BBPS4103 Strategic Management: University Competitive Analysis Report

This report analyzes the strategic management practices of three Malaysian universities: Open University Malaysia (OUM), Wawasan Open University, and Asia e University. It begins by providing background information on each institution, including their establishment, location, and key features. The core of the report focuses on identifying and analyzing the critical success factors (CSFs) for OUM, including international tie-ups, brand reputation, mode of delivery, and student accessibility. The report then contrasts these factors with the CSFs of Wawasan Open University, emphasizing its quality of services and teaching methods. Additionally, the report incorporates a competitive profile matrix to assess the competitive positions of the universities. The analysis examines the universities' strengths, weaknesses, and strategies within the higher education landscape, providing a comprehensive overview of their strategic approaches to achieve their goals.

Running head: STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT
STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Table of Contents
Assessment 1..............................................................................................................................3
Question 1..................................................................................................................................3
Question 2..................................................................................................................................5
Question 3................................................................................................................................10
Question 4................................................................................................................................11
Assessment 2............................................................................................................................12
Question i)................................................................................................................................12
Question ii)...............................................................................................................................14
Question iii)..............................................................................................................................20
Question iv)..............................................................................................................................20
References................................................................................................................................22

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Assessment 1
Question 1
Open university Malaysia
The open university of Malaysia is also known as OUM, it is the 7th largest university
of Malaysia and it is owned by the multimedia technology enhancement operations. The main
campus of this university is located in the Jalan Tun Ismail area of Kuala Lumpur. The
university has 37 learning centres apart from its main campus and has 10 regional centres
from which the students can pursue their courses.
In 2001 as the first open learning university this organisation has started with 753
students and within 10 years the number of students increased to 100000 with 50 academic
programmes. The institute has been rated as 5 tier institution in Malaysia by the MQA rating
system for higher education institutions. This university offers diploma courses almost in all
fields of education from information technology to accounting from management studies to
engineering. It also offers bachelor degrees and master degrees in IT, business administration,
project management, foreign language and engineering. The university has well qualified and
experienced faculties who are there to help and guide the students so that they can get the
most advanced skills through their learning process and can make successful career in their
respective field of studies. This university also offers eLearning facilities which give
opportunity to the working professionals to continue their studies along with their work
(Ibrahim & Khalil 2019).
Wawasan Open University
The Wawasan Open University is a private university that is situated in the Penang
area of Malaysia. This university is very popular among the working peoples who want to

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pursue higher education simultaneously with their profession. This university is affiliated by
the AAOU and started its operation in the year 2006 and it started to take application from
students for admission in the year 2007. Initially the university offers part time courses but in
the year 2013 this university started to offer full time degree courses to the STPM school
droppers and holders of diploma degree from its main campus.in addition to its main campus
the university also have four regional centres in Loph, Kuala Lumpur, Kuching and Johor
Bahru so that the students who are pursuing the distance learning courses can get all kind of
supports. The university also have toe small regional centres which are located in the Banadar
Utama and Klang region. The university provide both bachelor’s degree programmes and
master degree programmes in different subjects that includes engineering, management,
information technology (Liew 2016).
Asia E University
This an international university which is located in Kuala Lumpur, the Asia e
university provide both online and offline mode of learning. The university is formed by the
Asia cooperation dialogue foreign ministers which is represented by 34 foreign ministries of
the Asia pacific countries with the mission to enhance cooperation in the field of education.
The Asia e university is established in the year 2007 and have more than 29000 students. It
has membership of the association of common wealth universities and other international
organisations. Apart from its main campus this university has learning sections in various
other states of Malaysia as well as in foreign countries. Asia E University has a huge
infrastructure facility which enables the university to offer undergraduate, post graduate and
executive development courses from which the students can easily avail world class
knowledge and professional skills (Singh & Aziz 2019).

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Question 2
Success factors
Open university Malaysia
International tie ups and memorandum of agreement with other universities
The desire for cross border tie ups has increased over the years as students are
showing their interest to acquire globally recognised courses which will expand their job
opportunity in all over the world. The Open University is continuously trying to make
collaborations with foreign universities through, various agreements and making
memorandum of understanding and though franchising strategies. The university has opened
campuses in foreign countries which give opportunity to the students of the university to avail
globally recognised courses. Due to the increased global competition and make themselves
different from the other universities this university is giving more importance to make
international expansion (Hashim & Yusoff 2019).
In order to expand its operation internationally OUM has built up its international
operation office with the strategic objective to give opportunity to its students so that they can
get more opportunity of international courses and also to acquire more foreign students by
collaborating with the foreign partners. The university used to follow several steps for
imparting international courses to its students. The first step is to register the students with
course the process includes taking of examination for entering in such courses collection of
admission and registration fees. Second the foreign campus of the university offers academic
guidance to the students relating to various courses the process of application, and also to
provide information on the non-academic factors like the remuneration, fees and contracts.

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The third function of the campus is to act as a liaison with the global partners as well as with
the other departments of the main campus of the OUM (Mohamed 2016).
The university make its first international collaboration with the Arab open university
in the year 2007 and the current tie up is made with the international college of law, business
administration and technology university of united Arab emirates in 2017. The university has
made a memorandum of agreements with the foreign universities to fulfil the legal
obligations t5hat are required to make the tie ups as a recognised degree as per the
requirements of the government of these countries. Apart from managing the regular courses
provided by the foreign universities the campus also look after the sustainability of these
partnerships (Kanwar 2016).
Brand reputation and identity
OUM has been able to create a brand image in providing high quality distance
learning courses in Malaysia. The open university of Malaysia is considered as the trend
setter of offering distance learning courses to the working people through both the offline and
online methods. The eLearning facilities of this university is highly advanced and the
students get high quality of education from the reputed faculties. It is the first university in
Malaysia that offers open distance learning with the aim to spread education to all the section
of the society which is considered as an evolution of democracy in the Malaysian education
sector. This actually allows a shift of paradigm in the higher education system which gives an
opportunity to many working adults of the country to achieve higher education and make an
improvement in their professional life.
Mode of delivery
The university has the option of providing education on both online and offline
modes. In the main campus the students will get the opportunity to interact with the faculties

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and get their important guidance, as well as they will get the printed study materials of their
respective subjects. For electronic learning the students can get the opportunity to use the
specially formed learning management system which contain video classes of the faculties
and every guidelines that are essential for academic progress (Yasin et al 2019).
Open University of Malaysia has made a highly advanced system of online teaching
and learning which is very useful for the students as well as for the tutors. This system is
known as the “My virtual learning environment”. This system allows the students to integrate
with various tools and techniques to interact with the teachers. This system has given the
students a scope to get high quality of education even without attending classes. This my
virtual eLearning environment software make it possible to engage both the learners and the
faculties in an environment that assist in transfer and interaction of the course materials to the
students of different locations. This system is essential for enhancing the student base of the
university. The concept of no classroom boundaries for the students get immense popularity
and encourages the students to complete their education even by staying in remote places or
by doing job. This innovative system fulfil the objective of setting Open University Malaysia
that is democratisation of education.
Student’s accessibility and reachability
This is another factor that increase the rate of success of this university, the students
can easily access and reach the university whenever they feel any problem. There are more
than 30 learning centres in different states of Malaysia. These centres contain all the facilities
that are essential to get world class education facilities. The staffs of the university are very
cooperative in nature and always try to solve the problems of the students. The learning
centres contain well equipped meeting rooms, classrooms, laboratories, libraries, that are
essential for the students to gain knowledge and skills. This widely spread learning centres

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has made it possible to decentralise the education system and make it more convenient for the
students to resolve any confusion that they have in relation to the process of admission or in
relation to any course related matters. The high number of centres also useful to attract more
students to attain face to face classes and to take the advice of the experienced faculties
without facing the trouble to travel across the country and visit the main campuses frequently
(Leng & Ali 2016).
Wawasan Open University
Quality of services
As education is a service based industry, high quality of service is expected from the
universities. The higher education universities should ensure that they are committed to
impart high standards of education system which is different from others and students can
make a bright career after completing their course from such universities. There are almost
600 universities in Malaysia and most of the universities provide same kind of education
system what is different is the approach and method that one university practice to make their
students more competent in their professional life (kumar et al 2019).
The main objective of the WOU is to provide high quality of education system and
building professional skills among the students so that they can create a unique image in the
education industry which is highly competitive. The client service charter of this university
reflects how much dedicated the university is, to render advanced education service to the
students. The charter also indicates the commitment of the company to impart proper,
accurate and updated information to the students regarding all the aspects that are related with
knowledge and professional skills. The charter will make the university to become a unique
institute that is always ready to give the best service to all of its students (Ng & Tan 2017).

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The wawasan university try to benchmark its courses and academic curriculums with
the leading universities of the world so that their students can become the most
knowledgeable band efficient professionals in their respective areas and can earn reputation
in every field in which they want to make their career. To make sure that the university will
create a unique presence in the education system the Wawasan University has adopted many
quality assurance process out of these the most effective one is the development of an
overreaching policy document, which is known as the standard operating procedure
framework. It has been made mandatory to all the departments of the university to follow this
framework and to provide the necessary information to all the stakeholders and that will bring
more transparency in the process of operations and will increase the standard of service
provided by the university to its students (Liu Wu & He 2016).
Highly versatile teaching and learning methods
The main objective of every universities is to provide world class learning opportunity
to the students so that they can get a good job after completing the course. the teaching
faculties of this university is highly experienced and have all relevant knowledge that are
essential to impart the best training and guidance to the students using which the students can
make them ready to face the challenges of professional life . In wawasan more importance is
given in practical skills that will help the students in solving the complicated issues of his or
her professional life (Arumugam 2016).
To make the students more efficient the following steps are adopted by the university:
 Highly advanced course materials that are particularly made to make the students to
understand the basic concept of the particular subject and to acquire more practical
knowledge.
 Providing continuous support system to the students which includes

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 Digital library
 Highly advanced computer laboratory
 Support of regional learning centres
Asia E University
International recognition and presence
The Asia e university is formed with a motive to promote globalisation in the higher
education system. The university always give emphasis in collaborating various Asian
countries and form a global approach of imparting education. The government of Malaysia is
collaboration with other 34 countries formed this university where the students get world
class facilities and they get education as per the international curriculums. The mission of the
university is to give international recognition to the distance learning process by which more
number of people will get the opportunity to access global knowledge and professional
techniques (Kaushik & Dhanarajan 2016).
Support from the government
The government of Malaysia takes the main initiative to form this university so from
the very beginning this university gets all the government facilities like foreign
collaborations, funding and getting infrastructural advantages. The main stakeholders of the
university is the ministry of finance, ministry of foreign affairs and ministry of higher
education of Malaysia.
Question 3
Presentation and explanation of the competitive profile matrix

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Analysis of the competitive profile matrix
On the basis of the competitive profile matrix of these three universities it is clear that
the open university of Malaysia get the highest weight among the other two universities. The
weighted score of the OUM is 3.53 and in comparison to that the score of WOU is 2.85 and
that of AeU is 3.26. From the competitive matrix it can be possible to evaluate the current
position of an organisation in comparison to its competitors. In the CPM some specific
critical factors like in this case international partnership and collaboration, diverse teaching
and learning, are considered and based on such factors the comparison is made (Menon
Phalachandra & Emmanuel 2018).
The main competition occurs between the OUM and AeU and except some of the
factors like service delivery quality, global recognition and presence and government support
OUM has been able to score more than the AeU. From this matrix it can be said that among
these three universities WOU has to make many improvements in order to compete the other
two universities and OUM have to improve its score more in global presence otherwise AeU
will easily beat OUM and secure the leading position (Shanmugam 2018).
Question 4
Summary
From the analysis of the entire report it can be said that there is hard competition
among the three universities in Malaysia that are focusing on distance learning. The concept

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of distance learning is taking popularity and the government is also taking initiatives to
promote online learning system. On the basis of the competitive profile matrix it can be said
that OUM has been able to beat its competitors in almost all the critical factors that are
considered for making comparison. The major challenge that Open University Malaysia will
face is from Asia E University and Wawasan University has to take initiatives to improve its
standard to sustain in the competitive market (Hamid et al 2017).
Assessment 2
Question i)
Introduction of KPJ healthcare Berhad
KPJ is the largest private hospital in this country with 22 private specialist hospital in
Malaysia.The private hospital has also presence outside Malaysia. The organisation has 2
hospitals in Indonesia and one hospital in Thailand and an aged care unit in Australia. The
hospital has more than 2600 beds and the hospital provide a huge range of medical services
and more than 2.5 million patients.
The services of KPJ hospitals include hospital management, healthcare technical
services, development of hospitals and commissioning, nursing, and providing healthcare
education facilities, services on pathology departments, pharmacy science and many others
(Rahati, et al 2017).
Vision and mission statements