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> They hired them to stop them from building competitors If that were true, wouldn't you have to hire every developer who could possibly build your app in a we
by chillacy 7y ago
> They hired them to stop them from building competitors
If that were true, wouldn't you have to hire every developer who could possibly build your app in a weekend to succeed at that? It just takes one to start a new competitor.
Building a new competitor is more than just a matter of code, there are often network effects, a lot of marketing, and often still a cost to switch from a less than optimal but good enough solution to an optimal one.
- buboard 7y ago> every developer who could possibly build your app well haven't they? a competitor doesn't need to be a copycat. like how, e.g. google bought deepmind
- Rury 7y agoYou're not wrong, but neither is the OP. Sometimes big companies simply buy out startups so they can maintain market dominance - whether they be direct competitors or new emerging markets. You see this with Facebook buying Oculus in 2014, Microsoft buying Skype in 2008, Google buying Waze in 2013, Apple buying Shazam etc. Also this is not privy to the tech industry. Large companies of all sorts of industries use the growth by acquisition strategy.