SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Zhongyuan Unio (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Zhongyuan Unio is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing commodity prices, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, wage bills are increasing, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic ,
technology disruption, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Zhongyuan Unio can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Zhongyuan Unio, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Zhongyuan Unio 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 Zhongyuan Unio can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Zhongyuan Unio
2. Improving business portfolio management of Zhongyuan Unio
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 Zhongyuan Unio
Strengths of Zhongyuan Unio | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Zhongyuan Unio are -
Ability to recruit top talent
– Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry
– Zhongyuan Unio 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
– Zhongyuan Unio has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Zhongyuan Unio to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Zhongyuan Unio 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 Zhongyuan Unio have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Zhongyuan Unio has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Zhongyuan Unio is one of the most innovative firm in Biotechnology & Drugs sector.
Digital Transformation in Biotechnology & Drugs industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Zhongyuan Unio digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Organizational Resilience of Zhongyuan Unio
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Zhongyuan Unio does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Learning organization
- Zhongyuan Unio 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 Zhongyuan Unio is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Zhongyuan Unio emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Zhongyuan Unio in the Healthcare sector have low bargaining power. Zhongyuan Unio has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Zhongyuan Unio to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Training and development
– Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Weaknesses of Zhongyuan Unio | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Zhongyuan Unio are -
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Zhongyuan Unio, in the dynamic environment of Biotechnology & Drugs industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Zhongyuan Unio has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Need for greater diversity
– Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Zhongyuan Unio 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry using digital technology.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Biotechnology & Drugs industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in China, Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Zhongyuan Unio products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Zhongyuan Unio needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Zhongyuan Unio has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Zhongyuan Unio is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry, but Zhongyuan Unio needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Zhongyuan Unio to focus more on services in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Zhongyuan Unio 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. Zhongyuan Unio should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Zhongyuan Unio 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.
High dependence on Zhongyuan Unio ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Zhongyuan Unio still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Biotechnology & Drugs industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Zhongyuan Unio has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
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 Zhongyuan Unio supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Zhongyuan Unio is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Zhongyuan Unio vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Zhongyuan Unio Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Zhongyuan Unio are -
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Zhongyuan Unio 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 Zhongyuan Unio to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Zhongyuan Unio to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Zhongyuan Unio 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 Zhongyuan Unio to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Zhongyuan Unio to increase its market reach. Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Zhongyuan Unio 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 Zhongyuan Unio has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Biotechnology & Drugs industry. This can help Zhongyuan Unio to build a more holistic ecosystem for Zhongyuan Unio products in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
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. Zhongyuan Unio can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Manufacturing automation
– Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Zhongyuan Unio can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Zhongyuan Unio can develop new processes and procedures in Biotechnology & Drugs 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Threats Zhongyuan Unio External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Zhongyuan Unio 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.
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. Zhongyuan Unio can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Regulatory challenges
– Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Zhongyuan Unio 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 Zhongyuan Unio prominent markets.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Biotechnology & Drugs industry are lowering. It can presents Zhongyuan Unio with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Biotechnology & Drugs sector.
Increasing wage structure of Zhongyuan Unio
– 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 Zhongyuan Unio.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Zhongyuan Unio is facing in Biotechnology & Drugs sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Zhongyuan Unio 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 Biotechnology & Drugs industry.
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 Zhongyuan Unio business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Environmental challenges
– Zhongyuan Unio 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. Zhongyuan Unio can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Biotechnology & Drugs industry.
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 Zhongyuan Unio in the Biotechnology & Drugs sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Zhongyuan Unio 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Zhongyuan Unio Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Zhongyuan Unio 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 Zhongyuan Unio 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 Zhongyuan Unio 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 Zhongyuan Unio 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 Zhongyuan Unio needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.