SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Fujian Longma Environment (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Fujian Longma Environment is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – technology disruption, increasing energy prices, there is backlash against globalization, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs,
increasing household debt because of falling income levels, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Fujian Longma Environment
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Fujian Longma Environment can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Fujian Longma Environment, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Fujian Longma Environment 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 Fujian Longma Environment can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Fujian Longma Environment
2. Improving business portfolio management of Fujian Longma Environment
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Auto & Truck Manufacturers sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Fujian Longma Environment
Strengths of Fujian Longma Environment | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Fujian Longma Environment are -
Organizational Resilience of Fujian Longma Environment
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Fujian Longma Environment does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Ability to lead change in Auto & Truck Manufacturers
– Fujian Longma Environment is one of the leading players in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry in China. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry in China but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Fujian Longma Environment in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Fujian Longma Environment in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Fujian Longma Environment has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Fujian Longma Environment have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry
– Fujian Longma Environment has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Fujian Longma Environment to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Fujian Longma Environment to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Fujian Longma Environment comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers 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.
Training and development
– Fujian Longma Environment has one of the best training and development program in Consumer 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Fujian Longma Environment is one of the leading players in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Fujian Longma Environment in the Consumer Cyclical sector have low bargaining power. Fujian Longma Environment has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Fujian Longma Environment to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Diverse revenue streams
– Fujian Longma Environment is present in almost all the verticals within the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry. This has provided Fujian Longma Environment 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.
Digital Transformation in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Fujian Longma Environment digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Fujian Longma Environment 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Fujian Longma Environment 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.
Weaknesses of Fujian Longma Environment | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Fujian Longma Environment are -
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Fujian Longma Environment is just above the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry average. It needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in China, Fujian Longma Environment 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 Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry.
Need for greater diversity
– Fujian Longma Environment 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.
Skills based hiring in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Fujian Longma Environment 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 operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Fujian Longma Environment has high operating costs in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Fujian Longma Environment lucrative customers.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Fujian Longma Environment is one of the leading players in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry in last five years.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Fujian Longma Environment is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry, but Fujian Longma Environment needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Fujian Longma Environment to focus more on services in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Fujian Longma Environment is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Fujian Longma Environment to provide better information regarding Auto & Truck Manufacturers products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Lack of clear differentiation of Fujian Longma Environment products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Fujian Longma Environment needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Fujian Longma Environment 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 Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry using digital technology.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of China, Fujian Longma Environment needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Fujian Longma Environment Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Fujian Longma Environment are -
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. Fujian Longma Environment can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Fujian Longma Environment 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 Fujian Longma Environment to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Fujian Longma Environment can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Fujian Longma Environment can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Fujian Longma Environment in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry. Now Fujian Longma Environment can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Fujian Longma Environment can leverage digital technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning to automate the production process, customer analytics to get better insights into consumer behavior, realtime digital dashboards to get better sales tracking, logistics and transportation, product tracking, etc.
Reconfiguring business model
– The expansion of digital payment system, the bringing down of international transactions costs using Bitcoin and other blockchain based currencies, etc can help Fujian Longma Environment 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
– Fujian Longma Environment can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Auto & Truck Manufacturers 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Fujian Longma Environment can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers 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, Fujian Longma Environment 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Fujian Longma Environment 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 Fujian Longma Environment 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 Fujian Longma Environment to increase its market reach. Fujian Longma Environment 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Fujian Longma Environment has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Auto & Truck Manufacturers sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Fujian Longma Environment to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Fujian Longma Environment to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Threats Fujian Longma Environment External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Fujian Longma Environment are -
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 Fujian Longma Environment business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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 Fujian Longma Environment in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
High level of anxiety and lack of motivation
– the Great Resignation in United States is the sign of broader dissatisfaction among the workforce in United States. Fujian Longma Environment needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Regulatory challenges
– Fujian Longma Environment 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 Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry regulations.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Fujian Longma Environment 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 Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry and other sectors.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Fujian Longma Environment can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Fujian Longma Environment 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Fujian Longma Environment in Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry. The Auto & Truck Manufacturers 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Fujian Longma Environment has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Fujian Longma Environment needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Auto & Truck Manufacturers sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Fujian Longma Environment is facing in Auto & Truck Manufacturers sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Fujian Longma Environment
– 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 Fujian Longma Environment.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Fujian Longma Environment may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Auto & Truck Manufacturers sector.
Capital market disruption
– During the Covid-19, Dow Jones has touched record high. The valuations of a number of companies are way beyond their existing business model potential. This can lead to capital market correction which can put a number of suppliers, collaborators, value chain partners in great financial difficulty. It will directly impact the business of Fujian Longma Environment.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Fujian Longma Environment Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Fujian Longma Environment 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 Fujian Longma Environment 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 Fujian Longma Environment 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 Fujian Longma Environment 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 Fujian Longma Environment needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.