“The real risk isn’t losing to competitors. It’s being surprised by them.”
Most teams don’t lose because competitors are smarter.
They lose because competitors move first.
A rival announces a partnership you didn’t anticipate.
A feature shows up just as you’re launching something similar.
A positioning shift reframes the category before you’ve even entered it.
Nothing broke.
No one missed a deadline.
You just didn’t see it coming.
“The most damaging competitor moves are the ones that make your launch feel late.”
The Real Problem: Planning Without Pressure
Most teams don’t plan to be reactive. They just end up there.
They build strategy based on:
- What competitors have done
- Where the market is today
- What feels safe right now
Then the market moves.
Suddenly:
- Messaging needs “adjustment”
- Sales needs new answers
- Leadership wants to know why the plan no longer holds
This isn’t poor execution.
It’s strategy that was never tested under pressure.
At VIVO, this is the moment we’re usually called in—after a competitor move exposed a blind spot no one stress-tested early enough.
What Smart Teams Do Instead
Market leaders assume three things:
- Competitors are watching
- Competitors are planning moves of their own
- The market won’t wait for them to react
So they don’t ask “What are competitors doing?”
They ask:
“What will competitors do next—and how do we stay ahead of it?”
That’s the role of competitor wargaming—and it’s a core part of how VIVO helps teams prepare before pressure hits.
What Competitor Wargaming Actually Does
Competitor wargaming isn’t about predicting the future perfectly.
It’s about eliminating surprise.
Done well, it helps teams:
- Anticipate likely competitor moves
- Expose vulnerabilities early
- Decide how they’ll respond before it matters
“Competitive analysis explains the past. Wargaming prepares you for what’s coming.”
This future-focused lens is exactly why VIVO uses wargaming upstream of launch planning—not as a cleanup exercise after something goes wrong.
How It Works (Plain and Simple)
Competitor wargaming is structured role-playing.
A small, cross-functional team takes on one job:
Think like the competitor—and figure out how you’d beat us.
That means asking:
- Where are we exposed?
- What claims would they challenge?
- How would they reframe the category?
- Where would they move first to disrupt our plans?
This consistently surfaces risks internal teams miss—because internal teams are wired to defend their own ideas.
We see this pattern repeatedly in VIVO-led sessions: the biggest risks are rarely the loud ones—they’re the assumptions no one questioned.
Want to Predict Moves? Follow the Money.
What competitors say matters less than where they invest.
Watch:
- Acquisitions and partnerships — capabilities they’re racing to build
- Job postings — where they’re gearing up
- Scientific presentations — long-term bets
- Investor messaging — true priorities
“Competitors leave clues. Wargaming teaches teams how to read them.”
This is one of the fastest ways VIVO helps teams move from reaction to anticipation.
Turning Insight Into Readiness
The output of wargaming isn’t a deck.
It’s preparedness.
Teams use it to:
- Lock positioning before narratives shift
- Prepare responses before objections surface
- Adjust timing before competitors steal momentum
The goal isn’t to overreact.
It’s to act deliberately instead of scrambling.
Two Ways Teams Use Wargaming
Market-level wargaming
- 3–5 year horizon
- Focused on where competitors want to take the category
Launch-level wargaming
- 6–18 month horizon
- Focused on features, claims, and counter-moves
At VIVO, we see the strongest results when teams use both—because surprises don’t happen on a single timeline.
The Bottom Line
Being surprised by competitors isn’t a fluke.
It’s a planning failure.
“The teams that lead markets don’t react faster. They anticipate earlier.”
Competitor wargaming doesn’t make the future predictable.
It makes your strategy resilient.
And helping teams build that resilience—before launch—is what VIVO does best.
