C
59 companies
Carrefour Brazil
Retail
Carrefour Brazil illustrates the Red Queen hypothesis: you must adapt just to survive, not to win. The French hypermarket chain dominated Brazilian re...
Chipotle Mexican Grill
Fast-casual Restaurant
Chipotle marketed 'Food with Integrity' while deferring $2.3 million in annual food safety investments. The 2015-2016 E. coli and norovirus outbreaks...
Circuit City
Retail / Electronics
Circuit City was the second-largest electronics retailer in the United States with capital, infrastructure, and brand recognition. When the 2008 finan...
Corning Glass
Materials Science / Glass Technology
A 170-year-old glass technology company that exemplifies institutional knowledge preservation. Corning's ability to access 40-year-old research from P...
Canon
Photography & Imaging
Canon is mentioned as one of the competitors that entered and dominated the digital photography market while Kodak - which invented digital photograph...
Catholic Church
Religious Organization
With 1.3 billion members globally, the Catholic Church operates the oldest continuously functioning fractal organizational structure (~2,000 years). T...
China Evergrande Group
Real Estate Development
Once China's largest property developer by sales with peak assets of 2.3 trillion RMB ($358 billion), Evergrande collapsed into default in late 2021 w...
Chouinard Equipment
Climbing Equipment
Predecessor to Patagonia, founded by Yvon Chouinard to manufacture climbing gear. The company's 1972 decision to discontinue pitons despite comprising...
Clipper Ships (Industry)
Shipping
Clipper ships demonstrate selection pressure reversal and fitness landscape shifts. Dominant in 1850 transoceanic trade (20+ knot speeds, premium carg...
Coinbase
Cryptocurrency
Coinbase is mentioned as one of Y Combinator's large successful companies that participate in the mycelial network, supporting early-stage startups th...
Color Labs
Social Media / Photo Sharing
Color Labs represents a cautionary tale of germinating in shade. Founded by serial entrepreneur Bill Nguyen, the company raised $41 million in March 2...
Costco
Retail / Warehouse Club
Costco disrupted retail not with technology or logistics, but with a $60 membership fee. When the company launched in 1983, conventional wisdom said t...
Cadence Design Systems
Electronic Design Automation
Cadence provides EDA software in oligopoly with Synopsys. Resource partitioning through specialization with platform economics creating lock-in.
CaixaBank
Financial Services
CaixaBank is Spain's third-largest bank serving millions of retail and business customers. The company provides banking, insurance, and investment ser...
Caleres, Inc.
Footwear Manufacturing & Retail
Caleres is a leading footwear company managing a portfolio of iconic brands including Famous Footwear, Sam Edelman, Naturalizer, Dr. Scholl's Shoes, a...
Canva
Software
Canva constructed an entirely new niche: design for non-designers. The 99% excluded from Adobe's professional tools now create 30 billion designs acro...
Capgemini
Technology
Capgemini is a French multinational IT services and consulting company. The company provides digital transformation, technology, and engineering servi...
Capital City Bank Group, Inc.
Regional Banking
Capital City Bank Group is a financial holding company headquartered in Tallahassee, Florida, providing a full range of banking and financial services...
Carillion PLC
Construction & Facilities Management
Once the UK's second-largest construction and facilities management company, Carillion collapsed spectacularly in January 2018 - one of the UK's large...
Carlsberg Group
Brewing
Carlsberg is a Danish multinational brewing company, one of the major global brewers alongside AB InBev and Heineken. Together with these competitors,...
Carta
Fintech
Equity management platform for startups, investors, and employees managing cap tables. Provides valuation services and secondary trading marketplace....
Carvana
E-Commerce - Vehicles
Carvana is an e-commerce platform for buying used cars with iconic car vending machine towers.
Casper
Retail/Mattresses
American mattress company that pioneered DTC mattress sales. The chapter cites Casper as an example of convergent evolution in DTC retail, independent...
Caterpillar
Heavy Equipment Manufacturing
Caterpillar dominates heavy equipment manufacturing through economies of scale and global dealer network. Network effects via parts distribution and s...
Celine
Luxury Fashion
Example of mobility within LVMH's hierarchy. Celine was promoted from Tier 3 to Tier 2 between 2008-2018, with revenue growing 8× during that period....
ChargePoint
Clean Energy - EV Charging
ChargePoint operates one of the world's largest EV charging networks with over 200,000 charging points.
Charles Schwab
Financial Services
Charles Schwab is a discount brokerage founded in 1971 that demonstrated exemplary crisis alarm system management during Black Monday (October 19, 198...
Checkout.com
Fintech
Payment processing platform providing infrastructure for online and in-person transactions. Processes hundreds of billions in payments annually for ma...
Chevron
Oil & Gas
Chevron demonstrates vertical integration across oil and gas exploration, refining, and retail distribution. Economies of scale in capital-intensive o...
Chewy
E-Commerce - Pet Products
Chewy is the largest online retailer of pet products in the United States, competing with Amazon in pet category.
Chime
Financial Technology
Chime provides mobile-first banking with no monthly fees. First-mover advantage in neobanking with exponential growth.
China Construction Bank
Banking
China Construction Bank is one of China's 'Big Four' state-owned commercial banks, ranking among the world's largest banks by market capitalization.
China Merchants Bank
Banking
China Merchants Bank is one of China's leading commercial banks, known for advanced retail banking services and digital innovation.
China Mobile
Telecommunications
China Mobile is the world's largest mobile telecommunications operator by subscriber base, serving over 900 million customers and leading 5G network d...
China Yangtze Power
Hydroelectric Power
China Yangtze Power is the world's largest hydropower company, operating the Three Gorges Dam and representing one of the largest sources of carbon-fr...
Christian Dior
Luxury Fashion
Tier 1 brand within LVMH hierarchy, generating €8B revenue with 28% operating margin. As a dominant brand, Dior can veto corporate decisions and contr...
Cisco
Technology / Networking
Exemplar of network organization era (1990-2010) operating as a virtual corporation with extensive outsourcing, representing the shift to centralized...
Cloudflare
Internet Infrastructure & Security
Cloudflare provides CDN, security, and edge computing services. Network effects where each new customer improves performance for all users with econom...
Coca-Cola
Beverages
American multinational beverage corporation. Major case study demonstrating relationship-based territorial defense in the fountain market from 1950-19...
Cohere
Artificial Intelligence
Cohere develops large language models for enterprise applications. Platform economics with economies of scale in AI infrastructure.
Colgate-Palmolive
Consumer Goods
Colgate-Palmolive dominates oral care globally with first-mover advantage and economies of scale. Mutualistic networks with distributors and dentists.
Columbia Banking System, Inc.
Regional Banking
Columbia Banking System is a bank holding company operating through its subsidiary Columbia Bank, serving the Pacific Northwest with community banking...
COMAC
Aerospace
China's state-owned aircraft manufacturer developing competitive narrow-body aircraft (C919) that threatens the Boeing-Airbus duopoly. COMAC represent...
Comcast
Telecommunications & Media
Comcast demonstrates vertical integration across broadband infrastructure, cable television, and content production through NBCUniversal. Economies of...
Community Bank System, Inc.
Regional Banking
Community Bank System is a financial holding company providing banking and financial services through Community Bank, N.A. and other subsidiaries acro...
Compass Group
Food Services
Compass Group is the world's largest contract foodservice company, providing food and support services to business, healthcare, education, sports and...
Constellation Brands
Beverages
A U.S. beverage company ($9 billion revenue, 2022) that exemplifies extinction avoidance through portfolio pruning - identifying and divesting busines...
Constellation Software
Software Holding Company
The Canadian holding company that solved the growth limit problem by refusing to integrate anything. Founded in 1995 by Mark Leonard in Toronto, Cons...
Contemporary Amperex Technology (CATL)
Battery Technology
CATL is the world's largest manufacturer of lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles and energy storage systems, supplying Tesla, BMW, Volkswagen,...
Coty
Beauty/Cosmetics
Beauty company that acquired P&G's beauty brands (Wella, Clairol, CoverGirl, Max Factor) for $12.5B as part of P&G's 2014-2016 portfolio decomposition...
Coupang, Inc.
E-commerce
Coupang is South Korea's largest e-commerce company, known for ultra-fast delivery and customer service that rivals Amazon. The company has revolution...
Crocs
Apparel & Footwear
Crocs manufactures foam clog footwear that became cultural phenomenon through comfort and viral marketing.
CrowdStrike
Cybersecurity
CrowdStrike provides cloud-native endpoint security through its Falcon platform. Network effects where each new customer improves threat detection for...
CRRC Corporation
Railway Equipment
CRRC is the world's largest manufacturer of railway rolling stock, producing high-speed trains, metro vehicles, locomotives, and freight cars, dominat...
Cruise
Autonomous Vehicles
Cruise develops autonomous vehicles majority-owned by General Motors. First-mover advantage with vertical integration.
CubeSmart
Real Estate Investment Trust - Self Storage
CubeSmart is a leading self-storage real estate investment trust owning and operating self-storage properties across the United States. The company pr...
Cullen/Frost Bankers, Inc.
Regional Banking
Cullen/Frost Bankers is a financial holding company and one of the 50 largest U.S. banks by asset size. Through its subsidiary Frost Bank, the company...
CVS Health
Healthcare Services
CVS operates integrated healthcare through vertical integration of pharmacies, insurance (Aetna), and clinics. Network effects from retail locations a...
Cymer
Semiconductor Equipment
ASML subsidiary based in the USA that produces EUV light sources using pulsed lasers to generate plasma emitting EUV light. Cymer is part of ASML's ve...