The best answer I could come up with: it's not your typical employees who are going to be doing that. Employees are employees. Typically you want someone who is about to leave the company because they are bored and want to do something interesting...and they have an idea (or you give them an idea) that excites them.

So instead of VCs you invest company capital into them.

Obviously 99% of the time employees just leave and startups win the day. Which is fine. But that's basically just how it is. So you either adapt or die until the monopoly/cash cow runs its course.

Facebook turning into Meta making the 'startup' be the whole companies mission is a bold new idea, which I'm skeptical can work. But it's interesting.

Risk.

The company takes the risk rather than you personally. If it fails but you maintain good relations with the rest of the company you lose nothing and just transfer elsewhere (I guess, I’ve never worked at a big company preferring to go it alone)

Most start up founders have high opportunity cost but lose nothing if the start up fails.

They lose a steady salary until they are profitable or get funding

Less risk yes, but more importantly, for me, more stability. I can still hustle and innovate, but within the context of a full-time job where I can collect a (usually) steady paycheck.

I’m far more motivated by working on cool projects, so the reward for me is just as salient if I build something cool within someone else’s company or my own… I guess, having never done the latter.

But yeah, also tbh, risk is a big factor.