Blue Ocean Strategy

Cirque du Soleil succeeded because it realized that to win in the future, companies must stop competing with each other. The only way to beat the competition is to stop trying to beat the competition.

Competition-based red ocean strategy assumes that an industry’s structural conditions are given and that firms are forced to compete within them, an assumption based on what the academics call the structuralist view, or environmental determinism.

To fundamentally shift the strategy canvas of an industry, you must begin by reorienting your strategic focus from competitors to alternatives, and from customers to noncustomers of the industry.

A step-by-step model for creating strategy.

Competition should not occupy the center of strategic thinking.

The creators of blue oceans, surprisingly, didn’t use the competition as their benchmark.17 Instead, they followed a different strategic logic that we call value innovation. Value innovation is the cornerstone of blue ocean strategy. We call it value innovation because instead of focusing on beating the competition, you focus on making the competit

These six assumptions, on which most companies hypnotically build their strategies, keep companies trapped competing in red oceans. Specifically, companies tend to do the following: Define their industry similarly and focus on being the best within it Look at their industries through the lens of generally accepted strategic groups (such as luxury a

Industry structure is not given; it can be shaped.

Strategic creativity can be unlocked systematically.