Big companies in US, success and demise of brilliant ideas.

Here is the process I have observed repeatedly:

1. An Inventor/Business Genius (who is s/he? what does he/she need to succeed?)  (to be discussed later)  comes with a brilliant idea that can deliver on unfulfilled need of the society. Perhaps,  there is a need in a flying saucer for the  individual transportation.

2. If he/she has the right mix of talents (business+technical), he/she creates  a new company.

3. After an appropriate induction period, during which,  the company looses money, it starts to make a lot of money. They attract the best technical talent across the world and grow their business. The employees are very happy, creative  and loyal.

3a. The Inventor wants to improve the world and declares it as  the primary goal of the company.    Many things are going well, the people are enjoying the product, their quality of people's life is improving, and the company makes a lot of money. 

4.  Every person in the developed world now owns a flying saucer. To reach non-privileged world, the saucers get cheaper and lower in quality.

5. There are competitive technologies that emerge over time (e.g., Flying Frying Pans, Flying Teapots etc.) However, the Flying Saucer company came to the business first and  dominates the market.

6. After many years of success, the original inventor  of the Flying Saucer moves on to something else to do - perhaps he decides to explore the meaning of life,  or to do something completely different, e.g., making better potato chips. The company meanwhile becomes public and is now controlled by the Board. The Board hires the best CEOs they can find to replace the inventor. 

7. As the original inventor is gone, the company looses ability to make decisions. Nobody really has a long-term interest in the company and a consensus among the business leads is impossible to build. 

7. As the business starts to saturate, the Flying Saucer company realizes that the patents will expire soon and the golden mine will not last forever. Therefore, they ask for the new technologies to be developed by their truly brilliant staff.  And they do develop them! However, every time a new technology is developed, it is turned down, as it is believed not to make enough money. The Board always compares it to the  'golden mine' technology, and they are always of opinion that it is not worth doing.

8. Technical staff get frustrated as they truly are not needed anymore. Some  leave the company; some convert themselves into monsters.   The core expertise of the company now changes to the supply chain management aka, making products cheaper, with marginal quality, squeeze more money out of customers, sell them less for more,  etc. 

9. A new flying technology is being developed by competitors, e.g., magnetic-levitation-on-demand.  This technology is better than the flying saucer technology and gradually replaces it.

10. The flying saucer company declares bankruptcy and goes into the cryptocurrency business.

What is the problem? Why?

1. The curse of free money flow. A successful technology creates a cash flow that spoils the people and changes their mentality. There are no longer under pressure to do the new things, and in a way, rewarded for 'doing nothing' and staying the course.

 2. Lack of personal leadership when the original leader of the company is gone. Inability to make decisions comes with it.

3. Business and technical leadership disconnect-- typically they are different people that do not understand each other.