SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Sinco Pharmas (Hong Kong)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Sinco Pharmas is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – wage bills are increasing, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, technology disruption, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing household debt because of falling income levels,
talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Sinco Pharmas can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Sinco Pharmas, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Sinco Pharmas 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 Sinco Pharmas can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Sinco Pharmas
2. Improving business portfolio management of Sinco Pharmas
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Hong Kong
4. Making a Major Drugs sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Sinco Pharmas
Strengths of Sinco Pharmas | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Sinco Pharmas are -
Organizational Resilience of Sinco Pharmas
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Sinco Pharmas 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
– Sinco Pharmas has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Sinco Pharmas 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Sinco Pharmas has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Major Drugs industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Sinco Pharmas have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Sinco Pharmas comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Major Drugs industry, building diversified operations across different geographies so that disruption in one part of the world doesn’t impact the overall performance of the firm, and integrating the various business operations and processes through its digital transformation drive.
Innovation driven organization
– Sinco Pharmas is one of the most innovative firm in Major Drugs sector.
Ability to lead change in Major Drugs
– Sinco Pharmas is one of the leading players in the Major Drugs industry in Hong Kong. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Major Drugs industry in Hong Kong but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Sinco Pharmas in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Diverse revenue streams
– Sinco Pharmas is present in almost all the verticals within the Major Drugs industry. This has provided Sinco Pharmas 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Sinco Pharmas in Major Drugs industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
High brand equity
– Sinco Pharmas has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Sinco Pharmas to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Sinco Pharmas 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.
Training and development
– Sinco Pharmas has one of the best training and development program in Healthcare 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.
Learning organization
- Sinco Pharmas 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 Sinco Pharmas is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Sinco Pharmas emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Weaknesses of Sinco Pharmas | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Sinco Pharmas are -
Products dominated business model
– Even though Sinco Pharmas has some of the most successful models in the Major Drugs industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Sinco Pharmas should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Need for greater diversity
– Sinco Pharmas 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Sinco Pharmas, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Major Drugs 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Sinco Pharmas 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 strategic competitive environment developments
– As Sinco Pharmas is one of the leading players in the Major Drugs industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Major Drugs industry in last five years.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Sinco Pharmas is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Sinco Pharmas to provide better information regarding Major Drugs products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Skills based hiring in Major Drugs industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Sinco Pharmas 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.
High dependence on Sinco Pharmas ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Sinco Pharmas still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Major Drugs industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Sinco Pharmas has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Major Drugs industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Hong Kong, Sinco Pharmas is facing high bargaining power of the channel partners. So far it has not able to streamline the operations to reduce the bargaining power of the value chain partners in the Major Drugs industry.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Sinco Pharmas is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Major Drugs industry, but Sinco Pharmas needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Sinco Pharmas to focus more on services in the Major Drugs industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Employees’ less understanding of Sinco Pharmas strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Sinco Pharmas 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.
Sinco Pharmas Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Sinco Pharmas are -
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Sinco Pharmas 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 Sinco Pharmas to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Sinco Pharmas is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Sinco Pharmas can utilize new technology in the field of Major Drugs industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Sinco Pharmas has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Major Drugs industry. This can help Sinco Pharmas to build a more holistic ecosystem for Sinco Pharmas products in the Major Drugs industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Developing new processes and practices
– Sinco Pharmas can develop new processes and procedures in Major Drugs 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Sinco Pharmas 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Sinco Pharmas in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Major Drugs industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Major Drugs industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Sinco Pharmas can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Sinco Pharmas to increase its market reach. Sinco Pharmas 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Sinco Pharmas 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 Sinco Pharmas 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Sinco Pharmas 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.
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. Sinco Pharmas can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Sinco Pharmas 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 Sinco Pharmas to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Threats Sinco Pharmas External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Sinco Pharmas are -
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Sinco Pharmas has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Major Drugs industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Sinco Pharmas needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Major Drugs 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.
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.
Environmental challenges
– Sinco Pharmas 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. Sinco Pharmas can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Major Drugs industry.
Backlash against dominant players
– US Congress and other legislative arms of the government are getting tough on big business especially technology companies. The digital arm of Sinco Pharmas business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Major Drugs industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Sinco Pharmas can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Sinco Pharmas is facing in Major Drugs sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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.
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 Sinco Pharmas.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Major Drugs industry are lowering. It can presents Sinco Pharmas with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Major Drugs sector.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Sinco Pharmas may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Major Drugs sector.
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. Sinco Pharmas 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Sinco Pharmas 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 Major Drugs 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. Sinco Pharmas needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Major Drugs industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Sinco Pharmas Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Sinco Pharmas 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 Sinco Pharmas 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 Sinco Pharmas 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 Sinco Pharmas 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 Sinco Pharmas needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.