<P> The Resource - Based View (RBV) is an economic tool used to determine the strategic resources available to a firm . These resources can be exploited by the firm in order to achieve sustainable competitive advantage . Barney (1991) formalised this theory, although it was Wernerfelt (1984) who introduced the idea of resource position barriers being roughly analogous to entry barriers in the positioning school (see Porter, 1980). RBV proposed that firms are heterogenous because they possess heterogenous resources . </P> <P> The key points of the theory are: </P>

The resourced based view of the firm (rbv school) is