Things tend to repeat but it's not completely impossible to have large and lasting changes. Ursula K. Le Guin used to say how people thought inescapable the divine rights of kings.

On the other hand, Google did change the world. Everything's just more mature nowadays. There's less blue ocean in its business segments.

I wonder if a company could stay "evergreen" by constantly finding new business areas and somehow spinning off old ones? Apple for example almost died in between before really coming back with the iPhone.