This study seeks to understand how the interplay between Market Orientation, Firm strategy and Performance is developed over time. In order to study the interplay, I build a model on industry and company evolution by adopting a Variation, Selection and Retention (VSR) analysis of a telecom company and industry 1980-2010 in Finland market. The evolution of telecom industry and a case company is manifested in innovations and strategy in a company and respectively in the basis of competition in the market. In addition, what capabilities and resources a company can use successfully when innovating and developing products and services, and how those capabilities and resources change over time are of interest. A longitudinal (1980-2010) abductive case study of a telecom company’s offerings and strategy was made. Company’s spearhead innovations, managerial cognition and strategy were studied in a longitudinal setting. The theoretical contributions of the study are to discover Market Orientation payoff is context and industry life-cycle specific. Secondly, Market Orientation has potential adverse effects on Firm Performance, and what is the most important, Market Orientation as a sole source of innovation activity has a permanent influence on company’s comparative advantage in the market.

• Henrik Sievers(Aalto University)