competitive-moat-analysislisted

# competitive-moat-analysis ## When to use - A strategist needs a competitor map for a market / segment — not a feature-comparison sheet, but a *where-they-are-strong / where-we-are-strong / where-no-one-is* read. - A board pack or fundraise narrative claims a moat; the question is *which moat*, *how durable*, and *what would erode it*. - A market-entry decision needs white-space identification — where can we win cleanly because incumbents structurally can't follow? Do NOT use for narrative / messaging surface (route to Wing-3 `positioning-strategy` for the outward-facing pitch; this skill produces the internal cognition that pitch rests on), per-package adoption comparisons (route to `competitive-positioning` (Wing-1 package-peer comparison)), or build-vs-buy decisions (route to `build-buy-partner` (P1)). ## Cognition cluster - **Mental model 18 — Where to play, where not to play.** A moat is read as much from *what we refuse to do* as from what we do. Trying to win everywhere = winning nowhere. See [`mental-models.md`](../../../docs/contracts/mental-models.md) § 18. - **Mental model 28 — Inversion.** *"What would force a customer to leave us for an incumbent?"* The inversion answer surfaces the load-bearing moat assumption. If the answer is *"nothing"*, the moat is wishful; if the answer is concrete, that's the real fragility. See `mental-models.md` § 28. - **Mental model 21 — Second-order thinking.** Moats compound or decay; *"feature parity today"* says nothing about