Strategy Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words - 2

Strategy - Essay Example Following the global financial crisis that was offset by the bursting of the housing bubble in 2008 in the USA and later followed by the global financial crisis in 2010, a lot of firms have adopted measures to deal with the reduced revenue and sales yield amidst growing competition from other firms and many of the firms have adopted competitive business strategies. Competitive business strategies facilitate a firm to sell or produce products and services with more efficiency and with the sole aim of having a competitive advantage over their competitors (Mandarini 2014). There are a variety of business strategies that are used by managers as they have choices between using set standard strategies or creating their own set of strategies and therefore it should be noted that, flexibility and innovation play a very important role in competitive business strategies. Competitive advantage is a management strategy that was first developed by Michael Porter who classified the competitive advantage of an organization as being either achieved through differentiation, or by adopting lower costs of production (Dicken 2011). Competitive advantage enables a company to gain a competitive advantage over its rivals in the market through adopting new information technology, gaining access to natural resources or highly skilled personnel. One of the companies in the last decade that has outshone its competitors due to the adoption of a strategic management strategy that places emphasis on acquiring a competitive advantage via adoption of new technology and differentiation different form other firms in the market has been Apple. In the period between 2001 and 2007 following the unveiling of the Apple iPod and Apple iPhone respectively, the company, courtesy of its CEO, Steve Jobs had shifted from its previous strategy of premium priced innovative computers, w hich was a relatively safe strategy and adopted the highly risky but profitable strategy of venturing into the extremely