I think Jira entered an existing market. Issue tracking and tickets was already a category, and Atlassian won by being flexible and cheap enough for any team to adopt. I’d say it started in the red ocean zone because it competed with other trackers on features and price. Its bet was that PMs and engineers could share one system of record, and that the PM would adapt to the tool. I believe that bet worked, but it created a tool that tries to help everyone but actually delights pretty much no one.
I think that Linear resegmented the market. It sold the same basic product as Jira, but it narrowed the customer to fast-moving software startups and rebuilt the experience around speed and taste. I think it maybe started in a red ocean because the category was crowded, but it carved out a pocket that now feels more like a blue ocean. Its bet was that small, high-performing teams would pay for craft and would rather have an opinionated workflow than a configurable one. It also had to believe that PMs at these companies are close enough to engineering to live happily inside an engineering tool.
Lastly, I think that Productboard tried to create a new category which is a home for the work that happens before a ticket even exists, like collecting customer feedback, prioritizing, and building roadmaps. I think this is the closest to a blue ocean because it competed with spreadsheets and slide decks rather than another product. Its bet was that PMs have a distinct job that existing tools ignore, and that they would pay for a separate system to do it. I believe this is the riskiest belief because it assumes PMs will tolerate one more tool that sits beside Jira or Linear instead of replacing it.
