A GigaOm Radar plots solutions on a circular chart with three concentric rings — New Entrant on the outside, Challenger in the middle, Leader at the center — where proximity to the center indicates higher assessed overall value.
Radars are scored against a companion Key Criteria report, which defines the sector's table stakes, differentiating key criteria and non-functional evaluation metrics before any vendor is assessed.
Rings and quadrants, not one or the other
The Radar is frequently described as a ring chart or as a quadrant chart. It is both.
Two axes cross the circle: a vertical axis running Maturity to Innovation, and a horizontal axis running Feature Play to Platform Play. Every solution therefore carries two independent readings — which ring it sits in, and which quadrant.
A mature feature-play Leader and an innovative platform-play Leader occupy the same ring and describe very different companies.
Movement arrows
Each vendor is assigned an arrow projecting expected movement over roughly 12 to 18 months, graded forward mover, fast mover or outperformer.
This makes the Radar explicitly forward-looking in a way most comparative evaluations are not — the graphic encodes a prediction, not only an assessment.
Why it matters
Publishing the criteria before the assessment, in a separate document, is an unusually transparent structure. The Key Criteria report tells you what the analyst has decided matters in the sector, in writing, ahead of scoring.
Very few vendors read it as such. It is one of the clearest available statements of how an informed third party frames a market — which is the same question positioning is trying to answer.
Related: Omdia Universe · Scoring rubric · Inclusion criteria
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