SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Anji Foodstuff (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Anji Foodstuff is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – wage bills are increasing, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing commodity prices, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, geopolitical disruptions, there is backlash against globalization, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%,
there is increasing trade war between United States & China, technology disruption, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Anji Foodstuff can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Anji Foodstuff, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Anji Foodstuff 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 Anji Foodstuff can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Anji Foodstuff
2. Improving business portfolio management of Anji Foodstuff
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Food Processing sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Anji Foodstuff
Strengths of Anji Foodstuff | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Anji Foodstuff are -
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Anji Foodstuff in Food Processing industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Training and development
– Anji Foodstuff has one of the best training and development program in Consumer/Non-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.
Learning organization
- Anji Foodstuff 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 Anji Foodstuff is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Anji Foodstuff emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Anji Foodstuff is one of the leading players in the Food Processing industry in China. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in China. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Digital Transformation in Food Processing industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Anji Foodstuff digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Anji Foodstuff 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Anji Foodstuff comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Food Processing 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Anji Foodstuff has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Anji Foodstuff 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.
High brand equity
– Anji Foodstuff has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Anji Foodstuff to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Anji Foodstuff has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Food Processing industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Anji Foodstuff have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Food Processing industry
– Anji Foodstuff has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Anji Foodstuff to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Food Processing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Anji Foodstuff to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Anji Foodstuff has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Anji Foodstuff staying ahead in the Food Processing industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Innovation driven organization
– Anji Foodstuff is one of the most innovative firm in Food Processing sector.
Weaknesses of Anji Foodstuff | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Anji Foodstuff are -
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of China, Anji Foodstuff needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Anji Foodstuff is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Anji Foodstuff to provide better information regarding Food Processing products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High dependence on Anji Foodstuff ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Anji Foodstuff still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Food Processing industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Anji Foodstuff has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Anji Foodstuff needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Food Processing industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Anji Foodstuff can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Anji Foodstuff is planning to shift buying processes online.
Employees’ less understanding of Anji Foodstuff strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Anji Foodstuff 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Anji Foodstuff, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Food Processing 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Anji Foodstuff 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Anji Foodstuff 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 Food Processing industry using digital technology.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Food Processing industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in China, Anji Foodstuff 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 Food Processing industry.
Skills based hiring in Food Processing industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Anji Foodstuff has created an environment where the organization is dominated by functional specialists rather than management generalist. This has resulted into product oriented approach rather than marketing oriented approach or consumers oriented approach.
High dependence on 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 Anji Foodstuff supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Anji Foodstuff is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Anji Foodstuff vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Anji Foodstuff Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Anji Foodstuff are -
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Food Processing industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Anji Foodstuff in the Food Processing industry. Now Anji Foodstuff can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Anji Foodstuff can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Anji Foodstuff is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Anji Foodstuff can utilize new technology in the field of Food Processing industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Anji Foodstuff in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Food Processing industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Anji Foodstuff has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Food Processing industry. This can help Anji Foodstuff to build a more holistic ecosystem for Anji Foodstuff products in the Food Processing industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Buying journey improvements
– Anji Foodstuff can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Food Processing 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Anji Foodstuff 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 Anji Foodstuff to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Food Processing industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Anji Foodstuff 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. Anji Foodstuff 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Anji Foodstuff 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Anji Foodstuff 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Anji Foodstuff has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Food Processing sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Anji Foodstuff to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Anji Foodstuff to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Anji Foodstuff to increase its market reach. Anji Foodstuff 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.
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 Anji Foodstuff 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.
Threats Anji Foodstuff External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Anji Foodstuff are -
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Anji Foodstuff 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 Food Processing 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 Anji Foodstuff business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Anji Foodstuff in Food Processing industry. The Food Processing 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.
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 Anji Foodstuff.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Anji Foodstuff 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 Anji Foodstuff prominent markets.
Increasing wage structure of Anji Foodstuff
– 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 Anji Foodstuff.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Anji Foodstuff 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. Anji Foodstuff 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Anji Foodstuff 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 Food Processing industry and other sectors.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Food Processing industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Anji Foodstuff can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Food Processing industry are lowering. It can presents Anji Foodstuff with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Food Processing sector.
Regulatory challenges
– Anji Foodstuff 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 Food Processing industry regulations.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Anji Foodstuff Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Anji Foodstuff 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 Anji Foodstuff 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 Anji Foodstuff 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 Anji Foodstuff 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 Anji Foodstuff needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.