Why Big Corp Won't Hurt You

You surely can’t avoid the epic soap opera that is Twitter these days. I will spare you any commentary, snark, or armchair strategizing here — grab a bag of 🍿, sit back and enjoy the show.

What it does bring up for me, though, and something worth discussing, is an age-old question I get rather frequently from (particularly young(er)) entrepreneurs:

“What if [big company] decides to do what I am working on too?”

Ever since I got that question — and I understand where it comes from: It can feel scary to think what would happen to your fledging startup if a big company, with its near endless resources, builds what you are creating — I responded with a simple: They won’t. And even if they do, they will be so slow that you typically can easily outmaneuver them.

Now add the truth that “their politics will tear the initiative apart from the inside.” You realize that the odds you get squashed by a ginormous corporation are slim.

In full transparency, the tables might turn when you become big enough to register on the giga-corps radar. But by then, you should be so far ahead in the game that you make a juicy acquisition target. Ask the team at Figma, which did just what I outlined above and ended up selling to corporate juggernaut Adobe for an eye-watering USD 20 billion — not too shabby!

Just focus on building what matters. You’ll be fine.