Auxesis

What The Tool Does

Auxesis supports growth-direction decisions — which of the available growth moves to pursue, in what order, and whether the present is the right time to pursue them. Growth is not a single decision but a sequence of them, and the sequence matters; a move that is right in year five is often premature in year two and too late in year eight.

How The Tool Thinks

The framework Auxesis applies is a synthesis of the classical growth-matrix tradition (Ansoff, Porter) with the more recent work on dynamic capabilities and corporate venturing. It examines five growth vectors: deeper penetration of existing markets with existing products; new markets with existing products; new products in existing markets; adjacent product-market combinations; and genuinely new business lines. Each has a different risk profile, capability requirement, and funding horizon.

The tool is configured to expose two common failures: the tendency to pursue all growth vectors simultaneously (resulting in underfunding each), and the tendency to pursue distant adjacencies before exhausting deeper opportunities in the core business.

What It Can And Cannot Do

Auxesis can structure the growth analysis and sequence the available moves. It cannot evaluate the specific execution capacity required by each move, nor judge the specific market dynamics of the target opportunities. It also cannot assess the strategic opportunity cost of growth moves against the alternative of returning capital to shareholders — that is Kerdos's question, and for big growth decisions both tools should be consulted.