Traditional and Innovative Path towards Time-Based Competition

Time performances and time-based competition concepts are analyzed, introducing three types of time-based competitors. A traditional and an innovative path towards time-based competition are then recognized, the former achievable by over-resource applying, while the latter by practices related to just-in-time and concurrent engineering. It is explained how making a firm structurally faster leads a company to face a `conversion dilemma', i.e. to choose the proper strategic orientation that can be definitely regarded as affecting its external configuration, visible to the market, or only the internal one, transforming the time advantage into a cost one. Finally a matrix linking market sensitivity to external time performances and competitor typologies is proposed.