Monopolies
topic on 6 shows · 10 statements across 10 episodes
Acquired 
Masters of Scale 
BigDeal 
the a16z Podcast 
All-In 
20VC
10 statements about Monopolies, every show
Gilbert: Monopolies benefit society by generating cash flow for basic research
“There is a positive benefit to monopolies because they create the cash flows that fund these sorts of boondoggle basic research. A lot of the most important technologies that move society forward come out of these.”
Cahn: Monopolistic dominance is not the steady state of business
“People over estimate the monopolistic nature of businesses, and that we're living in this sort of unique Gilded Age monopolistic era, and that that Is, is not the steady state of business.”
Thiel: There Are Only Two Types of Businesses: Competitors and Monopolies
“The extreme binary View of the world I always articulate is that there are exactly two kinds of businesses in this world. There are businesses that are perfectly competitive, and there are businesses that are monopolies.”
Maples: Real Monopolies Require Government Coercion to Survive
“It is extraordinarily difficult to maintain a monopoly. That's not coercive. So like, you know, the only real monopolies that exists can be granted by the government and can be coercively maintained.”
Andreessen: Monopolies stop innovating and destroy innovation
“Monopolies stop innovating. Monopolies are just death to innovation because as you like to say, the motto of any monopoly is we don't I don't care because we don't have to.”
Horowitz: Crypto is one of the most important technological breakthroughs
“So crypto is a, you know, I'd say one of the most important, if not the most kind of important technological breakthrough that will lead us to, you know, hopefully a fairer, better, more productive, more entrepreneurial, more techno-optimistic society in that …”
Friedberg: Monopolies and large moats are not inherently bad for consumers
“We use the term monopoly as if it's de facto evil and bad, but not all monopolies or businesses that have very big moats is another way to kind of describe them, are necessarily bad for the customer. You get cheaper products, you get better products, you get m…”
Monopolies are always vulnerable to paradigm shifts without regulation
“Monopolies, even if you don't trust bust them are always at risk of being disrupted by a paradigm shift.”
Friedberg argues monopolies are lazy and easier to defeat than cronyism
“I think monopolies are good because monopolies are just like lazy, and it's easier to innovate and compete against a monopoly, to be honest, than it is to compete against cronyism.”
Miller: Many former tech startups have grown into powerful corporate monopolies
“These companies that for a while were these little startups that, you know, were, funny, doing funny things out here, and you could bring your dogs to work, are now these huge monopolies, in many cases, with a ton of power.”