Jira entered the market in 2002, specifically to beat out competitors (like Bugzilla). It was an existing market and a red ocean that they were able to succeed in. It was built around problems that software engineers and people who manage software engineers deal with. I would argue that since product management wasn’t as solidified of a role in 2002, they weren’t necessarily thinking much about them in the development of this product. However today, the product acts as though product managers follow the same system of problem tracking as engineering teams.
Linear was created in 2019, and was made as an alternative to Jira for fast paced startups and small teams. For this reason, it is a resegmented market. As I mentioned before with Jira, this is a red ocean that has been explored by many companies. However, marketing towards a very specific segment of that market leans a little blue ocean. I think they believe that engineers and product managers both want a fast solution that is less customizable to their own workflows.
ProductBoard was launched in 2016 and is specifically made for product managers. I might argue that this is a new market, despite the fact that similar products exist. Since the market is different from what had been done before, I think it aims to solve different problems and thus is not resegmented. While this may have started off as a blue ocean, it’s becoming more red as Product Managers become more and more of an established role. They seem to believe that Product Managers have unique problems from engineers and are willing to invest in a new product to solve them.
