SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Sinosun Tech (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Sinosun Tech is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing energy prices, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing commodity prices, geopolitical disruptions, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, technology disruption, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models,
competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Sinosun Tech can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Sinosun Tech, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Sinosun Tech 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 Sinosun Tech can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Sinosun Tech
2. Improving business portfolio management of Sinosun Tech
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Software & Programming sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Sinosun Tech
Strengths of Sinosun Tech | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Sinosun Tech are -
Innovation driven organization
– Sinosun Tech is one of the most innovative firm in Software & Programming sector.
Analytics focus
– Sinosun Tech 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 Software & Programming 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.
Organizational Resilience of Sinosun Tech
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Sinosun Tech does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Strong track record of project management in the Software & Programming industry
– Sinosun Tech is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Sinosun Tech 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Sinosun Tech has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Sinosun Tech staying ahead in the Software & Programming industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Digital Transformation in Software & Programming industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Sinosun Tech digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Sinosun Tech 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.
Learning organization
- Sinosun Tech 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 Sinosun Tech is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Sinosun Tech emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Sinosun Tech has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Software & Programming industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Sinosun Tech have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Sinosun Tech has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Sinosun Tech 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.
Ability to lead change in Software & Programming
– Sinosun Tech is one of the leading players in the Software & Programming industry in China. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Software & Programming industry in China but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Sinosun Tech in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Training and development
– Sinosun Tech has one of the best training and development program in Technology 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.
Weaknesses of Sinosun Tech | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Sinosun Tech are -
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Sinosun Tech has high operating costs in the Software & Programming industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Sinosun Tech lucrative customers.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Sinosun Tech is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Sinosun Tech to provide better information regarding Software & Programming products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Sinosun Tech 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 Software & Programming industry, Sinosun Tech 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Sinosun Tech 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 Software & Programming industry using digital technology.
Lack of clear differentiation of Sinosun Tech products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Sinosun Tech needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Sinosun Tech has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Software & Programming industry over the last five years. Sinosun Tech 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Sinosun Tech 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.
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 Sinosun Tech supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Sinosun Tech is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Sinosun Tech vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Sinosun Tech has some of the most successful models in the Software & Programming industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Sinosun Tech should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Sinosun Tech is one of the leading players in the Software & Programming industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Software & Programming industry in last five years.
Sinosun Tech Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Sinosun Tech are -
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Sinosun Tech 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 Sinosun Tech 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 Sinosun Tech to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Software & Programming industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Sinosun Tech can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Sinosun Tech can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Sinosun Tech operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Software & Programming sector.
Loyalty marketing
– Sinosun Tech 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Software & Programming industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Sinosun Tech 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. Sinosun Tech 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Sinosun Tech to increase its market reach. Sinosun Tech 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Sinosun Tech can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Software & Programming 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Sinosun Tech can develop new processes and procedures in Software & Programming 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
– Sinosun Tech 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.
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. Sinosun Tech can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Sinosun Tech 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Sinosun Tech is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Sinosun Tech can utilize new technology in the field of Software & Programming industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Threats Sinosun Tech External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Sinosun Tech are -
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Sinosun Tech 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.
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. Sinosun Tech 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Sinosun Tech is facing in Software & Programming sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Sinosun Tech 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 Software & Programming industry.
Backlash against dominant players
– US Congress and other legislative arms of the government are getting tough on big business especially technology companies. The digital arm of Sinosun Tech business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Regulatory challenges
– Sinosun Tech 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 Software & Programming industry regulations.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Software & Programming industry are lowering. It can presents Sinosun Tech with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Software & Programming sector.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Sinosun Tech in Software & Programming industry. The Software & Programming 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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Software & Programming industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Sinosun Tech can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Sinosun Tech 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 Software & Programming industry and other sectors.
Environmental challenges
– Sinosun Tech 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. Sinosun Tech can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Software & Programming industry.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Sinosun Tech 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 Sinosun Tech prominent markets.
Increasing wage structure of Sinosun Tech
– 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 Sinosun Tech.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Sinosun Tech Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Sinosun Tech 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 Sinosun Tech 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 Sinosun Tech 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 Sinosun Tech 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 Sinosun Tech needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.