What is an advantage that is realized by a company as a part of first mover advantage quizlet?

A first mover is a service or product that gains a competitive advantage by being the first to market with a product or service. Being first typically enables a company to establish strong brand recognition and customer loyalty before competitors enter the arena. Other advantages include additional time to perfect its product or service and setting the market price for the new item.

First movers in an industry are almost always followed by competitors that attempt to capitalize on the first mover's success and gain market share. Most often, the first mover has established sufficient market share and a solid enough customer base that it maintains the majority of the market.

Key Takeaways

• A first mover is a company that gains a competitive advantage by being the first to bring a new product or service to the market.
• First movers typically establish strong brand recognition and customer loyalty.
• The advantages of first movers include time to develop economies of scale—cost-efficient ways of producing or delivering a product.
• The disadvantages of first movers include the risk of products being copied or improved upon by the competition.
• Amazon and eBay are examples of companies that enjoy first-mover status.

Examples of First Movers

Businesses with a first-mover advantage include innovators, Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) and eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY). Amazon created the first online bookstore, which was immensely successful. By the time other retailers established an online bookstore presence, Amazon had achieved significant brand recognition and parlayed its first-mover advantage into marketing a range of additional, unrelated products. According to Forbes's "" 2019 ranking, Amazon ranks second. It has annual revenues of $280 billion and, through the end of 2019, had a 20% annual sales growth rate.

eBay built the first meaningful online auction website in 1995 and continues to be a popular shopping site worldwide. It ranked 43rd on the Forbes list of innovative companies. The company generates $287 billion in annual revenues, with a 2.8% annual sales growth rate.

Advantages of First Movers

Being the first to develop and market a product comes with many prime advantages that strengthen a company's position in the marketplace. For example, a first-mover often gains exclusive agreements with suppliers, sets industry standards, and develops strong relationships with retailers. Other advantages include

• Brand name recognition is the main first-mover advantage. Not only does it engender loyalty among existing customers, but it also draws new customers to a company's product, even after other companies have entered the market. Brand name recognition also positions companies to diversify offerings and services. Examples of dominant brand name recognition of a first-mover include soft drink colossus Coca-Cola (NYSE: KO), auto-additive giant STP (NYSE: ENR), and boxed-cereal titan Kellogg (NYSE: K).
• Economies of scale, particularly those regarding manufacturing or technology-based products, is a massive advantage for first movers. The first mover in an industry has a longer learning curve, which frequently enables it to establish a more cost-efficient means of producing or delivering a product before it competes with other businesses.
• Switching costs let a first-mover build a strong business foundation. Once a customer has purchased the first mover's product, switching to a rival product may be cost-prohibitive. For example, a company using the Windows operating system likely would not change to another operating system, because of the costs associated with retraining employees, among other costs. 

Disadvantages of First Movers

Despite the many advantages associated with being a first mover, there are also disadvantages. For example, other businesses can copy and improve upon a first mover's products, thereby capturing the first mover's share of the market.

It costs approximately 60% to 75% less to replicate a product than it costs to create a new product.

Also, often in the race to be the first to market, a company may forsake key product features to expedite production. If the market responds unfavorably, then later entrants could capitalize on the first mover's failure to produce a product that aligns with consumer interests; and the cost to create versus the cost to imitate is significantly disproportionate. 

Microsoft has responded to a list of concerns regarding its ongoing $68bn attempt to buy Activision Blizzard, as raised by the UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), and come up with an interesting statistic.

In response to continued questions over whether Microsoft owning Call of Duty would unfairly hobble PlayStation, Microsoft claimed that every COD player on PlayStation could move over to Xbox, and Sony's playerbase would still remain "significantly larger" than its own.

Microsoft does not go into detail on its mental arithmetic here, but does note elswhere in its comments that PlayStation currently has a console install base of 150 million, compared to Xbox's install base of 63.7 million.

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That claim is part of a range of comments given to Eurogamer sister site GamesIndustry.biz in response to the CMA's latest report, which otherwise mostly repeats many of the same concerns raised by the UK regulator - and others around the world - already.

For those following the case, the CMA's latest intervention will not come as a surprise - it is the next step on the regulator's recent roadmap for how and when it will weigh in with its final ruling. This month, we were due the CMA's October "issues statement" - and it seems that this is the document to which Microsoft has now publicly responded.

The usual topics are covered - surrounding the potential for the deal to harm competitors should Microsoft gain too much of an advantage owning Activision Blizzard franchises (mainly, Call of Duty) and therefore being able to leverage their brand power to become a dominant market leader in the console market and cloud streaming.

Specifically, the CMA sees potential for the deal to harm Sony but also other streaming services such as Google (perhaps a moot point now), Amazon and Nvidia.

"Having full control over this powerful catalogue, especially in light of Microsoft's already strong position in gaming consoles, operating systems, and cloud infrastructure, could result in Microsoft harming consumers by impairing Sony's – Microsoft's closest gaming rival – ability to compete," the CMA wrote, "as well as that of other existing rivals and potential new entrants who could otherwise bring healthy competition through innovative multi-game subscriptions and cloud gaming services."

In response, Microsoft said such "unsupported theories of harm" were not enough to even warrant the CMA's current Phase 2 investigation - which was triggered on 1st September.

"The suggestion that the incumbent market leader, with clear and enduring market power, could be foreclosed by the third largest provider as a result of losing access to one title is not credible," Microsoft told GamesIndustry.biz.

"While Sony may not welcome increased competition, it has the ability to adapt and compete. Gamers will ultimately benefit from this increased competition and choice.

"Should any consumers decide to switch from a gaming platform that does not give them a choice as to how to pay for new games (PlayStation) to one that does (Xbox), then that is the sort of consumer switching behavior that the CMA should consider welfare enhancing and indeed encourage. It is not something that the CMA should be trying to prevent."

The CMA is due to notify Microsoft of its provisional findings in January 2023, at which point it can seek possible remedies to any sticking points raised. The regulator's final report - and overall ruling - will then be published no later than 1st March next year.

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