Industry Structure And The Dynamics Of Competition

This book explores which kind of competitive moves and countermoves have been taken by mobile phone vendors like Nokia, Samsung, Motorola and Apple, as well as emerging rivals from developing countries, to defend their competitive position over the industry life cycle, and which factors have driven these actions.

The Dynamics of Industrial Competition describes the internal dynamics of industries using new and unique longitudinal data that make it possible to track firms over time. It provides a comprehensive picture of a number of aspects of firm turnover in North America that arise from the competitive process - the entry and the exit of firms, the growth and the decline of incumbent firms, and the merger process. Instantaneous and cumulative measures of market dynamics are provided. Since the forces contributing to competition are varied and industries are affected by heterogeneous forces, different aspects of firm turnover are considered in order to provide a comprehensive overview of the competitive process. Entry is divided into that portion coming from the creation of new plants and that portion arising from the acquisition of existing firms. Differences are drawn between the effects of related and unrelated acquisitions and between the effects of take-overs made by domestic and foreign firms. Differences between large- and small-firm activity are also investigated. The effects of turnover on productivity, efficiency, wage rates, and profitability are extensively model led. Using various measures of firm turnover to proxy the amount of competition, the study examines and contextualizes the relationship between industry performance and the intensity of the competitive process.

This book focuses on the actions and reactions of companies as they interact with one another and strive for advantage. Using actual data and case studies from the highly competitive airline, high technology, insurance and banking industries, the authors develop an original communication-information model which provides an effective method to explain, measure and even predict the ways in which firms compete in the marketplace. The theoretical contributions presented are backed up by a wealth of data, case studies, examples and illustrations.

There has been increasing interest and debate in recent years on the nature of economic processes in general and the related ideas of the market, in particular the competitive process. This study lies at the interface between two largely independent disciplines, economics and sociology, and reflects an attempt to bring the two fields of discourse more closely together. It explores this interface in a number of ways, looking at the competitive process and market relations from a number of different perspectives. A wide range of contributors are included, most of whom are leading writers and thinkers in the field.

Strategy as Action presents an action plan for how firms can build, improve, and defend their competitive advantage at every stage of their life cycle. For start-up firms entering a market, it provides a model for exploiting competitive uncertainty and blind spots; for growth firms who have established some market advantages, it provides an action plan for exploiting relative resources; for mature firms, it explains how to exploit market position; finally, for firms that have no decisive resource advantage, it provides an action plan based on firm co-operative reactions.

"Comprehensive in its scope and intensive in its analysis, the volume will be useful for researchers of industrial economics, business schools, policymakers, competition commissions, journalists, industry associations, and corporate executives." --Book Jacket.

Presents the comprehensive framework of analytical techniques to help a firm analyze its industry as a whole and predict the industry's future evolution, to understand its competitors and its own position ...