In his booklet on Leadership, Tom Peters makes the statement that Leaders create their own Market Space.YouTube, Wal-Mart, Salesforce.com, SAP, Microsoft, Amazon, Google and Apple are all examples of leaders who have created their own market space where none existed. Companies who have had phenomenal success from line extensions are much harder to find.
This is a short list of Leaders in consulting who are creating new and intriguing market spaces, some are doing so off the back of other innovations - but we still see this as market creating because they are "first movers" in their areas.
Astadia - carving out a niche in on-demand software services is not so difficult today. The world is on fire with interest in SaaS applications, so consultants are pushing against an open door.
But part of the reason why is because Astadia picked up the ball several years ago when nobody was working in this space. Back when Salesforce.com was still seen as a curiosity by some, and virtually unknown to most.
Astadia CEO Ernie Riddle has had the vision to bring the company to a position where they hold a leadership position in the field. (Having been the ones to define this market space originally)
They have recently secured $7 million in additional funding from Kodiak Venture Partners for organic growth, validating their vision and focus, they have a prescence in the USA and Europe, they are the biggest partner of Salesforce.com and they have a large number of applications on the Appexchange.
Astadia were way ahead of the curve on this one. They continue to grow through a combination of Salesforce.com training, building and distributing niche AppExchange products, and providing SaaS consultancy work for their clients globally.
Meridium - This company is not widely known of outside of its chosen market sector of physical asset management. Asset maintenance has been awash with point solutions for performance, and even their own brands of ERP systems. (EAM systems)
Yet amid this cacophony of solutions, company founder Bonz Hart saw a need for a system that would combine ALL point solutions in a seamless platform, one that would sit on the back of a companies ERP system, and would be able to make use of the sea of data that transactional systems generate.
And it worked...
Today Meridium counts among its client base some of the world largest asset-intensive organizations including RIO-TINTO, PEMEX, Dow Chemicals, SABIC and Excel Energy. They have an international operation with bases in the USA, Australia and the Persian Gulf, and they continue to generate a healthy pipeline of new sales and repeat work.
VRWorkplace - a consultancy founded to assist other companies to take full advantage of Virtual Worlds like Second Life.
Although a new venture, founder Dave Elchoness has a passionate and contagious vision of virtual societies where companies are able to beat the tyranny of distance and conduct "face to face" meetings with clients all over the world.
The potential is breathtaking, the reality has yet to be realized. We wish him well as a Leader creating new market spaces.
WSP Environment - The Environment as a fertile area for service consulting has been an obvious choice for well over a decade.
But it was Brad Blundell, MD of WSP Environment who cracked the code on how to make it a growing and successful venture.
At the base a well oiled machine serving High volume, low cost works at high quality, at the top a recognised brand that is called upon for high profile work such as establishing the carbon footprint at national levels, and in the middle a slew of innovative approaches such as Energy Efficiency services hitting niche markets with astounding accuracy.
Acquisitions of Environmental Strategies Consulting in the USA, along with three acquisitions in Australia, give WSP Environment the capability to support clients in Europe, the Asia Pacific, and into the Americas. A truly global Environmental consulting brand poised to reap the benefits of increased awareness throughout the world.
A very short list of companies that have come up under our radar. All are forging ahead in areas where nobody else is, or they are leaders in a space that they themselves opened. A testament to their vision and courage.
What's next? There are avenues that are screaming out for leadership either in terms of innovative products, services or business models. Leveraging data sources, Web 2.0 consulting, virtual outsourcing, and new ways to deliver old services.
Creating new market space is always fraught with risk, and we salute those who have tried and won the day. Who realy knows what tomorrow will bring.
Yahoo was great until Google gave "search" a make-over, CRM was huge until Salesforce.com sold the message that on-demand was the best way to deliver it, and telephones was a saturated market - until the iPhone.
