Asset Stocks and Sustained Competitive Advantage: A Comment

Abstract

In their paper, Dierickx and Cool suggest that the strategic factor markets model developed in Barney (Barney, J. B. 1986a. Strategic factor markets: Expectations, luck, and business strategy. Management Sci. (October) 1231–1241.) cannot be applied in the analysis of sustained competitive advantages due to asset stocks accumulated over time. In this comment, it is shown that the discussion of asset stocks extends and complements, rather than limits, the strategic factor markets model. This is done by analyzing how the strategic factor markets model can be used to examine the cost of accumulating asset stocks over long periods of time, and how these costs will compare to the value of strategies that are implemented exploiting these asset stocks.