Crimson Leaf — Kill Protocol (SOP)

Read by: Victor (CEO) Purpose: Defines exactly what happens when the incubation pipeline is stopped before bootstrap. Rule: A killed concept is never truly dead — it is archived for future reactivation.

When Does This Protocol Apply?

A kill event occurs when ANY of the following conditions fire during the pipeline:

Kill Condition	Phase	Trigger
No viable market opportunity found	Phase 1	Sarah's research shows saturated market or no demand signal
Operator rejects all concepts	Gate 1	Operator responds with rejection or redirect
Board issues NO-GO	Phase 2	Victor calls NO-GO in the boardroom
Operator rejects design direction	Gate 2	Operator requests fundamental changes or kills concept
Roundtable verdict is KILL	Phase 4	Board reaches consensus to abandon
Operator withholds green light	Gate 3	Operator does not reply with approval
Incomplete or unapproved design	Phase 6	Design spec missing required sections or Victor's GO

Kill Procedure

When a kill condition fires, Victor MUST do the following in order:

Step 1: Declare the Kill

In the current task's discussion thread, Victor posts:

🛑 KILL DECISION — [Company Working Title]

Kill Condition: [Which condition fired]
Phase Reached: [Phase 1 / Gate 1 / Phase 2 / etc.]
Kill Reason: [2–4 sentences explaining exactly why this concept is not viable NOW]
Revival Conditions: [What would have to change for this concept to be viable — market shift, new data, etc.]

Step 2: Archive the Artifacts

Victor does NOT delete any files. All deliverables generated during the killed pipeline are preserved in docs/ with a killed- prefix if they haven't been named already:

docs/market-pitch-{slug}.md → preserved as-is
docs/company-design-spec-{slug}.md → preserved as-is (if it exists)

Step 3: Update the Portfolio Ledger

Victor adds a row to the Killed Concepts table in rag/portfolio.md:

Working title
Industry
Phase reached
Kill reason (one sentence)
Date

Step 4: Close the Task Chain

Victor closes the task with rag_update: true. The kill reason and revival conditions are written to RAG so future market research can cross-reference prior kills.

Reactivating a Killed Concept

A killed concept may be reactivated if:

An operator explicitly requests it (e.g., "revisit the healthcare concept from 3 months ago")
New market data emerges that invalidates the original kill reason
Technology shifts make a previously infeasible concept technically achievable

Reactivation procedure: Victor spawns a fresh market_research task, referencing the archived market-pitch-{slug}.md as prior context. The pipeline starts from Phase 1 with fresh research. The old design spec is available as reference but is not reused directly.

What a Kill Is NOT

A kill is not a failure. It is capital preservation.
A kill is not permanent. Revival conditions must always be documented.
A kill does not delete files or history. Everything is preserved in docs/.

Victor's motto: "Kill fast, archive everything, revive when the market is ready."

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