Reconceptualizing Imitation: Implications for Dynamic Capabilities, Innovation, and Competitive Advantage

Strategic imitation occurs when a firm purposefully attempts to reproduce, in whole or part, other firms’ products, processes, capabilities, technologies, structures, and/or decisions in its pursuit of competitive advantage. Imitation is a pervasive firm behavior, and the literature relating to imitation is growing rapidly. In the resource-based view, for example, imitation is core because it is assumed to undermine inter-firm performance heterogeneity and erode leaders’ competitive advantage. We argue that work on imitation is circumscribed by a core set of assumptions: imitation is easy, weak firms imitate, uncertainty promotes imitation, and there is only one imitation strategy. We review the origins and implications of these assumptions in the extant literature, and, more importantly, expose a set of emerging counter-assumptions. In light of these counter-assumptions, we propose foundations for a new conceptual model of imitation that focuses on evolutionary dynamics. We suggest that imitation may be a key source of dynamic capabilities and innovation, and in turn it gives rise to competitive advantage.