Horizontal integration is the process of a company increasing production of goods or services at the same level of the value chain, in the same industry. A company may do this via internal expansion, acquisition or merger.
In the field of management, strategic management involves the formulation and implementation of the major goals and initiatives taken by an organization's managers on behalf of stakeholders, based on consideration of resources and an assessment of the internal and external environments in which the organization operates. Strategic management provides overall direction to an enterprise and involves specifying the organization's objectives, developing policies and plans to achieve those objectives, and then allocating resources to implement the plans. Academics and practicing managers have developed numerous models and frameworks to assist in strategic decision-making in the context of complex environments and competitive dynamics. Strategic management is not static in nature; the models can include a feedback loop to monitor execution and to inform the next round of planning.
In business, a competitive advantage is an attribute that allows an organization to outperform its competitors.
Porter's Five Forces Framework is a method of analysing the operating environment of a competition of a business. It draws from industrial organization (IO) economics to derive five forces that determine the competitive intensity and, therefore, the attractiveness of an industry in terms of its profitability. An "unattractive" industry is one in which the effect of these five forces reduces overall profitability. The most unattractive industry would be one approaching "pure competition", in which available profits for all firms are driven to normal profit levels. The five-forces perspective is associated with its originator, Michael E. Porter of Harvard University. This framework was first published in Harvard Business Review in 1979.
Marketing strategy is an organization's promotional efforts to allocate its resources across a wide range of platforms and channels to increase its sales and achieve sustainable competitive advantage within its corresponding market.
Michael Eugene Porter is an American academic known for his theories on economics, business strategy, and social causes. He is the Bishop William Lawrence University Professor at Harvard Business School, and was one of the founders of the consulting firm The Monitor Group and FSG, a social impact consultancy. He is credited for creating Porter's five forces analysis, which is instrumental in business strategy development at present. He is generally regarded as the father of the modern strategy field. He is also regarded as one of the world's most influential thinkers on management and competitiveness as well as one of the most influential business strategists. His work has been recognized by governments, non governmental organizations and universities.
In business analysis, PEST analysis describes a framework of macro-environmental factors used in the environmental scanning component of strategic management. It is part of an external environment analysis when conducting a strategic analysis or doing market research, and gives an overview of the different macro-environmental factors to be taken into consideration. It is a strategic tool for understanding market growth or decline, business position, potential and direction for operations.
A strategic alliance is an agreement between two or more parties to pursue a set of agreed upon objectives needed while remaining independent organizations.
Global strategy as defined in business terms is an organization's strategic guide to globalization. Such a connected world, allows a business's revenue to not be to be confined by borders. A business can employ a global business strategy to reap the rewards of trading in a worldwide market.
Corporate behaviour is the actions of a company or group who are acting as a single body. It defines the company's ethical strategies and describes the image of the company. Studies on corporate behaviour show the link between corporate communication and the formation of its identity.
International business refers to the trade of Goods and service goods, services, technology, capital and/or knowledge across national borders and at a global or transnational scale.
In economics, competition is a scenario where different economic firms are in contention to obtain goods that are limited by varying the elements of the marketing mix: price, product, promotion and place. In classical economic thought, competition causes commercial firms to develop new products, services and technologies, which would give consumers greater selection and better products. The greater the selection of a good is in the market, the lower prices for the products typically are, compared to what the price would be if there was no competition (monopoly) or little competition (oligopoly).
A business cluster is a geographic concentration of interconnected businesses, suppliers, and associated institutions in a particular field. Clusters are considered to increase the productivity with which companies can compete, nationally and globally. Accounting is a part of the business cluster. In urban studies, the term agglomeration is used. Clusters are also important aspects of strategic management.
Market environment and business environment are marketing terms that refer to factors and forces that affect a firm's ability to build and maintain successful customer relationships. The business environment has been defined as "the totality of physical and social factors that are taken directly into consideration in the decision-making behaviour of individuals in the organisation."
Technology Intelligence (TI) is an activity that enables companies to identify the technological opportunities and threats that could affect the future growth and survival of their business. It aims to capture and disseminate the technological information needed for strategic planning and decision making. As technology life cycles shorten and business become more globalized having effective TI capabilities is becoming increasingly important.
In international trade, foreign market entry modes are the ways in which a company can expand its services into a non-domestic market.
An enterprise planning system covers the methods of planning for the internal and external factors that affect an enterprise.
Strategic competitiveness is accomplished when a firm successfully integrates a value-creating strategy. The key to having a complete value-creating strategy is to adopt a holistic approach that includes business strategy, financial strategy, technology strategy, marketing strategy and investor strategy. The objective of the firm has to be based on creating value in an efficient way because it is the starting point for all businesses and it will generate profit after cost. Eric Beinhocker, the Executive Director of the Institute for New Economic Thinking at the Oxford Martin School, University of Oxford, says in his book The Origin of Wealth that the origin of wealth is knowledge. Knowledge does not have to be perceived as an assumption, or as an external factor. It has to be in the heart of the business. For this reason, the value-creating strategy must include a thorough knowledge of each area of the company in order to develop a competitive advantage.
Cooperative Strategy refers to a planning strategy in which two or more firms work together in order to achieve a common objective. Several companies apply cooperative strategies to increase their profits through cooperation with other companies that stop being competitors.
Michael A. Hitt is an American business management scholar, consultant, academic and author. He is a University Distinguished Professor Emeritus at Texas A&M University and a Distinguished Visiting Research Scholar at Texas Tech University.
