Huaze Cobalt A (693) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Misc. Fabricated Products
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Huaze Cobalt A (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Huaze Cobalt A is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing energy prices, there is backlash against globalization, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy,
central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Huaze Cobalt A can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Huaze Cobalt A, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Huaze Cobalt 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 Huaze Cobalt A can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Huaze Cobalt A
2. Improving business portfolio management of Huaze Cobalt A
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Misc. Fabricated Products sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Huaze Cobalt A
Strengths of Huaze Cobalt A | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Huaze Cobalt A are -
Highly skilled collaborators
– Huaze Cobalt A has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Misc. Fabricated Products industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Huaze Cobalt A have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Digital Transformation in Misc. Fabricated Products industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Huaze Cobalt A digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Huaze Cobalt 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 lead change in Misc. Fabricated Products
– Huaze Cobalt A is one of the leading players in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry in China. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry in China but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Huaze Cobalt A in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Huaze Cobalt A has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Huaze Cobalt A 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry
– Huaze Cobalt A is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Organizational Resilience of Huaze Cobalt A
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Huaze Cobalt A does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Training and development
– Huaze Cobalt 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Misc. Fabricated Products industry
– Huaze Cobalt A has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Huaze Cobalt A to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Huaze Cobalt A to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Huaze Cobalt A 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)
– Huaze Cobalt A has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Huaze Cobalt A staying ahead in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Learning organization
- Huaze Cobalt A 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 Huaze Cobalt A is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Huaze Cobalt A emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Innovation driven organization
– Huaze Cobalt A is one of the most innovative firm in Misc. Fabricated Products sector.
Weaknesses of Huaze Cobalt A | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Huaze Cobalt A are -
Employees’ less understanding of Huaze Cobalt A strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Huaze Cobalt A 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Huaze Cobalt A is just above the Misc. Fabricated Products 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Huaze Cobalt A is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry, but Huaze Cobalt A needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Huaze Cobalt A to focus more on services in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of China, Huaze Cobalt A needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Huaze Cobalt A, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Misc. Fabricated Products 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Huaze Cobalt A needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Huaze Cobalt A can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Huaze Cobalt A is planning to shift buying processes online.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Huaze Cobalt 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 Misc. Fabricated Products industry using digital technology.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Huaze Cobalt A, in the dynamic environment of Misc. Fabricated Products industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Huaze Cobalt A has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Skills based hiring in Misc. Fabricated Products industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Huaze Cobalt A 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 bargaining power of channel partners in Misc. Fabricated Products industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in China, Huaze Cobalt A 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 Misc. Fabricated Products industry.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Huaze Cobalt A 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.
Huaze Cobalt A Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Huaze Cobalt A are -
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Huaze Cobalt A can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Manufacturing automation
– Huaze Cobalt A can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Misc. Fabricated Products 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Huaze Cobalt A is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Huaze Cobalt A can utilize new technology in the field of Misc. Fabricated Products industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, 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, Huaze Cobalt A can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Huaze Cobalt A operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Misc. Fabricated Products sector.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Huaze Cobalt 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 Huaze Cobalt A to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Huaze Cobalt 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 Huaze Cobalt 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Huaze Cobalt 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. Huaze Cobalt A can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Buying journey improvements
– Huaze Cobalt A can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Misc. Fabricated Products 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Huaze Cobalt 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Huaze Cobalt A in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Misc. Fabricated Products industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Developing new processes and practices
– Huaze Cobalt A can develop new processes and procedures in Misc. Fabricated Products 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
– Huaze Cobalt 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 Huaze Cobalt A External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Huaze Cobalt A are -
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Huaze Cobalt 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.
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 Huaze Cobalt A in the Misc. Fabricated Products sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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 Huaze Cobalt A.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Huaze Cobalt 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 Huaze Cobalt A prominent markets.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Huaze Cobalt 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 Misc. Fabricated Products sector.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Huaze Cobalt A is facing in Misc. Fabricated Products sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, 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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Misc. Fabricated Products industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Huaze Cobalt A can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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. Huaze Cobalt A 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.
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. Huaze Cobalt A needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Misc. Fabricated Products industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Environmental challenges
– Huaze Cobalt 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. Huaze Cobalt A can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Misc. Fabricated Products 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 Huaze Cobalt A business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Huaze Cobalt A 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 Misc. Fabricated Products industry and other sectors.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Huaze Cobalt A Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Huaze Cobalt 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 Huaze Cobalt 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 Huaze Cobalt 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 Huaze Cobalt 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 Huaze Cobalt A needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.