What is blue ocean strategy?

Blue ocean strategy is the idea, from Kim and Mauborgne’s book of the same name, that the biggest wins come from creating uncontested market space (“blue oceans”) rather than fighting rivals in existing, saturated markets (“red oceans”). The method: stop benchmarking competitors feature-for-feature, and instead redraw the offer — eliminate and reduce what the industry over-serves, raise and create what it ignores.

In practice, few markets are purely blue, and buyers still anchor on the alternatives they know. Even a blue-ocean play needs competitive intelligence — not to copy rivals, but to know exactly which industry assumptions you are betting against.