SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Gansu Yasheng Industrial (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Gansu Yasheng Industrial is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – geopolitical disruptions, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models,
technology disruption, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Gansu Yasheng Industrial
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Gansu Yasheng Industrial can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Gansu Yasheng Industrial, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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 Gansu Yasheng Industrial can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Gansu Yasheng Industrial
2. Improving business portfolio management of Gansu Yasheng Industrial
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Crops sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Gansu Yasheng Industrial
Strengths of Gansu Yasheng Industrial | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Gansu Yasheng Industrial are -
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial is present in almost all the verticals within the Crops industry. This has provided Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Crops industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Gansu Yasheng Industrial have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Analytics focus
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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 Crops 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.
High brand equity
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Gansu Yasheng Industrial to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Learning organization
- Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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 Gansu Yasheng Industrial is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Gansu Yasheng Industrial emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Training and development
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial has one of the best training and development program in Consumer/Non-Cyclical 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Crops industry
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Gansu Yasheng Industrial to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Crops industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Gansu Yasheng Industrial to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial is one of the most innovative firm in Crops sector.
Strong track record of project management in the Crops industry
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Digital Transformation in Crops industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Gansu Yasheng Industrial digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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.
Weaknesses of Gansu Yasheng Industrial | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Gansu Yasheng Industrial are -
Products dominated business model
– Even though Gansu Yasheng Industrial has some of the most successful models in the Crops industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Gansu Yasheng Industrial should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
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 Gansu Yasheng Industrial supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Gansu Yasheng Industrial is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Gansu Yasheng Industrial vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Gansu Yasheng Industrial is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Crops industry, but Gansu Yasheng Industrial needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Gansu Yasheng Industrial to focus more on services in the Crops industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Gansu Yasheng Industrial is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Gansu Yasheng Industrial to provide better information regarding Crops products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Gansu Yasheng Industrial has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Crops industry over the last five years. Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Gansu Yasheng Industrial needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Crops industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Gansu Yasheng Industrial can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Gansu Yasheng Industrial is planning to shift buying processes online.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Gansu Yasheng Industrial is one of the leading players in the Crops industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Crops industry in last five years.
Lack of clear differentiation of Gansu Yasheng Industrial products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Gansu Yasheng Industrial needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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 Crops industry using digital technology.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Gansu Yasheng Industrial, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Crops industry. But it has very little resources allocation to manage the risks emerging from events such as natural disasters, climate change, melting of permafrost, tacking the rise of artificial intelligence, opportunities and threats emerging from commercialization of space etc.
Gansu Yasheng Industrial Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Gansu Yasheng Industrial are -
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Gansu Yasheng Industrial to increase its market reach. Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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 Gansu Yasheng Industrial to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Crops industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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. Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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 Crops industry.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Gansu Yasheng Industrial in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Crops industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Buying journey improvements
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Crops 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Crops sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Gansu Yasheng Industrial to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Gansu Yasheng Industrial to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Gansu Yasheng Industrial can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Loyalty marketing
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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.
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 Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Crops 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.
Threats Gansu Yasheng Industrial External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Gansu Yasheng Industrial are -
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Gansu Yasheng Industrial in Crops industry. The Crops 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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.
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 Gansu Yasheng Industrial.
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. Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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.
Environmental challenges
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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. Gansu Yasheng Industrial can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Crops 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 Gansu Yasheng Industrial business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Crops industry are lowering. It can presents Gansu Yasheng Industrial with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Crops sector.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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 Crops industry and other sectors.
Regulatory challenges
– Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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 Crops industry regulations.
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 Crops industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Gansu Yasheng Industrial can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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 Gansu Yasheng Industrial in the Crops sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Gansu Yasheng Industrial may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Crops sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Gansu Yasheng Industrial Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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 Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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 Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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 Gansu Yasheng Industrial 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 Gansu Yasheng Industrial needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.