Whether an industry presents a company with good prospects for attractive growth and profitability

is best gauged by how many industry members are currently making money and how many are losing money and whether the average profitability of industry members has risen or fallen over the past five years.

depends almost entirely on whether a company has the resources and competitive capabilities to capture the industry's most appealing market opportunities.

involves $($a$)$ using a strategic group map to determine which strategic groups are likely to enjoy good profits in the future and which ones are likely to experience weak profitability and $($b$)$ determining if a company's strategy incorporates at least $5$ of the industry's key success factors.

hinges in part on such considerations as the industry's growth potential, the anticipated strength of competitive forces, whether the company is strongly or weakly positioned on the industry's strategic group map, and whether and to what degree industry profitability will be favorably or unfavorably affected by the industry's driving forces.

is chiefly determined by how favorably the company is impacted by factors in the outer ring of its macro$-$environment.