Manipulating the supply chain or monopolizing key resources to increase market entry barriers, restrict the development of competitors and expand market control is a complex business strategy that may involve illegal and irregular activities in many cases. This behavior may damage the fair competition environment and consumer interests in the market and is not worth encouraging. However, understanding its means will help to understand the unhealthy phenomenon of market competition from the opposite side. The content is for reference only: ### Manipulating the supply chain 1. **Controlling the supply of raw materials** - **Long-term contract binding**: Signing exclusive or long-term exclusive contracts with major raw material suppliers to ensure that competitors have difficulty in obtaining a stable and sufficient supply of raw materials. For example, a large steel company signed a 20-year exclusive supply contract with the world's major iron ore suppliers, which greatly restricted the acquisition of raw materials by new entrants into the steel industry. - **Acquisition of raw material suppliers**: Directly acquiring key raw material production companies, thereby fully controlling the production, distribution and pricing of raw materials. For example, a well-known electronic chip manufacturer acquired several key rare metal mining companies and monopolized the supply of special metal materials required for chip manufacturing. New entrants into the chip manufacturing field found it difficult to conduct business due to the inability to obtain raw materials. 2. **Optimize supply chain processes** - **Reduce costs and improve efficiency**: Optimize their own supply chain processes through large-scale investment, achieve significant cost reduction and significantly improve delivery efficiency. For example, an e-commerce giant invested heavily in building an advanced warehousing and logistics system that can deliver goods to all parts of the country in a short time. In contrast, it is difficult for new entrants to the e-commerce industry to build such an efficient supply chain in a short period of time, so they are at a disadvantage in terms of delivery speed and cost, and the market entry barriers are therefore increased. - **Supply chain collaboration and integration**: Strengthen deep collaboration and integration with upstream and downstream companies in the supply chain to form a close industrial ecosystem. For example, automobile manufacturers and their parts suppliers establish a highly collaborative information sharing platform to achieve seamless connection between the precise supply of parts and production plans. It is difficult for new entrants to the automotive industry to quickly integrate into such a complex and close supply chain system, and it is difficult to meet the timeliness and supporting requirements of vehicle production. 3. **Establish strategic inventory** - **Stockpiling of key parts**: Stockpiling of a large number of key parts reduces the supply in the market, creates the illusion of supply shortages, and increases the cost of competitors to obtain these parts. For example, a mobile phone manufacturer purchased a large number of key components such as mobile phone chips in advance, occupying most of the chip inventory in the market, causing other mobile phone manufacturers to face high prices and unstable supply when purchasing chips, and new entrants to the mobile phone industry found it even more difficult to obtain sufficient chip resources to start production. - **Use inventory to adjust market prices**: According to the market competition situation, flexibly adjust inventory levels to influence product prices. When competitors try to expand their market share, increase inventory and dump products at low prices to suppress competitors' price space, making it difficult for them to make profits. New entrants find it more difficult to enter the market because they cannot bear the cost pressure brought by low-price competition. ### Monopoly of key resources 1. **Control technology patents** - **Extensive patent application**: Companies invest a lot of resources in research and development, and apply for extensive patents in a timely manner after the technical results are produced, building a huge patent barrier. For example, a pharmaceutical company has applied for many patents for its new drugs and production processes, covering drug formulas, preparation methods, packaging design and other aspects, making it easy for other companies to infringe its patents when developing similar drugs, facing the risk of legal proceedings, thereby hindering competitors from entering the drug market. - **Patent licensing restrictions**: Even if there are companies that conduct research and development in related fields and achieve certain results, companies that monopolize key resources can restrict their use by setting strict patent licensing conditions. For example, requiring high patent licensing fees, complex licensing procedures, and limiting the scope of product use, it is difficult for competitors to use these technologies to commercialize products, raising the market entry threshold. 2. **Possession of scarce resources** - **Land resource monopoly**: In some industries that have high requirements for geographical location, such as real estate development, high-quality land resources are monopolized through acquisitions, long-term leases, etc. For example, a large real estate company has acquired a large amount of land reserves in the core area of the city. It is difficult for new entrants to the real estate market to obtain development land in the same high-quality area. They can only choose relatively remote or difficult-to-develop plots, which puts them at a disadvantage in project competition and greatly increases market entry barriers. - **Data resource monopoly**: In the digital economy era, data has become a key resource. Some Internet giants have a large amount of user data through long-term accumulation and integration, which is of great value for precision marketing, product optimization, etc. Newly entered Internet companies lack sufficient data resources and find it difficult to accurately grasp market demand and user preferences, and are unable to formulate effective market strategies, which limits their development in the market and consolidates the market control of monopoly companies. 3. **Control the formulation of industry standards** - **Participate in the standard-setting process**: Companies actively participate in the formulation of national or international industry standards by virtue of their leading position and influence in the industry. In the formulation process, they incorporate technical parameters and product specifications that are beneficial to themselves into the standard system, making it difficult for products that do not meet these standards to enter the market. For example, a communications equipment manufacturer led the development of a new generation of communications technology standards.