Is it possible for a firm at a competitive disadvantage to recover its competitive advantage again? In the existing study, it is considered possible for a firm at a product development disadvantage to come back as long as it is superior in the business system. Then, is it possible for a firm to become competitive advantage again when it is behind both in the product development and in the business system? Based on a preposition set up by Kagono in 1999 and one by Kagono and Inoue in 2004, I have concluded a hypothesis that "A firm can recover its competitive advantage even from a disadvantaged position in product development and business system, as long as it can manage to reform its business system by making good use of the existing management resources, by creating a structure where such resources are well used and by improving the ability to utilize such resources." I am going to verify this hypothesis on Menicon's MELSPLAN which is a specific case where a business system has been successfully reformed at a certain level. Menicon has created a new business system, "MELSPLAN", by redefining its business so that it can recover its competitive advantage. Menicon has managed to turn its operation to surplus from deficit by generating member's fee by increasing the members, and as a result it became competitive again within a certain area. I prove that it is possible for a firm to recover its competitive advantage by differentiating itself from others by constructing new business system, even after its products and business system are fallen behind.
