1 min read –

It is annoying when people give up before even trying. In business, some companies think they have no chance to compete in the Asian markets.
 
They associate Asian markets with low costs and low quality. They wrongly believe that high-end expensive products cannot be sold in Asia.
 
First, they forget that big portions of Asian populations have high income levels.
 
Second, they ignore the 2005 book of Kim and Mauborgne : “Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Market Space and Make the Competition irrelevant”.
 
A “red ocean” situation is a market where competitors kill each other on price, tapping on existing demand.
 
If the market is an ocean and companies are sharks, the water becomes bloody, you get the picture. The blue ocean strategy avoids direct confrontation with competitors. The successful company proposes innovative and differentiating products.
 
So unique that it creates a new space in the market, making the competitors irrelevant. This new space is vast and untapped, like an ocean, with no bloody shark fight : a blue ocean.
 
It looks magic but it is difficult in reality because of 4 main obstacles :
 
1 – A cognitive barrier : many companies are satisfied with status quo.
2 – Politics : stakeholders can be opposed to this new strategy.
3 – Lack of motivation : disruptive innovation calls for modification of mental patterns.
4 – Lack of resource.
 
That was for the theory. In the next post (part 2) we will take two practical examples. Stay tuned.
 
If you need a good captain to help you navigate around the Indonesian blue ocean archipelago, contact us at CINTASIA .