1. Suppose you are a manager being asked to develop computer-based applications to gain a competitive advantage in an important market for your com-pany. What reservations might you have about doing so? Why?

2. How could a business use information technology to increase switching costs and lock in its cus¬tomers and suppliers? Usc business examples to support your answers.

3. How could a business leverage its investment in information technology to build strategic IT capa-bilities that serve as a barrier to new entrants into its markets?

4. Review the Real World Challenge introduced in the chapter. In such a major transformative project where no one can really envision what the end product (or end company) will look like, how should organizations set out to create these technology-enabled solutions? What kind of approaches would work best? Wont?

5. What strategic role can information play in busi-ness process reengineering?

6. How can Internet technologies help a business form strategic alliances with its customers, suppliers, and others?

7. How could a business use Internet technologies to form a virtual company or become an agile competitor?

8. Consider the Real World Solution discussed in the chapter. Do you think CenterPoint Properties' success is the result of the new business model or the new technology deployed to support it (i.e., CUB)? Is it possible to distinguish one from the other? What are the implications for other com-panies as they seek to reinvent themselves in the future?

9. Information technology can't really give a company a strategic advantage because most competitive advantages don't last more than a few years and soon become strategic necessities that just raise the stakes of the game. Discuss.

10. MIS author and consultant Peter Keen says: 'We have learned that it is not technology that creates a competitive edge, but the management process that exploits technology." What dots he mean? Do you agree or disagree? Why?