Nintendo Plays with Blue Ocean Strategy and Wins

Nintendo Plays with Blue Ocean Strategy and Wins

Well, the verdict is in and it seems that the newly-released Nintendo Wii gaming console stole the Christmas show. As recently reported by the Times Online the number three player in the games world has beaten its rivals with its must-have console, the Wii. To what may we attribute Nintendo’s success? You guessed it: Blue Ocean Strategy.

In fact, you may recall an article we wrote about the Nintendo Wii back in March of last year. In that article, Perrin Kaplan, vice president of marketing and corporate affairs for Nintendo of America discussed its implementation of Blue Ocean Strategy:

Seeing a Blue Ocean is the notion of creating a market where there initially was none--going out where nobody has yet gone. Red Ocean is what our competitors do--heated competition where sales are finite and the product is fairly predictable. We’re making games that are expanding our base of consumers in Japan and America.

What were the three key elements contributing to Nintendo’s Blue Ocean Strategy success? Its focus on core business, product innovation and, lastly, technological leaps when they matter. As Paul Jackson at Forrester Research said “Nintendo seems to have stolen the high ground in terms of playability and entertainment value.”

We tip our sails to the team at Nintendo for the successful implementation of Blue Ocean Strategy. Perhaps even they were caught off guard with the extent of their success, as evidenced by the endless holiday-time queues of customers wanting to pick up a Nintendo Wii.