Network Businesses - Death of Large Corporations

There was a time when big meant powerful. A time when big companies bought the smaller ones and grew in capabilities and strength.

The bigger; the better.

Companies were able to easily hold onto 50% - 60% of the market and beat the competition with their superior marketing power. Those days are soon going to be passe. The future does not belong to the big but the small companies.

These guys are nimble, can move swiftly, have the flexibility to change with the needs of the market. Small companies; with brilliant people, who in their individual capacity are capable creating value, have been coming together constantly. There are several such firms that operate across the world today. The era of large companies having a wide array of capabilities is gone and specialists who are truly remarkable at the work that they do, who work in very narrow domains of knowledge are replacing them fast. These small organizations, network with similar entities, but with varied competencies, in order to achieve huge synergies.

In the end several such groups, each consiting of just a handful of people will come together to pose a major challenge to the large firms who are bulky and cannot adapt quickly enough to the changing business environment.

Microsoft was extremely competitive when it was small, slowly and steadily it went on absorbing one small company after the other and now finds itself in a position where it is not able to compete effectively in any of the domains where it exists. Its latest launches have all failed and so have its attempts to buy others. The case is similar with Wal-Mart, Ford, and numerous other companies that are large.

In the years to come, smaller and smaller companies will come together to achieve larger and larger goals. It will be important for the now large companies, to split themselves into smaller and managable companies, which are specialists at what they do. They will have to network with not only themselves but also with other specialists firms.

This may not be the death knell for the large firms, but it surely is a warning!