Double Elephant A (2395) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Double Elephant A (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Double Elephant A is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, wage bills are increasing, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies,
technology disruption, there is backlash against globalization, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Double Elephant A
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Double Elephant A can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Double Elephant A, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Double Elephant 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.
SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix
SWOT analysis of Double Elephant A can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Double Elephant A
2. Improving business portfolio management of Double Elephant A
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Double Elephant A
Strengths of Double Elephant A | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Double Elephant A are -
Highly skilled collaborators
– Double Elephant A has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Double Elephant A have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Double Elephant 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.
Ability to lead change in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber
– Double Elephant A is one of the leading players in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry in China. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry in China but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Double Elephant A in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Digital Transformation in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Double Elephant A digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Double Elephant 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Double Elephant A is one of the leading players in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Double Elephant A has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Double Elephant A staying ahead in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Double Elephant A in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Innovation driven organization
– Double Elephant A is one of the most innovative firm in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber sector.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Double Elephant A comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber 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
– Double Elephant A has one of the best training and development program in Basic Materials 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.
Analytics focus
– Double Elephant 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 Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Double Elephant A is present in almost all the verticals within the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry. This has provided Double Elephant 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.
Weaknesses of Double Elephant A | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Double Elephant A are -
Products dominated business model
– Even though Double Elephant A has some of the most successful models in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Double Elephant A should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Lack of clear differentiation of Double Elephant A products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Double Elephant A needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
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 Double Elephant A supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Double Elephant A is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Double Elephant A vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Double Elephant A 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 Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry using digital technology.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Double Elephant A, in the dynamic environment of Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Double Elephant A has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Double Elephant A has high operating costs in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Double Elephant A lucrative customers.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Double Elephant A needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Double Elephant A can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Double Elephant A is planning to shift buying processes online.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry, Double Elephant A 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Double Elephant A has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry over the last five years. Double Elephant A 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
– Double Elephant 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.
High dependence on Double Elephant A ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Double Elephant A still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Double Elephant A has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Double Elephant A Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Double Elephant A are -
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Double Elephant 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 Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Double Elephant A is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Double Elephant A can utilize new technology in the field of Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Loyalty marketing
– Double Elephant 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Double Elephant A can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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 Double Elephant 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
– Double Elephant A can develop new processes and procedures in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Double Elephant A 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 Double Elephant A to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Double Elephant A has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry. This can help Double Elephant A to build a more holistic ecosystem for Double Elephant A products in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber 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, Double Elephant A 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.
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. Double Elephant A 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 Double Elephant A 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 Double Elephant A to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Double Elephant 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. Double Elephant 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Double Elephant 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.
Threats Double Elephant A External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Double Elephant A are -
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Double Elephant 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 Double Elephant 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 Double Elephant A business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Double Elephant A in Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry. The Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry is already at various protected from local competition in China, with the rise of trade war the protection levels may go up. This presents a clear threat of current business model in Chinese market.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry are lowering. It can presents Double Elephant A with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber sector.
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
– Double Elephant 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. Double Elephant A can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Double Elephant 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Double Elephant A has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Double Elephant A needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber 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 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. Double Elephant A needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Double Elephant A 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 Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber 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 Double Elephant A in the Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Double Elephant 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 Chemicals - Plastics & Rubber sector.
Increasing wage structure of Double Elephant 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 Double Elephant A.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Double Elephant A Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Double Elephant 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 Double Elephant 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 Double Elephant 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 Double Elephant 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 Double Elephant A needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.