That's exactly the point: the survivors prove the op's premise wrong. If the op premise were correct, the survivors would not exist, as that's what the op is claiming (that Intel exists means ARM can't exist; that Microsoft exists, means Redhat can't exist; that Walmart exists, means Amazon can't exist; that Sears existed (ha) means that Walmart could not have existed; and on it goes). Back in reality, that's not how things work. Instead of crushing Apple, Microsoft chose to help them survive. That's one example and it demolishes the op premise completely (ie competitors don't always seek absolute dominion for numerous reasons, such as political concerns; and sometimes competitors are just plain stupid or lazy or blind).

>>like finding a gold nugget. It just doesn't happen very often

>survivors prove the op's premise wrong

Nobody said it was impossible, except you. Recharacterizing a statement so you can knock it down is called a strawman fallacy. You may have heard of them.

You actually point out many examples that reinforce my point. Extremely poorly run companies like Yahoo, Sears, AOL, they're all still around. Microsoft has been poorly run for nearly two decades. It is still here. MS long since lost the server market to Linux, but that didn't stop them from throwing wrenches by proxy with SCO. MS failed miserably trying to approach the smartphone market, but that doesn't stop them from collecting licensing fees on every Android phone sold. Oracle too is trying aggressively to collect some of that Android lucre.

That's how the system works. It's winner take all. Pareto distributions everywhere. Quality products, services, and businesses are wiped out and destroyed by the rent seekers. Long after the rent seekers ceased to be productive contributors to the system, their bloated zombie corpses carry on, sucking the life out of anything new that was lucky enough to survive.

> You can't start a GPU company because they are the GPU Mafia. They'll run you out of business...

You seem pretty emphatic that it's impossible. Also, before you call Nvidia a rent seeker you might wish to look at the amount they spend on R&D and what they're doing in self-driving cars and deep learning.

Of course, a single counter example disproves the claim that it's impossible to compete with an established business.

But more realistically, we can list some successful outliers in a sea of tens of thousands of failed newcomers. It's very difficult indeed, but not impossible.

How many chip companies have seriously threatened Intel in 35 years? Not enough that it makes sense to invest in any of them but Intel. Picking ARM would have been pretty darn lucky.

In an economy the size of the US (much less the globe), as an example, very difficult means a lot of positive outcomes.

nVidia is a positive outcome vs Intel. So is Apple (after all, they sell a couple hundred million units per year of compute devices with their own customized processors, which directly threatens Intel's prosperity, of course thanks again to ARM).

Or see: McDonalds vs the hundred new burger companies (Five Guys, Shake Shack et al) that have cropped up in the last 10-15 years.

Or: Anheuser Busch AmBev vs the thousands of independent brewers that have cropped up and taken an increasingly large slice of a formerly stagnant market (thanks to government regulations) with finite physical shelf space. Talk about a perfect example of how wrong the op premise is.

Tell GM & Ford not to worry about Tesla and the electric car revolution, because they can just kill off Tesla at any time (and yes, some things like that did occur, such as Tucker - thanks to government abuse in the market).

The difference is McDonalds haven't patented "a circular ground meat disc 1-2 cm thick on a similarly shaped bun with high fructose and vinegar sauces and a token minimum of vegetables, including lettuce, pickles and tomato". I think the point is you should only be able to sue against profit a company makes, and damages against current businesses are desirable because it shows someone competing.

To simplify everything all patents should last 5 years max.

> you should only be able to sue against profit a company makes

So nobody should ever be able to sue Amazon for infringement? Do you think other companies accountants would have trouble making profit vanish to avoid lawsuits?