The Future of Competition: Co-Creating Unique Value with Customers.

• Author: Marshall, Jeffrey
• Position: BookShelf - Brief Article - Book Review

The Future of Competition: Co-Creating Unique Value with Customers. By C.K. Prahalad and Venkat Ramaswamy. Harvard Business School Press, 257 pages. $29.95.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

If theory is made king, books like The Future of Competition are destined for a coronation. It doesn't offer really specific, actionable advice, but asks executives to look at the world differently--at "the emerging concept of a market" that positions consumers as the co-creator of a market, along with the companies that serve it.

In effect, write Prahalad and Ramaswamy--professors of business administration and marketing, respectively, at the University of Michigan Business School--value is no longer being created only by the company, but by the company and its customers. As such, these co-creation experiences are the basis of value, not the traditional product-centric view that held the company's products and services alone created that value.

"A few progressive firms are starting to recognize that they must engender dialogue with networks of consumers playing active roles in co-creating...