SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for EmbedWay Shanghai (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , EmbedWay Shanghai is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, geopolitical disruptions, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing energy prices, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation,
increasing commodity prices, technology disruption, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of EmbedWay Shanghai
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that EmbedWay Shanghai can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the EmbedWay Shanghai, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which EmbedWay Shanghai 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 EmbedWay Shanghai can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of EmbedWay Shanghai
2. Improving business portfolio management of EmbedWay Shanghai
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Computer Hardware sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of EmbedWay Shanghai
Strengths of EmbedWay Shanghai | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of EmbedWay Shanghai are -
Strong track record of project management in the Computer Hardware industry
– EmbedWay Shanghai is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of EmbedWay Shanghai comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Computer Hardware 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.
Organizational Resilience of EmbedWay Shanghai
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing EmbedWay Shanghai does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the EmbedWay Shanghai 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– EmbedWay Shanghai has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Computer Hardware industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of EmbedWay Shanghai have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of EmbedWay Shanghai in the Technology sector have low bargaining power. EmbedWay Shanghai has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps EmbedWay Shanghai to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Ability to lead change in Computer Hardware
– EmbedWay Shanghai is one of the leading players in the Computer Hardware industry in China. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Computer Hardware industry in China but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled EmbedWay Shanghai in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that EmbedWay Shanghai 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Computer Hardware industry
– EmbedWay Shanghai has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled EmbedWay Shanghai to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Computer Hardware industry. The sustainable margins have also helped EmbedWay Shanghai to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Learning organization
- EmbedWay Shanghai 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 EmbedWay Shanghai is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at EmbedWay Shanghai emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Analytics focus
– EmbedWay Shanghai 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 Computer Hardware 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of EmbedWay Shanghai in Computer Hardware industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Weaknesses of EmbedWay Shanghai | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of EmbedWay Shanghai are -
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of EmbedWay Shanghai is just above the Computer Hardware 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.
Employees’ less understanding of EmbedWay Shanghai strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of EmbedWay Shanghai don’t have comprehensive understanding of the firm’s strategy. This is reflected in number of promotional campaigns over the last few years that had mixed messaging and competing priorities. Some of the strategic activities and services promoted in the promotional campaigns were not consistent with the organization’s strategy.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Computer Hardware industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in China, EmbedWay Shanghai 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 Computer Hardware industry.
Skills based hiring in Computer Hardware industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at EmbedWay Shanghai 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at EmbedWay Shanghai, in the dynamic environment of Computer Hardware industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. EmbedWay Shanghai has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of EmbedWay Shanghai, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Computer Hardware 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
EmbedWay Shanghai has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Computer Hardware industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, EmbedWay Shanghai is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help EmbedWay Shanghai to provide better information regarding Computer Hardware products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Lack of clear differentiation of EmbedWay Shanghai products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, EmbedWay Shanghai needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that EmbedWay Shanghai needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Computer Hardware industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at EmbedWay Shanghai can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as EmbedWay Shanghai is planning to shift buying processes online.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, EmbedWay Shanghai has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Computer Hardware industry over the last five years. EmbedWay Shanghai 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.
EmbedWay Shanghai Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of EmbedWay Shanghai are -
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at EmbedWay Shanghai 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 Computer Hardware industry.
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 EmbedWay Shanghai 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for EmbedWay Shanghai in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Computer Hardware industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Loyalty marketing
– EmbedWay Shanghai 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 EmbedWay Shanghai to increase its market reach. EmbedWay Shanghai 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for EmbedWay Shanghai 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– EmbedWay Shanghai can develop new processes and procedures in Computer Hardware 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, EmbedWay Shanghai can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that EmbedWay Shanghai operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Computer Hardware sector.
Buying journey improvements
– EmbedWay Shanghai can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Computer Hardware 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.
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. EmbedWay Shanghai can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of EmbedWay Shanghai has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Computer Hardware industry. This can help EmbedWay Shanghai to build a more holistic ecosystem for EmbedWay Shanghai products in the Computer Hardware industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, EmbedWay Shanghai 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects EmbedWay Shanghai can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Threats EmbedWay Shanghai External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of EmbedWay Shanghai are -
Technology disruption because of hacks, piracy etc
– The colonial pipeline illustrated, how vulnerable modern organization are to international hackers, miscreants, and disruptors. The cyber security interruption, data leaks, etc can seriously jeopardize the future growth of the organization.
Environmental challenges
– EmbedWay Shanghai 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. EmbedWay Shanghai can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Computer Hardware 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 EmbedWay Shanghai in the Computer Hardware sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Regulatory challenges
– EmbedWay Shanghai 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 Computer Hardware industry regulations.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that EmbedWay Shanghai is facing in Computer Hardware sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– EmbedWay Shanghai 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 Computer Hardware industry.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for EmbedWay Shanghai in Computer Hardware industry. The Computer Hardware 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on EmbedWay Shanghai 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 Computer Hardware industry and other sectors.
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.
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 EmbedWay Shanghai business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Computer Hardware industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. EmbedWay Shanghai can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– EmbedWay Shanghai has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Computer Hardware industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, EmbedWay Shanghai needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Computer Hardware 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– EmbedWay Shanghai high dependence on third party suppliers can disrupt its processes and delivery mechanism. For example -the current troubles of car makers because of chip shortage is because the chip companies started producing chips for electronic companies rather than car manufacturers.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of EmbedWay Shanghai Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at EmbedWay Shanghai 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 EmbedWay Shanghai 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 EmbedWay Shanghai 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 EmbedWay Shanghai 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 EmbedWay Shanghai needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.