Deck 8: Business Strategy and Competitive Advantage in Emerging Industries and for Online Businesses

Question 1

It is not always advantageous to be a first-mover.

Answer 1

True

Question 2

__________ involves tailoring online offerings to individual consumers as Amazon.com does with its customer recommendations.

A) Correlative segmentation
B) Collaborative filtering
C) Market fragmentation
D) Market segmentation
E) None of these

Answer 2

B

Question 3

Disadvantages of pure online plays include which of the following?

A) Some customers who use the Internet as a source of product and service information still prefer to make their purchases through traditional channels.
B) Customers cannot physically examine, touch, and test products.
C) Knowledge transfer is restricted to codified knowledge, sacrificing the spontaneity and judgment that can result from interactions with skilled sales personnel.
D) The lack of a physical storefront, fixtures, and amenities limits the ability of pure play firms to reinforce a brand image.
E) All of these

Answer 3

E

Question 4

Which of the following factors, if lacking in an emerging online industry, would have an effect on a pure play competitor?

A) Buyers
B) Suppliers
C) Distribution channels
D) A common language and set of norms
E) All of these

Question 5

EMI's inability to gain long-term competitive advantage after introducing its CT scanner is an example of its misreading of which factor of uncertainty in emerging markets?

A) Demand
B) Industry infrastructure
C) Industry standards
D) The nature of competition
E) None of these

Question 6

Which factor/s characterize the dynamic emerging industry contexts in which first-mover decisions must often be made?

A) The ambiguity of emerging markets
B) Short product life cycles
C) A and B
D) All of these
E) None of these

Question 7

List three competitive advantages that first-movers can gain when entering emerging industry environments.

Question 8

List three competitive disadvantages that can befall first-movers when entering emerging industry environments.

Question 9

List four ways in which online competition differs from prior business contexts.

Question 10

List three disadvantages that customers can encounter when shopping online.

Question 11

Give three downsides related to using a strategy of cost leadership for online sellers of standardized products and services?

Question 12

Why are online retail firms that pursue narrowly focused strategies unlikely to be as successful as online retail firms pursuing either cost leadership or differentiation strategies?

Question 13

When online businesses first emerged, why were pure online plays in the market predicted to be in the strongest competitive position?

Question 14

What off-line and pre-existing capabilities did clicks-and-bricks firms have that caused many of them to eventually become online markets leaders?

Question 15

List three ways in which online businesses can take advantage of the interactive characteristics of the Internet.

Question 16

__________ refers to the long-term competitive advantage gained from having products or services that cannot be easily imitated or copied.

A) Dominant design
B) Inimitability
C) Interconnectedness
D) immutability
E) None of these

Question 17

EMI's inability to gain long-term competitive advantage from its development of the CT scanner is an example of which factor influencing first-mover success?

A) Dominant design
B) Inimitability
C) Interconnectedness
D) Prime concept
E) None of these

Question 18

Chrysler's introduction of the minivan was an example of which factor influencing first-mover success?

A) Dominant design
B) Inimitability
C) Interconnectedness
D) Prime concept
E) None of these

Question 19

A first-mover strategy is a guarantee of competitive advantage.

Question 20

Empirical research suggests that first-movers often enjoy a number of advantages that persist over time.

Question 21

First-mover strategies have few of the qualities and objectives of the generic strategy of differentiation.

Question 22

Litigation can be used as a competitive weapon to delay or defend against market entry by competing firms.

Question 23

Virtual activities do not eliminate the need for physical activities, but often decrease their importance.

Question 24

Cost leadership is widely practiced among online businesses that sell standardized products and services.

Question 25

Internet technologies tend to reduce fixed costs while increasing the significance of variable costs.

Question 26

No online company has yet successfully employed a combination of cost leadership and differentiation strategies.

Question 27

The Internet offers significant opportunities for reducing operating costs of product producing firms, however the same cannot be said of service firms.

Question 28

For online businesses, cost leadership and differentiation or their equivalents are viewed as equally effective strategies.

Question 29

Online firms that pursue narrowly focused strategies are unlikely to be as successful as online firms pursuing either cost leadership or differentiation strategies.

Question 30

Moving quickly up the experience or learning curve creates a significant absolute cost advantage for a second-mover firm pursuing a first-mover firm in an emerging market.

Question 31

A characteristic of many emerging business opportunities is that the length of product life cycles can vary considerably.

Question 32

Ambiguity and uncertainty about the attractiveness of emerging market opportunities exists with respect to which of the following factors?

A) Demand
B) Industry infrastructure
C) Industry standards
D) The nature of competition
E) All of these

Question 33

Discuss three factors that distinguish successful first- and second-movers from those firms that are less successful.