Superactive (176) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Superactive (Hong Kong)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Superactive is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing household debt because of falling income levels, there is backlash against globalization, technology disruption, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, geopolitical disruptions, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, 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, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Superactive

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Superactive can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Superactive, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Superactive 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 Superactive can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Superactive
2. Improving business portfolio management of Superactive
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Hong Kong
4. Making a Appliance & Tool sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Superactive

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

The strengths of Superactive are -

Diverse revenue streams

– Superactive is present in almost all the verticals within the Appliance & Tool industry. This has provided Superactive 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.

Digital Transformation in Appliance & Tool industry

- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Superactive digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Superactive has successfully integrated the four key components of digital transformation – digital integration in processes, digital integration in marketing and customer relationship management, digital integration into the value chain, and using technology to explore new products and market opportunities.

Ability to recruit top talent

– Superactive is one of the leading players in the Appliance & Tool 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.

Superior customer experience

– The customer experience strategy of Superactive in Appliance & Tool industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.

Effective Research and Development (R&D)

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

Successful track record of launching new products

– Superactive has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Superactive 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

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

Analytics focus

– Superactive 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 Appliance & Tool 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.

Organizational Resilience of Superactive

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

High brand equity

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

Innovation driven organization

– Superactive is one of the most innovative firm in Appliance & Tool sector.

Low bargaining power of suppliers

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

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

The weaknesses of Superactive are -

Lack of clear differentiation of Superactive products

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

Compensation and incentives

– The revenue per employee of Superactive is just above the Appliance & Tool 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.

Workers concerns about automation

– As automation is fast increasing in the Appliance & Tool industry, Superactive 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 Appliance & Tool industry

– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Superactive 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.

Capital Spending Reduction

– Even during the low interest decade, Superactive 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 Appliance & Tool industry using digital technology.

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

Employees’ less understanding of Superactive strategy

– From the outside it seems that the employees of Superactive 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.

Interest costs

– Compare to the competition, Superactive 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.

Increasing silos among functional specialists

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

High dependence on Superactive ‘s star products

– The top 2 products and services of Superactive still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Appliance & Tool industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Superactive has relatively successful track record of launching new products.

Low market penetration in new markets

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

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

The opportunities of Superactive are -

Reforming the budgeting process

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

Finding new ways to collaborate

– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Appliance & Tool industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Superactive can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.

Leveraging digital technologies

– Superactive 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.

Building a culture of innovation

– managers at Superactive 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 Appliance & Tool industry.

Using analytics as competitive advantage

– Superactive has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Appliance & Tool sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Superactive to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Superactive to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.

Developing new processes and practices

– Superactive can develop new processes and procedures in Appliance & Tool 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.

Buying journey improvements

– Superactive can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Appliance & Tool 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.

Learning at scale

– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Superactive 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.

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. Superactive can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.

Loyalty marketing

– Superactive 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 Superactive in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Appliance & Tool industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.

Increase in government spending

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

Low interest rates

– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Superactive 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.

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

The threats of Superactive 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.

Increasing wage structure of Superactive

– 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 Superactive.

Easy access to finance

– Easy access to finance in Appliance & Tool industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Superactive can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.

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 Superactive.

High dependence on third party suppliers

– Superactive 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.

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. Superactive needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Appliance & Tool industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.

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 Superactive in the Appliance & Tool 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.

Consumer confidence and its impact on Superactive 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 Appliance & Tool industry and other sectors.

Environmental challenges

– Superactive 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. Superactive can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Appliance & Tool 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 Superactive business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.

Learning curve for new practices

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

Stagnating economy with rate increase

– Superactive 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 Appliance & Tool industry.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Superactive Template, Example

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

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