SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for T&S Communications (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , T&S Communications is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing energy prices, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing commodity prices, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models,
banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, geopolitical disruptions, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of T&S Communications
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that T&S Communications can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the T&S Communications, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which T&S Communications 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 T&S Communications can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of T&S Communications
2. Improving business portfolio management of T&S Communications
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Electronic Instr. & Controls sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of T&S Communications
Strengths of T&S Communications | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of T&S Communications are -
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the T&S Communications 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– T&S Communications is one of the leading players in the Electronic Instr. & Controls 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 Electronic Instr. & Controls industry
– T&S Communications is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Electronic Instr. & Controls industry
– T&S Communications has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled T&S Communications to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry. The sustainable margins have also helped T&S Communications to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Ability to lead change in Electronic Instr. & Controls
– T&S Communications is one of the leading players in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry in China. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry in China but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled T&S Communications in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of T&S Communications in the Technology sector have low bargaining power. T&S Communications has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps T&S Communications to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Successful track record of launching new products
– T&S Communications has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. T&S Communications 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– T&S Communications has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – T&S Communications staying ahead in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Organizational Resilience of T&S Communications
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing T&S Communications does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
High brand equity
– T&S Communications has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled T&S Communications to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of T&S Communications in Electronic Instr. & Controls industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Innovation driven organization
– T&S Communications is one of the most innovative firm in Electronic Instr. & Controls sector.
Weaknesses of T&S Communications | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of T&S Communications are -
Skills based hiring in Electronic Instr. & Controls industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at T&S Communications 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though T&S Communications has some of the most successful models in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. T&S Communications should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High dependence on T&S Communications ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of T&S Communications still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Electronic Instr. & Controls industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though T&S Communications has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that T&S Communications needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at T&S Communications can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as T&S Communications is planning to shift buying processes online.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, T&S Communications 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry, T&S Communications needs to come up with a strategy to reduce the workers concern regarding automation. Without a clear strategy, it could lead to disruption and uncertainty within the organization.
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 T&S Communications supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, T&S Communications is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left T&S Communications vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, T&S Communications has high operating costs in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract T&S Communications lucrative customers.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, T&S Communications is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help T&S Communications to provide better information regarding Electronic Instr. & Controls products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of T&S Communications, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Electronic Instr. & Controls 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.
Need for greater diversity
– T&S Communications 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.
T&S Communications Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of T&S Communications are -
Loyalty marketing
– T&S Communications 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for T&S Communications in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
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. T&S Communications can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Buying journey improvements
– T&S Communications can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Electronic Instr. & Controls 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, T&S Communications 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. T&S Communications 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. T&S Communications 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects T&S Communications can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for T&S Communications 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 T&S Communications to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Leveraging digital technologies
– T&S Communications 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Electronic Instr. & Controls industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for T&S Communications in the Electronic Instr. & Controls industry. Now T&S Communications can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, T&S Communications 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 T&S Communications to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at T&S Communications 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 Electronic Instr. & Controls industry.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, T&S Communications is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. T&S Communications can utilize new technology in the field of Electronic Instr. & Controls industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Threats T&S Communications External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of T&S Communications are -
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Electronic Instr. & Controls industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. T&S Communications can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Environmental challenges
– T&S Communications 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. T&S Communications can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Electronic Instr. & Controls 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 T&S Communications in the Electronic Instr. & Controls sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Regulatory challenges
– T&S Communications 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 Electronic Instr. & Controls industry regulations.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– T&S Communications 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.
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.
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. T&S Communications 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.
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 T&S Communications.
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 T&S Communications business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– T&S Communications 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 Electronic Instr. & Controls industry.
Consumer confidence and its impact on T&S Communications 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 Electronic Instr. & Controls industry and other sectors.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for T&S Communications in Electronic Instr. & Controls industry. The Electronic Instr. & Controls 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Electronic Instr. & Controls industry are lowering. It can presents T&S Communications with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Electronic Instr. & Controls sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of T&S Communications Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at T&S Communications 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 T&S Communications 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 T&S Communications 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 T&S Communications 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 T&S Communications needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.