INTERNATIONAL COMPETITIVENESS - ASSESSING AND EXPLORING COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE BY OCEAN CONTAINER CARRIERS

Container shipping is a mature global service industry. The competitiv e pressures of the past several years and the current recession have t riggered a re-examination of competitive strategy by most container ca rriers. The strategies being discussed are service differentiation, th e addition of new value-added services and total quality management. B ut will these provide a carrier with a firm-specific competitive advan tage which is also sustainable? This paper introduces a process for id entifying the sources of competitive advantage for firms in the indust ry and how these sources may be used to ensure survival in the coming decade. The paper then evaluates the strategies likely to be successfu l in the long term and the type of firm which might exploit them.