Academic Response Subsequent to Porter on Strategy

Academics also responded to this new approach to strategy in at least four
important ways.

First, scholars such as Anita McGahan extended Porter’s concepts
through extensive empirical research that broadly supported Porter’s concepts.


Second, a former student of Porter’s, Richard Rumelt, focused strategy
away from industry characteristics toward the characteristics of individual firms.
He found that the industry-level differences highlighted in the five forces model
were actually less predictive of firm profitability than were differences between
firms within a single industry.

Third, a related stream of scholarship called the resource-based view of the firm looked within firms to identify the sources of superior firm profitability, and it isolated ownership of certain key resources as the locus of competitive advantage, rather than the Porterian view of a firm’s position in its market and its value chain.

Finally, a fourth stream examined the role of economic complements to the firm’s own assets. Controlling key complementary assets afforded firms a comparative advantage, which facilitated entry into new industries.

Henry W. Chesbrough
Melissa M. Appleyard

Open Innovation and Strategy
CALIFORNIA MANAGEMENT REVIEW VOL. 50,NO. 1 FALL 2007