How could IT provide a competitive advantage to a business?

The simple fact that a company has IT cannot provide it with a
competitive advantage because essentially every firm of any size has IT. What can provide a
competitive advantage is IT that is better than that of
competitors.

The link below tells us that there are many advantages
to having IT. It says that

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Examples of IT's benefits to different areas of an
enterprise include:

• timely and efficient delivery of
  products and services


• higher sales through better understanding of
  customer behaviors


• cost savings from fewer staff hours and reduced
  human or machine error


• better resource planning through detailed,
  accurate, and timely financial
  information.

Looking at
this list, you can see where having better IT than your competitors would be
useful.

If your IT system is better, you might have a superior
database telling you what your customers like to buy, at what price, at what time of year, and
other information like that. This could help you to better plan what sort of inventory to have
available. If you have a better IT system, less time will be wasted on mistakes. This will mean
that you will have lower labor costs per unit of output.

Since IT
is, as the link says, the "lifeblood" of any major firm, having better IT clearly is a
competitive advantage.