Far East Consortium Int (35) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Construction Services
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Far East Consortium Int (Hong Kong)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Far East Consortium Int is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – geopolitical disruptions, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing transportation and logistics costs, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings,
increasing household debt because of falling income levels, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Far East Consortium Int
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Far East Consortium Int can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Far East Consortium Int, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Far East Consortium Int 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 Far East Consortium Int can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Far East Consortium Int
2. Improving business portfolio management of Far East Consortium Int
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Hong Kong
4. Making a Construction Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Far East Consortium Int
Strengths of Far East Consortium Int | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Far East Consortium Int are -
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Construction Services industry
– Far East Consortium Int has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Far East Consortium Int to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Construction Services industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Far East Consortium Int to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Strong track record of project management in the Construction Services industry
– Far East Consortium Int is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Far East Consortium Int 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Far East Consortium Int is one of the leading players in the Construction Services industry in Hong Kong. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Hong Kong. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Organizational Resilience of Far East Consortium Int
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Far East Consortium Int does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Far East Consortium Int has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Far East Consortium Int 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Far East Consortium Int is present in almost all the verticals within the Construction Services industry. This has provided Far East Consortium Int 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.
High brand equity
– Far East Consortium Int has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Far East Consortium Int to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Far East Consortium Int 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Far East Consortium Int has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Construction Services industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Far East Consortium Int have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Training and development
– Far East Consortium Int has one of the best training and development program in Capital Goods 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Far East Consortium Int has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Far East Consortium Int staying ahead in the Construction Services industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Weaknesses of Far East Consortium Int | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Far East Consortium Int are -
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Far East Consortium Int is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Construction Services industry, but Far East Consortium Int needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Far East Consortium Int to focus more on services in the Construction Services industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Far East Consortium Int, in the dynamic environment of Construction Services industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Far East Consortium Int has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Far East Consortium Int 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 Construction Services industry, Far East Consortium Int 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 strategic competitive environment developments
– As Far East Consortium Int is one of the leading players in the Construction Services industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Construction Services industry in last five years.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Far East Consortium Int, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Construction Services 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 operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Far East Consortium Int has high operating costs in the Construction Services industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Far East Consortium Int lucrative customers.
Need for greater diversity
– Far East Consortium Int 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Hong Kong, Far East Consortium Int needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Lack of clear differentiation of Far East Consortium Int products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Far East Consortium Int needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
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 Far East Consortium Int supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Far East Consortium Int is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Far East Consortium Int vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Far East Consortium Int Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Far East Consortium Int are -
Manufacturing automation
– Far East Consortium Int can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Construction Services 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Far East Consortium Int has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Construction Services sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Far East Consortium Int to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Far East Consortium Int to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Far East Consortium Int can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Construction Services industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Far East Consortium Int 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. Far East Consortium Int 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Far East Consortium Int 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 Far East Consortium Int in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Construction Services industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Far East Consortium Int has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Construction Services industry. This can help Far East Consortium Int to build a more holistic ecosystem for Far East Consortium Int products in the Construction Services industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, 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, Far East Consortium Int can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Far East Consortium Int operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Construction Services 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 Far East Consortium Int 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Far East Consortium Int 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Far East Consortium Int 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 Far East Consortium Int to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Buying journey improvements
– Far East Consortium Int can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Construction Services 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Far East Consortium Int to increase its market reach. Far East Consortium Int 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.
Threats Far East Consortium Int External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Far East Consortium Int are -
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Far East Consortium Int has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Construction Services industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Far East Consortium Int needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Construction Services 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.
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 Far East Consortium Int in the Construction Services sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Construction Services industry are lowering. It can presents Far East Consortium Int with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Construction Services sector.
Regulatory challenges
– Far East Consortium Int 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 Construction Services industry regulations.
Environmental challenges
– Far East Consortium Int 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. Far East Consortium Int can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Construction Services industry.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Far East Consortium Int in Construction Services industry. The Construction Services 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Far East Consortium Int 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 Construction Services industry.
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. Far East Consortium Int 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.
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 Construction Services industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Far East Consortium Int can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Far East Consortium Int 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 Construction Services industry and other sectors.
Increasing wage structure of Far East Consortium Int
– 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 Far East Consortium Int.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Far East Consortium Int Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Far East Consortium Int 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 Far East Consortium Int 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 Far East Consortium Int 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 Far East Consortium Int 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 Far East Consortium Int needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.