ed to complement that of 'competitive advantage'. A special case was the phenomenon of 'second-mover advantage', where the first-mover actually incurs a disadvantage. This may arise variously because the pioneer increases the knowledge available about the application (hence driving the risks down); establishes a level of volume (and hence overcomes resistance and drives average costs down); and/or becomes locked into a system which quickly becomes obsolescent (and hence is subject to being overtaken by a well-informed and unencumbered second-mover). A distinction came to be drawn between 'sustainable' and 'contestable' competitive advantage (Clemons 1986, Feeny & Ives 1989, Ciborra 1992). The thesis was that many kinds of advantage which can possibly be derived from innovative use of IT result only in ephemeral advantage, which is quickly neutralisable by second- and later-movers. A distinction needs to be made between the sustainability of the original advantage, and of any derived advantage (such as increased market share). An enhancement to the Porter framework of competitive strategy was the notion of 'alliance' (Barrett & Konsynski 1982, Gummesson 1987, EDP Analyzer 1987, Johnston & Vitale 1988, Rockart & Short 1989, Wiseman 1989, Konsynski & McFarlan 1990, Ford 1990, Bowersox 1990). This referred to chains or clusters of organisations which collaborate in order to gain competitive advantage over other, similar organisations, or to neutralise the advantage of one or more competitor organisations. A further idea which has emerged is that innovation in IT is of strategic importance only if it is compatible with, and preferably leverages upon the company's existing characteristics and advantages (Beath & Ives 1986, Clemons & Row 1987, Ives & Vitale 1988, Hopper 1990). One particularly important facet of this is the notion of 'strategic alignment' of IT policies and initiatives with the directions indicated by the corporation's senior ...
