What does it take to disrupt an industry, outpace competitors, and win—repeatedly? Just ask Reggie Fils-Aimé, former president and COO of Nintendo of America, who brought the Nintendo DS, Wii, 3DS, and the record-breaking Switch to global prominence.
Now, with the Nintendo Switch 2 off to the fastest-selling console launch in history—3.5 million units in just a few days—companies across sectors are asking: What’s Nintendo’s secret?
At cybersecurity firm ThreatLocker’s annual customer event Zero Trust World earlier this year, Fils-Aimé shared his “Seven Rules for Disruptive Innovation”—a playbook not just for gaming giants, but for anyone ready to rethink the rules in their industry and tackle threats, including cybercrime, with bold strategy and creativity.
Rule 1 – Disruption is a culture, not a one-off event
According to Fils-Aimé, disruption is not just a moment at Nintendo – it is a mindset woven into every part of the business. “For Nintendo, disruption has always meant looking at the same data others have—but from a completely different angle.”
Rather than chasing the latest tech, the former COO says the Japanese gaming giant often used widely available tools in unexpected ways—pairing mature technologies with emerging ones to create breakthrough products. This approach, he notes, prioritises timing and perspective over novelty.
Reggie Fils-Aimé, former president and COO of Nintendo [CC BY-SA 3.0]
The exec recalls that software teams constantly experimented. Ideas could incubate for years before launch. He recalls speaking with a senior developer just after a major title shipped: “Reggie, the tech behind this game? We started developing it 15 years ago.”
It was a reminder of how long Nintendo incubates ideas—waiting for the right moment to bring them to market.
Importantly, innovation was not limited to R&D. Marketing and sales teams played a key role in expanding Nintendo’s reach, redefining who a “gamer” could be and unlocking new markets. This alignment, says Fils-Aimé, created a virtuous cycle of innovation and growth.
For decades, Nintendo has introduced features like motion controls, dual screens, and haptic feedback—not to follow trends, but to surprise and delight consumers. Competitors often followed.
Rule 2 – Innovate from your core
Disruption that sticks doesn’t come from chasing trends—it comes from building on what your company already does best.
“You need to be crystal clear on your core,” says Fils-Aimé. “What differentiates you in the market? What’s your mission? What strengths can’t your competitors replicate?”
When innovation flows from that foundation, it becomes both unique and hard to copy.
As a case-in-point, during a previous role at Panda Express, the marketing exec was asked to scale a fast-casual Chinese food concept—a category still dominated by family-run restaurants. Panda’s legacy was fine-dining quality through its Panda Inn restaurants. The challenge? Translate that quality into a scalable format tha could compete with global chains.
“I wasn’t a restaurateur—I was a marketer. But I knew the food couldn’t change. That was the non-negotiable core.”
Everything else—from restaurant design to menu breadth and operations—was reimagined. A 1996 prototype store in Southern California had to hit $1 million in revenue to justify the model. It did—and the concept became the growth engine for the brand. “We built around one idea: fantastic food. That was the core—and we protected it.”
This principle of leading from your core also reflects the former COO’s experience at Nintendo. The company never tried to compete on raw processing power or hardware specs alone. Instead, it built around its core strength: delivering unique, joyful gaming experiences. Whether it was motion control on the Wii or the portability of the Switch, every innovation traced back to that core mission.
Rule 3 – Disrupt with unexpected relevance
Disruption isn’t just about doing something new—it’s about delivering something relevant, but in a way your audience doesn’t see coming.
“Giving people exactly what they expect won’t surprise or delight them,” says Fils-Aimé. “The sweet spot is when it feels familiar—but still completely fresh.”
He uses his experience of working for Guinness, a heritage brand, rooted in tradition. For many, a perfect pint happens in a pub—but most beer is consumed at home. Guinness disrupted its own category by inventing a nitrogen-filled widget that replicates the draft pour from a can.
“That tiny device drove 30 years of growth and made Guinness newly relevant without sacrificing its heritage,” says the marketer. On the flip side, efforts like Guinness Blonde—an attempt to compete with mass-market lagers—flopped repeatedly. “It strayed too far from what made Guinness special,” he notes. “There was no meaningful relevance.”
Nintendo faced a similar challenge in the highly competitive world of first-person shooters—dominated by gritty, violent titles like Call of Duty. Instead of following that formula, Nintendo stayed true to its mission: creating joy.
Nintendo’s answer to the first person shooter: Splatoon
“We knew we couldn’t just copy what was already out there. It had to feel Nintendo.”
The result was Splatoon—a colourful, kid-friendly take on the shooter genre. Players spray ink, not bullets. They battle as shapeshifting “Inklings” and win by covering territory, not racking up kills. It’s inventive, inclusive, and unmistakably on-brand.
Rule 4 – Overcommunicate to everyone who matters
Disruptive innovation rarely follows a straight line—so you need to overcommunicate with everyone it affects.
“It’s not just consumers,” says Fils-Aimé. “It’s employees, business partners, investors—anyone touched by your innovation needs to understand what you’re doing, why you’re doing it, and how it’s going to work.”
Without that clarity, uncertainty creeps in. Stakeholders can misinterpret your strategy, and outside commentary can become a distraction.
During his time at Nintendo, Fils-Aimé and his team relied on the frameworks from Clayton Christensen’s The Innovator’s Dilemma to guide their thinking on consoles like the Nintendo DS and the Wii.
The key insight they learned from this book, says Fils-Aime was that true disruption often comes not by improving what exists, but by introducing value on a completely different vector—something existing competitors can’t easily respond to.
“That kind of disruption can confuse people—especially internally—if you’re not constantly explaining your intent.”
Whether you’re launching a category-shifting product or rethinking your go-to-market strategy, transparency helps your stakeholders move with you, not against you.
Rule 5: Disrupters truly understand their markets
To disrupt an industry, according to Fils-Aimé, “you have to dig deep”—not just into the trends and opportunities, but the root causes of stagnation.
When the marketing leader joined Nintendo, Sony’s PS2 dominated. But the industry overall was flat. “Software sales, where the real profits lie, were declining.” Competitors like Sony and Microsoft believed better graphics and faster processors would win back consumers.
Nintendo disagreed. “We saw the real issue as complexity—controllers were overloaded, experiences were repetitive, and innovation was stagnant,” Fils-Aimé recalls.
Nintendo Switch created new demographics for gaming
Its response wasn’t faster tech—it was simpler, more intuitive design. The Nintendo DS, launched before the iPhone, featured a touchscreen, a microphone, and dual screens, enabling novel user experiences.
“It opened gaming up to women, seniors, and casual players,” selling over 150 million units.
Then came the Wii. With its motion-sensitive remote, “you could swing like a tennis racket or bowl with a flick of the wrist.” Nintendo used accessible tech to deliver radically different experiences—selling over 100 million consoles and reshaping the gaming demographic forever.
Rule 6: Fail forward
“Innovation means failure is inevitable,” admits Fils-Aimé – because true innovators push boundaries, chase the next big idea, and run towards risk, not away from it.
According to the former gaming exec, the key isn’t to avoid failure, but to fail forward—learning fast, extracting insight, and using that knowledge to shape future success.
After the breakout success of the Wii, Nintendo launched the Wii U, introducing a tablet-like gamepad that allowed players to interact with games in new ways: track inventory, view secondary info, or play directly on the controller while the main screen was used for something else. But commercially, it fell flat.
Still, the team mined critical feedback. “We heard that consumers loved the idea of switching seamlessly between big screen and handheld play.” That nugget became the heart of Nintendo’s next innovation: the Switch.
‘Never leave the game behind’ was the core concept. One system, two modes—play docked to a TV or instantly shift to handheld. The detachable controllers featured advanced tech like near-field communication and infrared sensors, enabling both single- and multiplayer experiences on the go.
There was risk. “A lot of tech, a lot of belief—but it was all grounded in deep consumer insight.” The gamble paid off: the Nintendo Switch is now the second best-selling video game system in history, with over 150 million units sold and 1.4 billion games shipped.
Rule 7: Constructive innovation is a leadership function
“Innovation doesn’t happen in isolation—it’s a leadership function.” Not just from the C-suite, but from anyone in the organisation willing to push bold ideas forward, challenge consensus, and make tough, strategic decisions.
To innovate constructively, you need a culture that’s constantly searching for the relevant and unexpected disruption rooted in core truths, not random reinvention. “You will fail, but if the culture supports failing forward and adapting fast, that’s where the breakthroughs happen.”
One defining example: the decision to bundle Wii Sports with the Wii console. It was a contentious call. Nintendo’s Japanese developers believed the game—featuring five intuitive, motion-based sports—could sell tens of millions as a standalone title at $50, generating massive profit.
But according to Fils-Aimé, he saw something else. “Wii Sports was the clearest expression of what made the Wii different: active, social play that anyone—families, kids, grandparents—could join. It wasn’t just a game; it was the demo of the product experience.”
He fought to include it in the console bundle. After months of negotiation, Nintendo split the strategy: Wii Sports would be bundled in the Americas and Europe, sold separately in Japan—an accidental A/B test.
The result? Explosive adoption in the bundle markets, where the game became a social phenomenon—played in bars, cruise ships, retirement homes.
“I truly believe if we hadn’t made that decision, the trajectory of the Wii—and Nintendo—would have been very different.”
