Geotech (1707) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Geotech (Hong Kong)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Geotech is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing commodity prices, increasing energy prices, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, wage bills are increasing, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, etc

---

---

---

---

Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Geotech

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Geotech can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Geotech, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Geotech 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 Geotech can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Geotech
2. Improving business portfolio management of Geotech
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 Geotech

---

Strengths of Geotech | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of Geotech are -

High brand equity

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

Diverse revenue streams

– Geotech is present in almost all the verticals within the Construction Services industry. This has provided Geotech a diverse revenue stream that has helped it to survive disruptions such as global pandemic in Covid-19, financial disruption of 2008, and supply chain disruption of 2021.

Analytics focus

– Geotech 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 Construction Services 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.

Highly skilled collaborators

– Geotech 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 Geotech have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.

Superior customer experience

– The customer experience strategy of Geotech in Construction Services industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.

Cross disciplinary teams

– Horizontal connected teams at the Geotech 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 Construction Services industry

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

High switching costs

– The high switching costs that Geotech 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.

Ability to lead change in Construction Services

– Geotech is one of the leading players in the Construction Services industry in Hong Kong. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Construction Services industry in Hong Kong but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Geotech in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.

Effective Research and Development (R&D)

– Geotech has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Geotech 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.

Organizational Resilience of Geotech

– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Geotech does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.

Learning organization

- Geotech 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 Geotech is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Geotech emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.

---

---

Weaknesses of Geotech | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of Geotech are -

Lack of clear differentiation of Geotech products

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

Capital Spending Reduction

– Even during the low interest decade, Geotech 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 Construction Services industry using digital technology.

High cash cycle compare to competitors

Geotech has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Construction Services industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.

Increasing silos among functional specialists

– The organizational structure of Geotech is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Construction Services industry, but Geotech needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Geotech to focus more on services in the Construction Services industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.

Slow to strategic competitive environment developments

– As Geotech 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.

Aligning sales with marketing

– From the outside it seems that Geotech needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Construction Services industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Geotech can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Geotech is planning to shift buying processes online.

Slow decision making process

– As mentioned earlier in the report, Geotech has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Construction Services industry over the last five years. Geotech 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.

Skills based hiring in Construction Services industry

– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Geotech 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.

Products dominated business model

– Even though Geotech has some of the most successful models in the Construction Services industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Geotech should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.

Low market penetration in new markets

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

Need for greater diversity

– Geotech 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.

---

Geotech Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of Geotech are -

Loyalty marketing

– Geotech 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.

Building a culture of innovation

– managers at Geotech 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 Construction Services industry.

Reforming the budgeting process

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

Buying journey improvements

– Geotech 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.

Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities

– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Geotech 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 Geotech to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.

Better consumer reach

– The expansion of the 5G network will help Geotech to increase its market reach. Geotech 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.

Manufacturing automation

– Geotech 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.

Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Construction Services industry

– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Geotech in the Construction Services industry. Now Geotech can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.

Developing new processes and practices

– Geotech can develop new processes and procedures in Construction Services industry using technology such as automation using artificial intelligence, real time transportation and products tracking, 3D modeling for concept development and new products pilot testing etc.

Using analytics as competitive advantage

– Geotech 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 Geotech to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Geotech to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.

Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains

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

Increase in government spending

– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Geotech can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Geotech 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 Geotech 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.

---

Threats Geotech External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of Geotech are -

Increasing wage structure of Geotech

– 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 Geotech.

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 Geotech in the Construction Services sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

High dependence on third party suppliers

– Geotech 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.

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. Geotech 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.

Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution

– Geotech has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Construction Services industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Geotech 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.

Consumer confidence and its impact on Geotech 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.

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. Geotech needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Construction Services industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.

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 Geotech business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.

Environmental challenges

– Geotech 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. Geotech can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Construction Services industry.

Stagnating economy with rate increase

– Geotech 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.

Trade war between China and United States

– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Geotech 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.

Regulatory challenges

– Geotech 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.

---

Weighted SWOT Analysis of Geotech Template, Example

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

--- ---