Ask HN: Why are some corporations lazy and not Ambitious enough?

2 points by joeamroo 3 years ago | 5 comments

By lazy and not ambitious enough I mean they are not pursuing “world historical” projects but are instead opting to keep feeding their cash cow or opting for easier projects (Apple refusing any project that is too much physical work that can’t be outsourced outright) . I’m talking about the corporations that posses a few rare qualities: 1. Founder controlled WHILE having big free cash flows (think a certain social media company Or for a better example, a Payments company founders )

2. A cash cow that provides relatively easy funding (only Ad-funded models, toll boxes or a huge subscription service with near-zero marginal costs)

Now if these kind of companies exist (even though it’s pretty rare) why isn’t there companies ambitious enough to fund or work on world-changing projects even if it falls from their main line of business? I can only think of one potential company: Stripe.

What do you think?

muzani 3 years ago |

I think it's simply that most humans just want cash cows. Entrepreneurship attracts the most ambitious, but a lot of people just want enough money to do what they want and not be dishonored.

Also this seems to happen more with American businesses, which often specialize. Asian businesses tend to do everything, e.g. noodles, dried fish, electronic devices, data, wool, plastic refining, microwaves, logistics, real estate, education, lending, etc.

FAANG has proven that the specialization model works brilliantly, and so many corporations mimic the cash cow approach.

Another model is to have a holding company invest in multiple other forms of specialized businesses. Google does search and data, and doesn't innovate as much. But Alphabet can do all the experiments it wants, fueled with Google income. People look at Google and wonder why it isn't more innovative, but that's not the role Google tries to take.

mtmail 3 years ago |

You mean Stripe Climate? It's ambitious but if I read the launch press release correct Stripe put in $1m USD of its own money and the majority is funded Stripe's customers donating 1% of their revenue. I don't see them using free cash flow or a significant percentage of their own revenue on the project. The team organizing funding of the climate projects is not inside Stripe https://frontierclimate.com/ [Edit: turns out it does belong to Stripe "Frontier is a public benefit LLC wholly owned by Stripe Inc."]

Spooky23 3 years ago |

Apple is one of the largest companies on earth. The institutional investors that own the company want consistent results.

They are actually rare in that they have the ability to churn out new product categories in a broader ecosystem of related products.

Power controlled by a guy or small group can work out incredibly well or disastrously. Zuckerberg’s laser focus and tenacity made Facebook a giant and his quixotic pursuit of VR thus far is a disaster. Elon is the the poster child for what happens when there’s no corporate bureaucracy to prevent bad decisions.

SavageBeast 3 years ago |

Stock holders tend to frown on money going out the door thats not in an effort to bring more money in the other door.

faangiq 3 years ago |

Corporations exist to divide up existing pies.