What are key resources in a business model?
Key resources are the most important assets a company needs in order to create and deliver what it offers. Without them, the business model would not work. The idea is best known as one of the nine building blocks of the Business Model Canvas, a planning tool popularised by Alexander Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur. In the canvas, key resources sit alongside other blocks such as value proposition, customer segments, and key activities.
Not every asset is a key resource. The question to ask is: which assets are essential, and what would stop the business from operating or competing if they were lost?
Types of key resources
The canvas commonly groups key resources into four types.
Physical resources
Tangible assets such as buildings, machinery, vehicles, equipment, stock, and distribution networks. A manufacturer relies on factories and machines, and a retailer on shops and warehouses.
Intellectual resources
Intangible assets such as brands, patents, copyrights, proprietary data, software, and customer lists. A software company might depend on its code and a drinks brand on its name and recipe. These resources overlap with the intangible benefits discussed elsewhere in this cluster.
Human resources
The people, skills, and knowledge a business relies on. Workforce management terms covers how that is planned and measured. This matters most in knowledge-heavy and creative industries, such as consulting, design, or research.
Financial resources
Cash, credit lines, and other funding that let the business operate and invest. A business that needs large upfront spending may treat access to capital as a key resource. How long that cash lasts is often described as runway.
Examples by business type
These are simplified illustrations.
- Online marketplace: its platform and software, its user base, and the engineers who maintain it.
- Restaurant: premises, kitchen equipment, skilled chefs, and a good reputation.
- Consulting firm: experienced staff, methods, and client relationships.
- Delivery company: vehicles, routing technology, and drivers.
- Pharmaceutical firm: patents, laboratories, and research scientists.
Key resources versus other terms
- Key resources vs key activities. Resources are what you have; activities are what you do with them.
- Key resources vs competitive advantage. A resource becomes an advantage mainly when it is valuable and hard for others to copy. Not all key resources achieve this.
- Key resources vs sources of business ideas. People sometimes mix these up. Sources of business ideas, such as personal experience, customer problems, and market gaps, are where ideas start, whereas key resources are what a model needs once it is running.
How to identify your key resources
- Write down your value proposition: what you promise customers. (see business plan vs business model)
- Ask which assets are needed to deliver it reliably.
- Separate the essential assets from the merely useful.
- Group them into physical, intellectual, human, and financial.
- Note which are owned, leased, or borrowed from partners.
- Identify the risks, such as dependence on one supplier or one key person.
Managing and protecting key resources
- Maintain and replace physical assets on a planned schedule.
- Protect intellectual property through suitable legal means, ideally with professional advice.
- Retain and develop key staff, and avoid knowledge sitting with one person.
- Plan funding so cash does not become a constraint.
- Consider partnerships when owning a resource is too costly.
Resources also interact with the business drivers that shape results, and the ability to expand them smoothly affects how scalable the business is.
Key takeaways
- Key resources are the essential assets a business model depends on.
- The four common types are physical, intellectual, human, and financial.
- Identify them by starting with your value proposition and asking what is truly essential.
- Dependence on a single resource is a risk worth planning for.