Tianjin Port (600717) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Tianjin Port (China)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Tianjin Port is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, technology disruption, there is backlash against globalization, wage bills are increasing, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing energy prices, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Tianjin Port

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Tianjin Port can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Tianjin Port, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Tianjin 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.

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SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix

SWOT analysis of Tianjin Port can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Tianjin Port
2. Improving business portfolio management of Tianjin 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 Tianjin Port

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

The strengths of Tianjin Port are -

High switching costs

– The high switching costs that Tianjin Port 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.

Analytics focus

– Tianjin 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)

– Tianjin Port has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Tianjin 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.

Digital Transformation in Misc. Transportation industry

- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Tianjin Port digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Tianjin Port 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

– Tianjin 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 Tianjin Port have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.

Ability to lead change in Misc. Transportation

– Tianjin Port is one of the leading players in the Misc. Transportation industry in China. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Misc. Transportation industry in China but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Tianjin Port in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.

Innovation driven organization

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

Cross disciplinary teams

– Horizontal connected teams at the Tianjin 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.

High brand equity

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

Learning organization

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

Training and development

– Tianjin Port has one of the best training and development program in Transportation 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.

Strong track record of project management in the Misc. Transportation industry

– Tianjin 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.

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

The weaknesses of Tianjin Port are -

High bargaining power of channel partners in Misc. Transportation industry

– because of the regulatory requirements in China, Tianjin 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.

Lack of clear differentiation of Tianjin Port products

– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Tianjin Port needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.

Aligning sales with marketing

– From the outside it seems that Tianjin Port needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Misc. Transportation industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Tianjin Port can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Tianjin Port is planning to shift buying processes online.

High dependence on Tianjin Port ‘s star products

– The top 2 products and services of Tianjin 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 Tianjin Port has relatively successful track record of launching new products.

Ability to respond to the competition

– As the decision making is very deliberative at Tianjin Port, in the dynamic environment of Misc. Transportation industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Tianjin Port has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.

Employees’ less understanding of Tianjin Port strategy

– From the outside it seems that the employees of Tianjin 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.

Increasing silos among functional specialists

– The organizational structure of Tianjin Port is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Misc. Transportation industry, but Tianjin Port needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Tianjin Port to focus more on services in the Misc. Transportation industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.

Need for greater diversity

– Tianjin Port has taken concrete steps on diversity, equity, and inclusion. But the efforts so far has resulted in limited success. It needs to expand the recruitment and selection process to hire more people from the minorities and underprivileged background.

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

High operating costs

– Compare to the competitors, Tianjin Port has high operating costs in the Misc. Transportation industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Tianjin Port lucrative customers.

Slow decision making process

– As mentioned earlier in the report, Tianjin Port has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Misc. Transportation industry over the last five years. Tianjin Port 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.

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

The opportunities of Tianjin Port are -

Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities

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

Leveraging digital technologies

– Tianjin 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.

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 Tianjin 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.

Manufacturing automation

– Tianjin Port can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Misc. Transportation 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 Misc. Transportation industry

– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Tianjin Port in the Misc. Transportation industry. Now Tianjin Port can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.

Increase in government spending

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

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

Using analytics as competitive advantage

– Tianjin Port has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Misc. Transportation sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Tianjin Port to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Tianjin Port to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.

Loyalty marketing

– Tianjin 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.

Creating value in data economy

– The success of analytics program of Tianjin Port has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Misc. Transportation industry. This can help Tianjin Port to build a more holistic ecosystem for Tianjin Port products in the Misc. Transportation industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.

Buying journey improvements

– Tianjin Port can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Misc. Transportation 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.

Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains

– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Tianjin 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 Tianjin 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.

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Tianjin Port in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Misc. Transportation industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.

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

The threats of Tianjin Port are -

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. Tianjin Port needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Misc. Transportation industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.

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.

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.

Learning curve for new practices

– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Tianjin 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.

Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins

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

Environmental challenges

– Tianjin 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. Tianjin Port can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Misc. Transportation industry.

Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution

– Tianjin Port has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Misc. Transportation industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Tianjin 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.

Shortening product life cycle

– it is one of the major threat that Tianjin Port is facing in Misc. Transportation 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 Misc. Transportation industry are lowering. It can presents Tianjin 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.

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 Tianjin Port.

Consumer confidence and its impact on Tianjin Port 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 Misc. Transportation industry and other sectors.

Increasing wage structure of Tianjin 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 Tianjin Port.

Trade war between China and United States

– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Tianjin Port in Misc. Transportation industry. The Misc. 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.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Tianjin Port Template, Example

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

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