United Company Rusal (486) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Metal Mining
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for United Company Rusal (Hong Kong)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , United Company Rusal is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – there is backlash against globalization, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing transportation and logistics costs, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, technology disruption, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google,
increasing energy prices, geopolitical disruptions, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of United Company Rusal
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that United Company Rusal can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the United Company Rusal, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which United Company Rusal 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 United Company Rusal can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of United Company Rusal
2. Improving business portfolio management of United Company Rusal
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Hong Kong
4. Making a Metal Mining sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of United Company Rusal
Strengths of United Company Rusal | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of United Company Rusal are -
Training and development
– United Company Rusal 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 Metal Mining industry
– United Company Rusal has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled United Company Rusal to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Metal Mining industry. The sustainable margins have also helped United Company Rusal to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– United Company Rusal has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – United Company Rusal staying ahead in the Metal Mining industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Diverse revenue streams
– United Company Rusal is present in almost all the verticals within the Metal Mining industry. This has provided United Company Rusal 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.
Ability to lead change in Metal Mining
– United Company Rusal is one of the leading players in the Metal Mining industry in Hong Kong. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Metal Mining industry in Hong Kong but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled United Company Rusal in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the United Company Rusal 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 United Company Rusal 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– United Company Rusal has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. United Company Rusal 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.
Analytics focus
– United Company Rusal 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 Metal Mining industry. The technology infrastructure of Hong Kong 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Metal Mining industry
– United Company Rusal is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of United Company Rusal in Metal Mining industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Highly skilled collaborators
– United Company Rusal has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Metal Mining industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of United Company Rusal have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Weaknesses of United Company Rusal | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of United Company Rusal are -
Employees’ less understanding of United Company Rusal strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of United Company Rusal 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Metal Mining industry, United Company Rusal 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that United Company Rusal needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Metal Mining industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at United Company Rusal can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as United Company Rusal is planning to shift buying processes online.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at United Company Rusal, in the dynamic environment of Metal Mining industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. United Company Rusal 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 Metal Mining industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at United Company Rusal 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, United Company Rusal 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, United Company Rusal is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help United Company Rusal to provide better information regarding Metal Mining products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, United Company Rusal has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Metal Mining industry over the last five years. United Company Rusal 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.
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 United Company Rusal supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, United Company Rusal is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left United Company Rusal vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As United Company Rusal is one of the leading players in the Metal Mining industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Metal Mining industry in last five years.
High dependence on United Company Rusal ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of United Company Rusal still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Metal Mining industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though United Company Rusal has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
United Company Rusal Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of United Company Rusal are -
Loyalty marketing
– United Company Rusal 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.
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 United Company Rusal 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– United Company Rusal 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
– United Company Rusal has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Metal Mining sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled United Company Rusal to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help United Company Rusal to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for United Company Rusal 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of United Company Rusal has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Metal Mining industry. This can help United Company Rusal to build a more holistic ecosystem for United Company Rusal products in the Metal Mining industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, United Company Rusal is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. United Company Rusal can utilize new technology in the field of Metal Mining industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, United Company Rusal 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 United Company Rusal to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help United Company Rusal to increase its market reach. United Company Rusal 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at United Company Rusal 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 Metal Mining industry.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Metal Mining industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. United Company Rusal can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, United Company Rusal can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that United Company Rusal operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Metal Mining sector.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Metal Mining industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for United Company Rusal in the Metal Mining industry. Now United Company Rusal can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Threats United Company Rusal External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of United Company Rusal are -
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 United Company Rusal in the Metal Mining sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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 United Company Rusal business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Regulatory challenges
– United Company Rusal 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 Metal Mining industry regulations.
Consumer confidence and its impact on United Company Rusal 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 Metal Mining industry and other sectors.
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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– United Company Rusal 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 Metal Mining industry.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, United Company Rusal 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 United Company Rusal prominent markets.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– United Company Rusal has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Metal Mining industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, United Company Rusal needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Metal Mining 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.
Environmental challenges
– United Company Rusal 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. United Company Rusal can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Metal Mining industry.
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. United Company Rusal needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Metal Mining industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 United Company Rusal.
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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, United Company Rusal may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Metal Mining sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of United Company Rusal Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at United Company Rusal 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 United Company Rusal 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 United Company Rusal 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 United Company Rusal 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 United Company Rusal needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
