Market Analysis

Many enterprises have developed sophisticated market analysis processes that employ much the same philosophy as Domain Analysis[QFD86,MCCAIN85]. They conduct extensive interviews of users and customers of products, review the literature, analyze technology trends, and produce a characterization of the desired features of future products, with prioritization. More progressive groups employ creative techniques to ensure innovation, much like the DA practice of exploring novel combinations of features. We contend that some of the efforts in a full Market Analysis map to the early information-gathering phases of a traditionally-defined Domain Analysis. While Market Analysis provides significant input to the DA process, the two processes are distinct.