View source for Best of breed

'''Best of breed''' (BoB) is a [[product]] or [[service]] ''best in its class''. The [[company]] may want to obtain best of breed equipment, software, patent. It can give [[competitive advantage]], because customers usually prefer the best [[quality]] products and services<ref>Light, B., Holland, C. P., Wills, K., 2001, p. 216-224</ref>. However, there are also downsides of having best of breed products. What is interesting, this term is used more often in IT more than in other economic fields.

==Advantages and disadvantages of BoB==
As it was said earlier, there may occur many different approaches about using best of breed products and services, because there are some advantages and disadvantages, everything depends on what is crucial for the specific company.
* best of breed products are usually '''expensive'''. Before making purchase the company should analyze potential [[cost]] and benefits<ref>Constantinos S. 1999, p. 2-4 </ref>. In many cases buying best of breed product won't be as profitable as it looked at first glance,
* often high cost goes for high '''quality''', so the company should consider BoB if it wanhs to be associated with quality, 
* the best of breed products often are '''not compatible''' with older ones. If the company buys new equipment for [[production line]], there can be a problem with compatibility. In case of software, interfaces often don't [[work]] as supposed. Before purchase the company should ''analyze compatibility'' of the products,
* best of breed products may be ''highly desired'' by customers, that's way sometimes it's very hard to buy them, so because of limited purchase, they may become a '''luxury good'''. Hence, sometimes it is necessary to wait a long time after making the order<ref>Light B., Holland Ch. P., Kelly S., Willis K., 2000, p.2-7</ref>,
* if the company offers best of breed products, it makes the impression of better than the others, and, consequently it's '''better placed''' on a '''competitive market'''. 
* if the necessity of any kind of ''[[merger]]'' appears, it is easier to integrate the systems between companies which are on the similar technological level. Even if only one of them uses BoB, their '''infrastructure''' helps with formal issues<ref>Light B., Holland Ch. P., Kelly S., Willis K., 2000, p.2-7</ref>.

==Best of breed systems==
Then it comes to IT systems - ''best of bread'' means, that the system is created of individually designed components - applications<ref>Hermann S. A., Pharm. D., 2010, p. 1-3</ref>. Each one has its own base with data. In big companies, or those with numerous departments, where everyone has to use the best quality programme, servers are overflowing with memory of so many databases. There's a solution for this: ''integrated systems''<ref> Burchi F., Fanzo J., Frison E., 2010, p.358-373</ref>. There are numerous of applications providing similar solutions - so the [[market]] is highly competitive. In integrated systems approach, the company resigns from the best quality (BoB) of the programmes in favour of getting many applications in one system with just one [[database]]. 

==Examples of Best of breed==
# ''' Software''': Microsoft Office, Adobe Creative Suite, and Slack are all examples of best of breed software. Microsoft Office is considered the gold [[standard]] of office productivity suites while Adobe Creative Suite is the premier set of tools for digital media [[production]] and Slack is a powerful collaboration platform for teams.
# ''' Hardware''': Apple Macbook Pros and Apple iPhones are two of the most popular best of breed hardware products. MacBook Pros are considered the premier laptop for creative professionals and Apple iPhones are the most popular smartphones in the world.
# ''' Patents''': Tesla, Inc. has a number of best of breed patents related to electric vehicle [[technology]]. These patents, combined with Tesla's other innovations, has helped the company become one of the most valuable automakers in the world.
# ''' Services''': Amazon Web Services (AWS) is one of the most popular best of breed [[cloud computing]] services. AWS provides a wide range of services and tools to help customers build and scale their applications quickly and cost-effectively.

==Other approaches related to Best of breed==
Best of breed is not the only approach when it comes to choosing products or services. There are several other approaches which could be beneficial as well, such as:
* [[Horizontal integration]] - This approach is when a company seeks to acquire products or services from different suppliers in order to create a single unified offering. It allows for greater flexibility and cost savings.
* [[Vertical integration]] - This approach is when a company seeks to acquire products or services from the same [[supplier]] in order to create a single unified offering. It can reduce costs and time to market, while also allowing for better control over the quality of the product.
* Strategic partnerships - This approach is when two or more companies join forces to create a single unified offering. It allows for greater flexibility in terms of [[product development]] and cost savings.

In summary, best of breed is just one approach when it comes to choosing products or services. There are several other approaches which may be beneficial as well such as horizontal integration, vertical integration and strategic partnerships.

==Footnotes==
<references />

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==References==
* Andrews S., (2012). [https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0020025514009918 ''A ‘Best-of-Breed’ approach for designing a fast algorithm for computing fixpoints of Galois Connections''], [[Information]] Sciences, Vol. 295, 20 Feb. 2015, 633-649
* Burchi F., Fanzo J., Frison E., (2010). [https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/8/2/358/pdf ''The Role of Food and Nutrition System Approaches in Tackling Hidden Hunger''], Public Health 2011, 8(2), 358-373
* Constantinos S. (1999). [https://aisel.aisnet.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1633&context=amcis1999 ''Supply Chain Management (SCM) and Organizational Key Factors for Successful Implementation of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Systems''], AMCIS 1999 Proceedings. 276, 2-4
* Ferrández O., South B. R., Shen Sh., Friedlin F. J., Samore M. H., Meystre S. M., (2013). [https://academic.oup.com/jamia/article/20/1/77/730648 ''BoB, a best-of-breed automated text de-identification system for VHA clinical documents''], Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association, Volume 20, Issue 1, Jan. 2013, 77-83
* Hermann S. A., Pharm. D., (2010). [https://academic.oup.com/ajhp/article/67/17/1406/5130666 ''Best-of-breed versus integrated systems''], American Journal of Health-[[System]] Pharmacy, Volume 67, Issue 17, 1 Sep. 2010, 1-3
* Light B., Holland Ch. P., Kelly S., Willis K., (2000). [https://aisel.aisnet.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1191&context=ecis2000 ''Best of Breed IT Strategy: An Alternative to Enterprise Resource Planning Systems''], ECIS 2000 Proceedings. 180, 2-7
* Light, B., Holland, C. P., Wills, K. (2001). [https://eprints.qut.edu.au/75725/3/75725.pdf ''ERP and best of breed: a comparative analysis''], Business [[Process]] [[Management]] Journal, 7(3). 216-224

{{a|Anna Włodarczyk}}
[[Category:Information management]]