Leveraging the advantage of early entry: proprietary technologies versus cost leadership

This research develops the relationships between the "early mover advantage" and a firm's market share. It tests hypotheses relating a firm's strategic choices and order of entry to market share on a cross-sectional data set of 1042 French manufacturing companies. The results support the persistence of an advantage for early movers. Furthermore, the development of proprietary technologies, considered as a capability to protect in-house knowledge from competition, has a leverage effect on the advantage of early moving. Finally, if cost leadership is a relevant strategy to gain market share, it is mostly beneficial for late entrants. (C) 2002 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.