SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Korla Pear (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Korla Pear is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – geopolitical disruptions, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, there is backlash against globalization, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion,
increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, wage bills are increasing, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Korla Pear can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Korla Pear, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Korla Pear 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 Korla Pear can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Korla Pear
2. Improving business portfolio management of Korla Pear
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Crops sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Korla Pear
Strengths of Korla Pear | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Korla Pear are -
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Crops industry
– Korla Pear has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Korla Pear to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Crops industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Korla Pear to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Learning organization
- Korla Pear 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 Korla Pear is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Korla Pear emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Korla Pear comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Crops 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.
Ability to lead change in Crops
– Korla Pear is one of the leading players in the Crops industry in China. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Crops industry in China but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Korla Pear 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
– Korla Pear has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Korla Pear 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Korla Pear 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Crops industry
– Korla Pear is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Diverse revenue streams
– Korla Pear is present in almost all the verticals within the Crops industry. This has provided Korla Pear 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.
Digital Transformation in Crops industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Korla Pear digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Korla Pear 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.
Organizational Resilience of Korla Pear
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Korla Pear does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Korla Pear has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Korla Pear staying ahead in the Crops industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Korla Pear in the Consumer/Non-Cyclical sector have low bargaining power. Korla Pear has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Korla Pear to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Weaknesses of Korla Pear | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Korla Pear are -
Need for greater diversity
– Korla Pear 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, Korla Pear 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 Crops industry using digital technology.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Korla Pear, in the dynamic environment of Crops industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Korla Pear has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Crops industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in China, Korla Pear 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 Crops industry.
Employees’ less understanding of Korla Pear strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Korla Pear 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.
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 Korla Pear supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Korla Pear is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Korla Pear vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Korla Pear is one of the leading players in the Crops industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Crops industry in last five years.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Crops industry, Korla Pear 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.
Skills based hiring in Crops industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Korla Pear 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Korla Pear, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Crops 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.
High dependence on Korla Pear ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Korla Pear still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Crops industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Korla Pear has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Korla Pear Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Korla Pear are -
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Korla Pear 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 Korla Pear to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Korla Pear 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Korla Pear can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Korla Pear operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Crops sector.
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 Korla Pear 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Crops industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Korla Pear in the Crops industry. Now Korla Pear can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Manufacturing automation
– Korla Pear can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Crops 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Crops industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Korla Pear can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Korla Pear 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 Korla Pear to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Korla Pear 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Korla Pear has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Crops sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Korla Pear to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Korla Pear to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Korla Pear 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Korla Pear has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Crops industry. This can help Korla Pear to build a more holistic ecosystem for Korla Pear products in the Crops industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Crops industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Korla Pear 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. Korla Pear 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.
Threats Korla Pear External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Korla Pear are -
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Korla Pear may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Crops sector.
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 Korla Pear in the Crops sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Korla Pear 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 Korla Pear prominent markets.
Environmental challenges
– Korla Pear 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. Korla Pear can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Crops 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 Korla Pear business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Korla Pear is facing in Crops 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 Crops industry are lowering. It can presents Korla Pear with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Crops sector.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Crops industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Korla Pear can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Korla Pear 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 Crops industry and other sectors.
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 Korla Pear.
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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Korla Pear has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Crops industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Korla Pear needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Crops 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Korla Pear Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Korla Pear 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 Korla Pear 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 Korla Pear 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 Korla Pear 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 Korla Pear needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.