SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Angel Yeast (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Angel Yeast is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – technology disruption, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, geopolitical disruptions, wage bills are increasing, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs,
competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Angel Yeast can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Angel Yeast, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Angel Yeast 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 Angel Yeast can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Angel Yeast
2. Improving business portfolio management of Angel Yeast
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Food Processing sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Angel Yeast
Strengths of Angel Yeast | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Angel Yeast are -
Ability to recruit top talent
– Angel Yeast is one of the leading players in the Food Processing 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.
Ability to lead change in Food Processing
– Angel Yeast is one of the leading players in the Food Processing industry in China. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Food Processing industry in China but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Angel Yeast in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Digital Transformation in Food Processing industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Angel Yeast digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Angel Yeast 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Food Processing industry
– Angel Yeast is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
High brand equity
– Angel Yeast has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Angel Yeast to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Angel Yeast comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Food Processing 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.
Organizational Resilience of Angel Yeast
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Angel Yeast does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Innovation driven organization
– Angel Yeast is one of the most innovative firm in Food Processing sector.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Angel Yeast has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Food Processing industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Angel Yeast have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Angel Yeast has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Angel Yeast 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 Angel Yeast in the Consumer/Non-Cyclical sector have low bargaining power. Angel Yeast has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Angel Yeast to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Angel Yeast in Food Processing industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Weaknesses of Angel Yeast | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Angel Yeast are -
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Angel Yeast, in the dynamic environment of Food Processing industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Angel Yeast has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High dependence on Angel Yeast ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Angel Yeast still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Food Processing industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Angel Yeast has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Angel Yeast has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Food Processing industry over the last five years. Angel Yeast 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Angel Yeast is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Food Processing industry, but Angel Yeast needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Angel Yeast to focus more on services in the Food Processing industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Angel Yeast has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Food Processing industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Angel Yeast has some of the most successful models in the Food Processing industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Angel Yeast should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of China, Angel Yeast needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Angel Yeast 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 Food Processing industry using digital technology.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Angel Yeast 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 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 Angel Yeast supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Angel Yeast is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Angel Yeast vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Angel Yeast is just above the Food Processing 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.
Angel Yeast Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Angel Yeast are -
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Angel Yeast is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Angel Yeast can utilize new technology in the field of Food Processing industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Angel Yeast 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Angel Yeast to increase its market reach. Angel Yeast 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Angel Yeast in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Food Processing 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 Food Processing industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Angel Yeast can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Food Processing industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Angel Yeast in the Food Processing industry. Now Angel Yeast can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Angel Yeast 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Angel Yeast 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 Angel Yeast to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Angel Yeast 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 Angel Yeast 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, Angel Yeast 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Angel Yeast 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Angel Yeast has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Food Processing sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Angel Yeast to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Angel Yeast to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Buying journey improvements
– Angel Yeast can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Food Processing 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.
Threats Angel Yeast External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Angel Yeast are -
Regulatory challenges
– Angel Yeast 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 Food Processing industry regulations.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Food Processing industry are lowering. It can presents Angel Yeast with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Food Processing sector.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Angel Yeast 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Angel Yeast may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Food Processing sector.
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 Angel Yeast.
Technology disruption because of hacks, piracy etc
– The colonial pipeline illustrated, how vulnerable modern organization are to international hackers, miscreants, and disruptors. The cyber security interruption, data leaks, etc can seriously jeopardize the future growth of the organization.
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 Angel Yeast business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Angel Yeast 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 Food Processing industry.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Angel Yeast 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 Angel Yeast prominent markets.
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.
Environmental challenges
– Angel Yeast 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. Angel Yeast can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Food Processing industry.
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. Angel Yeast needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Food Processing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Angel Yeast in the Food Processing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Angel Yeast Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Angel Yeast 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 Angel Yeast 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 Angel Yeast 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 Angel Yeast 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 Angel Yeast needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.