Are you sure you're not thinking of Charles Stross' "Accelerando" (where this is done in Ch. 2. "Troubadour" [1])? It's been a while since I read "Rainbows End"

Are you sure you're not thinking of Charles Stross' "Accelerando" (where this is done in Ch. 2. "Troubadour" [1])? It's been a while since I read "Rainbows End" [2], but I don't recall autonomous companies in it, and I don't see an obvious way that they would fit in the plot. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerando https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerando [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbows_End https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbows_End