War Gaming: Wind Turbine Manufacturer Needs Direction to Plan Market Entry

A  European wind turbine company needed to develop a successful strategy to expand into North America.

This meant a thorough understanding of how market influencers would react to their entry.

A war gaming exercise would help fast track their business plans and provide measures to take against these market forces.

• Created teams, each representing a key market group  (competitor, customer, government and renewable energy association).
   
• Simulated various market influencers: a) customer purchase behaviors, b) competitor pricing strategies, c) support by various renewable energy associations and d) impact of government legislation.
   
• Tested 3 entry strategies (focus on commercial market, target both residential and commercial markets or hire a distributor to sell their product).

 

Through role playing, the team members gained an intuitive understanding of the market influencers and how each of the entry strategies could play out .

This laid the foundation for a winning strategy