SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Guanghe Landscape (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Guanghe Landscape is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, there is backlash against globalization, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing transportation and logistics costs, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, wage bills are increasing, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies,
increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Guanghe Landscape
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Guanghe Landscape can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Guanghe Landscape, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Guanghe Landscape 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 Guanghe Landscape can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Guanghe Landscape
2. Improving business portfolio management of Guanghe Landscape
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Audio & Video Equipment sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Guanghe Landscape
Strengths of Guanghe Landscape | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Guanghe Landscape are -
Diverse revenue streams
– Guanghe Landscape is present in almost all the verticals within the Audio & Video Equipment industry. This has provided Guanghe Landscape 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.
Analytics focus
– Guanghe Landscape 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 Audio & Video Equipment 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Guanghe Landscape has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Audio & Video Equipment industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Guanghe Landscape have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Organizational Resilience of Guanghe Landscape
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Guanghe Landscape does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Guanghe Landscape in Audio & Video Equipment industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Guanghe Landscape is one of the leading players in the Audio & Video Equipment 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.
Ability to lead change in Audio & Video Equipment
– Guanghe Landscape is one of the leading players in the Audio & Video Equipment industry in China. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Audio & Video Equipment industry in China but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Guanghe Landscape in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Digital Transformation in Audio & Video Equipment industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Guanghe Landscape digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Guanghe Landscape 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Guanghe Landscape 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Guanghe Landscape 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Audio & Video Equipment industry
– Guanghe Landscape is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Innovation driven organization
– Guanghe Landscape is one of the most innovative firm in Audio & Video Equipment sector.
Weaknesses of Guanghe Landscape | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Guanghe Landscape are -
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Guanghe Landscape 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 Audio & Video Equipment industry, Guanghe Landscape 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 to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Guanghe Landscape is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Guanghe Landscape to provide better information regarding Audio & Video Equipment products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Lack of clear differentiation of Guanghe Landscape products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Guanghe Landscape needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Audio & Video Equipment industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in China, Guanghe Landscape 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 Audio & Video Equipment industry.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Guanghe Landscape is just above the Audio & Video Equipment 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Guanghe Landscape needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Audio & Video Equipment industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Guanghe Landscape can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Guanghe Landscape is planning to shift buying processes online.
High dependence on Guanghe Landscape ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Guanghe Landscape still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Audio & Video Equipment industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Guanghe Landscape has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Skills based hiring in Audio & Video Equipment industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Guanghe Landscape 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of China, Guanghe Landscape needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Guanghe Landscape has high operating costs in the Audio & Video Equipment industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Guanghe Landscape lucrative customers.
Guanghe Landscape Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Guanghe Landscape are -
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. Guanghe Landscape can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Guanghe Landscape 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Guanghe Landscape 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Audio & Video Equipment industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Guanghe Landscape 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. Guanghe Landscape 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Audio & Video Equipment industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Guanghe Landscape can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Guanghe Landscape in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Audio & Video Equipment industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Loyalty marketing
– Guanghe Landscape 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 Guanghe Landscape 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, Guanghe Landscape is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Guanghe Landscape can utilize new technology in the field of Audio & Video Equipment industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
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 Guanghe Landscape 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
– Guanghe Landscape can develop new processes and procedures in Audio & Video Equipment 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
– Guanghe Landscape 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Guanghe Landscape 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 Guanghe Landscape to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Threats Guanghe Landscape External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Guanghe Landscape are -
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Guanghe Landscape 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 Guanghe Landscape prominent markets.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Guanghe Landscape in Audio & Video Equipment industry. The Audio & Video Equipment 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.
Environmental challenges
– Guanghe Landscape 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. Guanghe Landscape can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Audio & Video Equipment industry.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Guanghe Landscape 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 Audio & Video Equipment industry.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Guanghe Landscape 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 Audio & Video Equipment industry and other sectors.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Guanghe Landscape has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Audio & Video Equipment industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Guanghe Landscape needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Audio & Video Equipment 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.
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. Guanghe Landscape 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.
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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Guanghe Landscape is facing in Audio & Video Equipment sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Audio & Video Equipment industry are lowering. It can presents Guanghe Landscape with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Audio & Video Equipment sector.
Regulatory challenges
– Guanghe Landscape 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 Audio & Video Equipment industry regulations.
Increasing wage structure of Guanghe Landscape
– 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 Guanghe Landscape.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Guanghe Landscape 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 Guanghe Landscape Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Guanghe Landscape 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 Guanghe Landscape 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 Guanghe Landscape 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 Guanghe Landscape 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 Guanghe Landscape needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
