Sierte Fertiliz A (2538) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Sierte Fertiliz A (China)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Sierte Fertiliz A is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing energy prices, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, technology disruption, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, there is backlash against globalization, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Sierte Fertiliz A

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Sierte Fertiliz A can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Sierte Fertiliz A, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Sierte Fertiliz A 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 Sierte Fertiliz A can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Sierte Fertiliz A
2. Improving business portfolio management of Sierte Fertiliz A
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Chemical Manufacturing sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Sierte Fertiliz A

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Strengths of Sierte Fertiliz A | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of Sierte Fertiliz A are -

Successful track record of launching new products

– Sierte Fertiliz A has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Sierte Fertiliz A has effective processes in place that helps in exploring new product needs, doing quick pilot testing, and then launching the products quickly using its extensive distribution network.

Low bargaining power of suppliers

– Suppliers of Sierte Fertiliz A in the Basic Materials sector have low bargaining power. Sierte Fertiliz A has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Sierte Fertiliz A to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.

Operational resilience

– The operational resilience strategy of Sierte Fertiliz A comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Chemical Manufacturing 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.

Ability to recruit top talent

– Sierte Fertiliz A is one of the leading players in the Chemical Manufacturing 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.

Digital Transformation in Chemical Manufacturing industry

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

Diverse revenue streams

– Sierte Fertiliz A is present in almost all the verticals within the Chemical Manufacturing industry. This has provided Sierte Fertiliz A 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.

Analytics focus

– Sierte Fertiliz A 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 Chemical Manufacturing 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.

Learning organization

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

Ability to lead change in Chemical Manufacturing

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

High brand equity

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

High switching costs

– The high switching costs that Sierte Fertiliz A 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.

Superior customer experience

– The customer experience strategy of Sierte Fertiliz A in Chemical Manufacturing industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.

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Weaknesses of Sierte Fertiliz A | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of Sierte Fertiliz A are -

Lack of clear differentiation of Sierte Fertiliz A products

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

Products dominated business model

– Even though Sierte Fertiliz A has some of the most successful models in the Chemical Manufacturing industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Sierte Fertiliz A should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.

Aligning sales with marketing

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

Increasing silos among functional specialists

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

Interest costs

– Compare to the competition, Sierte Fertiliz A 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 strategic competitive environment developments

– As Sierte Fertiliz A is one of the leading players in the Chemical Manufacturing industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Chemical Manufacturing industry in last five years.

Need for greater diversity

– Sierte Fertiliz A 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.

No frontier risks strategy

– From the 10K / annual statement of Sierte Fertiliz A, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Chemical Manufacturing 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.

Skills based hiring in Chemical Manufacturing industry

– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Sierte Fertiliz A 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.

High dependence on Sierte Fertiliz A ‘s star products

– The top 2 products and services of Sierte Fertiliz A still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Chemical Manufacturing industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Sierte Fertiliz A 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 Sierte Fertiliz A supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Sierte Fertiliz A is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Sierte Fertiliz A vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.

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Sierte Fertiliz A Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of Sierte Fertiliz A are -

Increase in government spending

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

Learning at scale

– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Sierte Fertiliz A 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.

Using analytics as competitive advantage

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

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 Sierte Fertiliz A 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.

Developing new processes and practices

– Sierte Fertiliz A can develop new processes and procedures in Chemical Manufacturing 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.

Leveraging digital technologies

– Sierte Fertiliz A 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.

Loyalty marketing

– Sierte Fertiliz A 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.

Better consumer reach

– The expansion of the 5G network will help Sierte Fertiliz A to increase its market reach. Sierte Fertiliz A 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.

Building a culture of innovation

– managers at Sierte Fertiliz A 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry.

Redefining models of collaboration and team work

– As explained in the weaknesses section, Sierte Fertiliz A is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Sierte Fertiliz A can utilize new technology in the field of Chemical Manufacturing industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.

Buying journey improvements

– Sierte Fertiliz A can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Chemical Manufacturing 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.

Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19

– consumer behavior has changed in the Chemical Manufacturing industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Sierte Fertiliz A 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. Sierte Fertiliz A 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 Sierte Fertiliz A can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.

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Threats Sierte Fertiliz A External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of Sierte Fertiliz A are -

Learning curve for new practices

– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Sierte Fertiliz A may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Chemical Manufacturing sector.

Increasing wage structure of Sierte Fertiliz A

– 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 Sierte Fertiliz A.

High dependence on third party suppliers

– Sierte Fertiliz A 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.

Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins

– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Sierte Fertiliz A 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 Sierte Fertiliz A prominent markets.

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 Sierte Fertiliz A 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 Chemical Manufacturing industry are lowering. It can presents Sierte Fertiliz A with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Chemical Manufacturing sector.

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. Sierte Fertiliz A 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.

Easy access to finance

– Easy access to finance in Chemical Manufacturing industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Sierte Fertiliz A can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.

Shortening product life cycle

– it is one of the major threat that Sierte Fertiliz A is facing in Chemical Manufacturing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.

Regulatory challenges

– Sierte Fertiliz A 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 Chemical Manufacturing 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.

Environmental challenges

– Sierte Fertiliz A 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. Sierte Fertiliz A can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Chemical Manufacturing industry.

Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution

– Sierte Fertiliz A has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Chemical Manufacturing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Sierte Fertiliz A needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Chemical Manufacturing 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.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Sierte Fertiliz A Template, Example

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

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