- Who are out most important customers, and how can we be competitive and deliver value to them? After Amazon.com’s success selling books online, management accountants at Barnes & Noble outlined the costs and benefits of several alternative approaches for enhancing the company’s information technology infrastructure and developing the capability to sell books online. A similar cost-benefit analysis led Toyota to build flexible computer-integrated manufacturing plants that enable it to use the same equipment efficiently to produce a variety of cars in response to changing customer tastes.