The European Business Review

COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE THROUGH SOFTWARE: Contrasting Enterprises & Startups

I have an interesting vantage point whereby one portion of my professional life I work in the innovation scene with startups and entrepreneurs, in the other, my company service medium to large enterprises with digital transformation. There are expected differences between these two commercial segments, but in the area of software use and digital strategies, the former is performing considerably better than the latter.

As the world increasingly becomes driven by software and algorithms, corporations still find themselves playing the cost optimisation game, where IT is a means to that end. Meanwhile, startups are gaining an advantage by configuring and investing in their own software unique to them.

Startups and enterprises are often at opposite ends for obvious reasons. On one hand, you have entrepreneurs, aspiring innovators from university or industry-backed incubators, who have (mostly) nothing to lose and everything to gain. They are agile, experiment frequently and can happily pivot when needed.

On the other hand, enterprises with existing - often mature - products to protect, find it hard to adapt their business models. Adding to the common understanding just mentioned, this article explores

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