Beijing Gas Blue Sky (6828) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Beijing Gas Blue Sky (Hong Kong)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Beijing Gas Blue Sky is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing commodity prices, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, wage bills are increasing, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Beijing Gas Blue Sky

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Beijing Gas Blue Sky can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Beijing Gas Blue Sky, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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.

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SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix

SWOT analysis of Beijing Gas Blue Sky can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Beijing Gas Blue Sky
2. Improving business portfolio management of Beijing Gas Blue Sky
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Hong Kong
4. Making a Printing & Publishing sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Beijing Gas Blue Sky

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Strengths of Beijing Gas Blue Sky | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of Beijing Gas Blue Sky are -

Organizational Resilience of Beijing Gas Blue Sky

– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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

– Beijing Gas Blue Sky has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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 Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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)

– Beijing Gas Blue Sky has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Beijing Gas Blue Sky staying ahead in the Printing & Publishing industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.

High brand equity

– Beijing Gas Blue Sky has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Beijing Gas Blue Sky to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.

Strong track record of project management in the Printing & Publishing industry

– Beijing Gas Blue Sky is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.

Analytics focus

– Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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 Printing & Publishing 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.

Training and development

– Beijing Gas Blue Sky has one of the best training and development program in Services 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 Printing & Publishing industry

– Beijing Gas Blue Sky has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Beijing Gas Blue Sky to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Printing & Publishing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Beijing Gas Blue Sky to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.

Highly skilled collaborators

– Beijing Gas Blue Sky has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Printing & Publishing industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Beijing Gas Blue Sky have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.

Low bargaining power of suppliers

– Suppliers of Beijing Gas Blue Sky in the Services sector have low bargaining power. Beijing Gas Blue Sky has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Beijing Gas Blue Sky to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.

Ability to recruit top talent

– Beijing Gas Blue Sky is one of the leading players in the Printing & Publishing 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.

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Weaknesses of Beijing Gas Blue Sky | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of Beijing Gas Blue Sky are -

Workers concerns about automation

– As automation is fast increasing in the Printing & Publishing industry, Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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 Printing & Publishing industry

– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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.

Compensation and incentives

– The revenue per employee of Beijing Gas Blue Sky is just above the Printing & Publishing 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.

Low market penetration in new markets

– Outside its home market of Hong Kong, Beijing Gas Blue Sky needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.

Lack of clear differentiation of Beijing Gas Blue Sky products

– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Beijing Gas Blue Sky needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.

Interest costs

– Compare to the competition, Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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.

Employees’ less understanding of Beijing Gas Blue Sky strategy

– From the outside it seems that the employees of Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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.

Slow to strategic competitive environment developments

– As Beijing Gas Blue Sky is one of the leading players in the Printing & Publishing industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Printing & Publishing industry in last five years.

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 Beijing Gas Blue Sky supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Beijing Gas Blue Sky is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Beijing Gas Blue Sky vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.

High cash cycle compare to competitors

Beijing Gas Blue Sky has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Printing & Publishing industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.

Slow to harness new channels of communication

– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Beijing Gas Blue Sky is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Beijing Gas Blue Sky to provide better information regarding Printing & Publishing products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.

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Beijing Gas Blue Sky Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of Beijing Gas Blue Sky are -

Buying journey improvements

– Beijing Gas Blue Sky can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Printing & Publishing 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.

Low interest rates

– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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 Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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.

Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Printing & Publishing industry

– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Beijing Gas Blue Sky in the Printing & Publishing industry. Now Beijing Gas Blue Sky can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.

Creating value in data economy

– The success of analytics program of Beijing Gas Blue Sky has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Printing & Publishing industry. This can help Beijing Gas Blue Sky to build a more holistic ecosystem for Beijing Gas Blue Sky products in the Printing & Publishing industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, 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 Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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.

Reforming the budgeting process

- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Beijing Gas Blue Sky can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Beijing Gas Blue Sky in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Printing & Publishing industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.

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. Beijing Gas Blue Sky can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.

Increase in government spending

– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Beijing Gas Blue Sky can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Beijing Gas Blue Sky operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Printing & Publishing sector.

Building a culture of innovation

– managers at Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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 Printing & Publishing industry.

Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains

– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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 Beijing Gas Blue Sky to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.

Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19

– consumer behavior has changed in the Printing & Publishing industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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. Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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.

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Threats Beijing Gas Blue Sky External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of Beijing Gas Blue Sky are -

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.

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 Beijing Gas Blue Sky in the Printing & Publishing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

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.

High dependence on third party suppliers

– Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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.

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 Beijing Gas Blue Sky business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.

Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution

– Beijing Gas Blue Sky has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Printing & Publishing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Beijing Gas Blue Sky needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Printing & Publishing 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. Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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.

Increasing wage structure of Beijing Gas Blue Sky

– 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 Beijing Gas Blue Sky.

Learning curve for new practices

– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Beijing Gas Blue Sky may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Printing & Publishing sector.

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 Beijing Gas Blue Sky.

Shortening product life cycle

– it is one of the major threat that Beijing Gas Blue Sky is facing in Printing & Publishing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.

Consumer confidence and its impact on Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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 Printing & Publishing industry and other sectors.

Environmental challenges

– Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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. Beijing Gas Blue Sky can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Printing & Publishing industry.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Beijing Gas Blue Sky Template, Example

Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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 Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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 Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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 Beijing Gas Blue Sky 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 Beijing Gas Blue Sky needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.

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