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An examination on the sustainable competitive advantage of private finance initiative projects

Teresa de Lemos (Center of Business Studies of IST, Lisboa, Portugal)
Luis Almeida (Center of Business Studies of IST, Lisboa, Portugal)
Martin Betts (School of Construction and Property Management, University of Salford, Manchester, UK)
David Eaton (School of Construction and Property Management, University of Salford, Manchester, UK)

Construction Innovation

ISSN: 1471-4175

Article publication date: 1 December 2003

1252

Abstract

The Private Finance Initiative (PFI) is a long‐term concession of services used by the UK Government to capture private capital to fund public projects. This model is being increasingly applied in Portugal and the assessment of its competitive advantage is very important to Portugal. The empiric study undertaken both in Portugal and the UK has permitted some conclusions to be drawn already. PFI has developed the way the construction industry is managed, and has increased the competitive advantage of UK construction industry acting in the four vectors of competitive advantage: innovation, quality, efficiency and attention to the client. Innovation occurred through new designs that were more efficient and cost effective through the project’s whole life cycle. There is the widespread use of management tools: whole life cycle costing, risk management and benchmarking. PFI also improved communication in the UK construction industry, forcing interaction and feedback from all stakeholders in a project.

Keywords

Citation

de Lemos, T., Almeida, L., Betts, M. and Eaton, D. (2003), "An examination on the sustainable competitive advantage of private finance initiative projects", Construction Innovation, Vol. 3 No. 4, pp. 249-259. https://doi.org/10.1108/14714170310814963

Publisher

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MCB UP Ltd

Copyright © 2003, MCB UP Limited

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