Strategic Market Management, 10th Edition

CHAPTER TWELVE

Leveraging the Business

Results are gained by exploiting opportunities, not by solving problems.

—Peter Drucker

The more opportunities I seize, the more opportunities multiply before me.

—Sun Tzu

The most dangerous moment comes with victory.

—Napoleon

Ultimately, growth avenues outside the existing business need to be explored. While it is risky to leave the comfort of the familiar and the tested, it also removes the ceiling on the firm's growth potential. There is virtually unlimited potential when you agree to extend the business.

The goal discussed in this chapter is to leverage the existing business into new product markets. The assets and competencies of the business, in particular, are potential sources of advantage in a new marketplace. The capabilities around marketing skills, distribution clout, developing and manufacturing products, R&D, and brand equities are among the potential bases for advantage for a new growth business. The idea is to build on the core business to create a synergy. The challenge, though, is to achieve real synergy with real impact on the customer value proposition, costs, or investments. Too often, apparent synergy is not realized.

The spectrum of available choices can be categorized generally as to how removed they are from the core business. Those that are close will represent less risk and have the greatest chance of leveraging business assets and competencies to achieve a real advantage. As more distance is allowed from the current ...