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Porter's 5-Forces Model

PORTER'S 5-FORCES MODEL
A means of providing corporations with an analysis of their competition and determining strategy, Porter's five-forces model looks at the strength of five distinct competitive forces, which, when taken together, determine long-term profitability and competition. Porter's work has had a greater influence on business strategy than any other theory in the last half of the twentieth century, and his more recent work may have a similar impact on global competition.
Michigan native Michael Porter was born in 1947, was educated at Princeton, and earned an MBA (1971) and Ph.D. (1973) from Harvard. He was promoted to full professor at Harvard at age 34 and is currently C. Roland Christensen Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School. He has published numerous books and articles, the first Interbrand Choice, Strategy and Bilateral Market Power, appearing in 1976. His best known and most widely used and referenced books are Competitive Strategy (1980) and Competitive Advantage (1985). Competitive Strategy revolutionized contemporary approaches to business strategy through application of the five-forces model. In Competitive Advantage, Porter further developed his strategy concepts to include the creation of a sustainable advantage. His other model, the value chain model, centers on product added value. Porter's work is widely read by business strategists around the world as well as business students. Any MBA student recognizes his name as one of the icons of business literature. The Strategic Management Society named Porter the most important living strategist in 1998, and Kevin Coyne of the consulting firm McKinsey and Co. called Porter "the single most important strategist working today, and maybe of all time."
The five-forces model was developed in Porter's 1980 book, Competitive Strategy: Techniques for Analyzing Industries and Competitors. To Porter, the classic means of developing a strategy—a formula for competition,...