Yes, software is eating the world and hardware as well. Established, existing companies are quickly realizing the entire game is being changed underneath them. The symptoms are everywhere. Some companies like Qualcomm and Intuit are attempting to create corporate entrepreneurship programs. Others are simply buying their way into the game.

Since the early days of the industrial revolution, a small set of large companies have controlled the exclusive rights to create new businesses. If you wanted to create a new business, you had to convince one of them first. Those rights are being returned to individuals and small teams at an incredibly accelerating pace. The rise of the entrepreneur is a real thing.

In her book Different, Youngme Moon makes the point that in it’s infancy, a brilliant game changing idea is indistinguishable from a wasteful idea doomed to fail. Existing businesses with known business models are tooled to find waste and squash it. That means businesses are very difficult places to incubate and foster new ideas.

That tension between leverage and control fascinates me. As well, helping to make sure that existing businesses find their place in this changing game. They have unfair advantages that need to be leveraged like existing customers, domain expertise, distribution networks and more. A small group of us at ThreeFortyNine are working on a new program to help companies leverage their unfair advantages.

I’ve created an short pdf introducing what we’re planning. I’m curious for feedback and want to meet with companies curious about this program. Please comment below or contact me directly