Blue Ocean Strategy Customer's Review By J. Revel

By J. Revel (USA) - See all my reviews

Blue Ocean Strategy is described as the creation of new markets; where market space is uncontested; where the competition becomes irrelevant; and where the tendency to engage in value-cost trade-off is broken. It was written by W. Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne.
The book takes the reader through a descriptive analysis of the Blue Ocean Strategy. However, I feel it fails to make a convincing case for maintaining a competitive advantage in the long run, even though it attempts to do so in its conclusion "The sustainability and Renewal of Blue Ocean Strategy". For example, it defends the Blue Ocean Strategy by demonstrating how CNN and its 24 hour news business model, was ridiculed by the major networks as an unsustainable business model. The authors point out that "ridicule does not inspire rapid imitation". Perhaps they are right, but for how long? A few years later we now have MSNB, CNBC and the new ratings king, for now anyway, Fox News. You could make a point that Fox News actually benefited from NOT being the Blue Ocean innovator.

Also, the risks of the Blue Ocean Strategy are not discussed extensively. There is something to be said about joining a crowded market (red ocean) and competing by improving the value proposition minimally. Most business people dream of creating this elusive "Blue Ocean" where there is no competition, however, I would venture to speculate that for every successful blue ocean strategy there are hundreds of failures that could have had a better result had they decided to compete in an established market.

We all admire the Blue Ocean creators for their vision and value to the marketplace and this book describes some of the advantages of creating such an enterprise quite well. The authors do get you thinking creatively and they do a fabulous job analyzing their Blue Ocean companies and how they broke from the status quo by their focus on value innovation.

Blue Ocean has made it into the vernacular of the business world. I am surprised how often I have heard and used this term to describe the creation of a new market.
Enjoy!