Century Resources is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at New Century Resources emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Digital Transformation in Coal industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For New Century Resources digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. New Century Resources 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of New Century Resources in Coal industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Diverse revenue streams
– New Century Resources is present in almost all the verticals within the Coal industry. This has provided New Century Resources 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Coal industry
– New Century Resources is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– New Century Resources has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – New Century Resources staying ahead in the Coal industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
High brand equity
– New Century Resources has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled New Century Resources to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of New Century Resources in the Energy sector have low bargaining power. New Century Resources has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps New Century Resources to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Training and development
– New Century Resources has one of the best training and development program in Energy 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of New Century Resources comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Coal 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Coal industry
– New Century Resources has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled New Century Resources to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Coal industry. The sustainable margins have also helped New Century Resources to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Innovation driven organization
– New Century Resources is one of the most innovative firm in Coal sector.
Weaknesses of New Century Resources | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of New Century Resources are -
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As New Century Resources is one of the leading players in the Coal industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Coal industry in last five years.
Employees’ less understanding of New Century Resources strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of New Century Resources 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at New Century Resources, in the dynamic environment of Coal industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. New Century Resources has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Products dominated business model
– Even though New Century Resources has some of the most successful models in the Coal industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. New Century Resources 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, New Century Resources is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help New Century Resources to provide better information regarding Coal products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, New Century Resources has high operating costs in the Coal industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract New Century Resources lucrative customers.
Lack of clear differentiation of New Century Resources products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, New Century Resources needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Australia, New Century Resources needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, New Century Resources 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
New Century Resources has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Coal industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Skills based hiring in Coal industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at New Century Resources 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.
New Century Resources Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of New Century Resources are -
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Coal industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. New Century Resources 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. New Century Resources 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for New Century Resources 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.
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. New Century Resources 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 New Century Resources can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, New Century Resources can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that New Century Resources operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Coal sector.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Coal industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for New Century Resources in the Coal industry. Now New Century Resources can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Manufacturing automation
– New Century Resources can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Coal 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.
Buying journey improvements
– New Century Resources can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Coal 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– New Century Resources can develop new processes and procedures in Coal 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Coal industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. New Century Resources can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of New Century Resources has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Coal industry. This can help New Century Resources to build a more holistic ecosystem for New Century Resources products in the Coal 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, New Century Resources 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 New Century Resources to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, New Century Resources 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.
Threats New Century Resources External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of New Century Resources are -
Environmental challenges
– New Century Resources 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. New Century Resources can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Coal industry.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, New Century Resources may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Coal 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. New Century Resources 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.
Regulatory challenges
– New Century Resources 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 Coal industry regulations.
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 New Century Resources in the Coal sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that New Century Resources is facing in Coal 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 Coal industry are lowering. It can presents New Century Resources with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Coal sector.
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 New Century Resources business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, New Century Resources 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 New Century Resources prominent markets.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– New Century Resources 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 Coal industry.
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 New Century Resources.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– New Century Resources 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– New Century Resources has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Coal industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, New Century Resources needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Coal 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 New Century Resources Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at New Century Resources 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 New Century Resources 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 New Century Resources 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 New Century Resources 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 New Century Resources needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
