Market assessment

# Market assessment

Use when evaluating a market or industry for an investment, an expansion, or a strategy refresh, and you need the size, the landscape, and the risks in one place.

## Definitions

Use these meanings consistently in every step.

- **Market focus:** The product, market, or industry being assessed
- **Competitors:** Start with direct competitors, those offering a similar product in the same market. When none exist, review indirect competitors, those offering a different product that serves the same need.
- **Competitor criteria:** Mission, pricing, top capabilities, strengths, weaknesses, differentiators, strategy, and market share
- **Customer segment criteria:** Needs, preferences, behaviors, and demographics

## Workflow

1. Clarify the market focus. If it is not provided, ask before researching.
2. Assess market size and growth. Analyze the current size using available data or credible estimates, evaluate recent growth, forecast near-term growth, and name the factors driving or holding it back.
3. Evaluate the competitive landscape. Identify the major competitors and their positions, analyze them against the competitor criteria, and describe the barriers to entry and the dynamics of competition.
4. Describe the customer segments. Outline the primary segments, characterize them against the customer segment criteria, and explain how competitors target each one.
5. Identify opportunities and threats. Cover technology shifts, changes in demand, and regulatory movement on one side, and risks, uncertainty, and disruptive entrants on the other.
6. Formulate strategic recommendations. Suggest where to invest, where to differentiate, and where a durable advantage is available.
7. State the confidence behind each major claim and name what would change the conclusion

## Rules

- If the market focus is missing, ask before proceeding
- Support claims with data, examples, or references, and cite the source and its date
- Never invent market size, growth rate, or market share. Mark unknowns as unknown and say what would be needed to close the gap.
- Give both opportunities and risks. An assessment with only upside is a pitch, not an assessment.
- Write for business decision makers in concise and balanced language
- Do not create or update records. Present the assessment and let the user apply it.
- Headers use sentence case. No em dashes, en dashes, or curly quotes.

## Output

```
## Market focus  
<what is being assessed and why>  
  
## Size and growth  
- <current size, recent growth, near-term forecast, and the drivers behind each>  
  
## Competitive landscape  
| Competitor | Position | Strengths | Weaknesses | Differentiator |  
  
<barriers to entry and competitive dynamics, in three to five sentences>  
  
## Customer segments  
| Segment | Needs | Behaviors | Who targets them today |  
  
## Opportunities  
- <opportunity, and the evidence for it>  
  
## Threats  
- <threat, and what it would cost>  
  
## Recommendations  
1. <action, and the reasoning>  
  
## Confidence and unknowns  
- <claim, confidence, and what would change it>
```

## Quality checks

- Every figure carries a source and a date
- Both opportunities and threats are covered substantively
- Unknowns are marked rather than estimated silently
- Each recommendation traces back to something in the assessment