Reflecting on the last ten years one has to ask toward the end of the boom did companies engage too heavy in competition and as a result did growth / innovation suffer?

Rather than businesses opening in regions where competition was low for example, the tendency it would seem was for Aldi in the supermarket industry, for example, as close open a store as close as possible to Lidl. As this practice became more apparent natural defensive strategies such as buying up other prime real estate to circumvent competition moving in also became the norm. Companies got so bogged down in innovation to keep existing customers rather than focus that same effort to grow a market differential.

With this fundamental shift in economics, the new focus it could be argued, now needs to be on niching and craving out new market sections that as a business you can become the market leader in rather than fighting to keep market share in diminishing markets.

Innovation and doing one thing amazingly instead of everything being just being the same as competitors and frankly average is no longer an option to do business. Is manager ego and sticking to proven strategies that worked in a business climate different to what we face today a sure-fire way to get washed away in the recession cleansing?