Developing strategies based on porter's competitive advantage theory during the process of identifying core competencies of company

ABSTRACT Competitive Advantage has gained more importance for the companies that continue their activities in an increasing competitive environment and different strategies are analyzed in order to gain sustainable competitive advantage. Companies can have sustainable competitive advantage against their rivals in the industry and earn above average income by developing differentiated products or services and create a superior value for the customer. One of the strategic approaches that is proposed for competitive advantage is the concept of "Core Competencies" which will be studied in this thesis. According to Gary Hamel and C.K.Prahalad; companies can create a superior value for the customers by developing valuable, rare, inimitable and nonsubstitutable core competencies that are unique for them in the industry. When a company has a core competence, it can achieve sustainable competitive advantage and make strategic alliances by exploiting this competence to varied customer segments, products and services. In order to obtain competitive advantage, companies should develop core competencies by becoming learning organizations. It is recommended to the companies to give priority to explore their resources and capabilities by doing internal analysis and develop core competencies, then determine their core competence based strategies according to the opportunities outside. The companies that maintain their core competencies against the changes, may become more powerful to sustain their competitive advantages in the industry. vm