Adjacent Moves Use Case - Patterns of Digital Strategy using Wardley Maps

Digital hasn’t just accelerated markets — it has blurred their boundaries. Competitors no longer come from your category; they come from the outer edges.

In this next session of our year-long strategy series, we unpack one of the patterns at the core of unexpected disruption: Adjacent Moves. This is the play where newcomers enter from a neighbouring space with a product that looks harmless… until it quietly becomes the centre of gravity.

It’s how the iPod dethroned the Walkman.

How smartphones have consumed the entire mobile market.

How Tesla continues to exapt innovations from energy storage, software, and automotive engineering to rewrite what a “car company” even is.

Adjacent moves don’t feel dangerous — until they’re terminal. And most incumbents miss the threat because they’re sitting comfortably in their known "Red Ocean" (reference to Red Ocean strategies).