How established industries are striking back at upstart “disrupters”

Established industry giants are taking the fight to tech upstarts. They will have second-mover advantage, says Matthew Lynn.

VW ID.4 electric car
VW has trusted brands with huge production capacity and a powerful distribution network.
(Image credit: © Sean Gallup/Getty Images)

Its shares are soaring as it unveils a range of snazzy new electric vehicles. Tesla? Er, no, Volkswagen. The German car maker has unveiled plans for more than 30 electric vehicles across its VW, Audi, Porsche, Seat and Skoda brands. That is going to be quite a line-up for anyone in the market for a new battery-powered car, and investors are, quite rightly, starting to wonder if it won’t look a lot stronger than Tesla’s.

Or how about the stock soaring as customers sign up to its streaming service in record numbers. Netflix? No, Disney. Its streaming service has been a huge hit, signing up 100 million pay subscribers in a little over a year. It took Netflix a decade to reach that milestone.

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Matthew Lynn

Matthew Lynn is a columnist for Bloomberg, and writes weekly commentary syndicated in papers such as the Daily Telegraph, Die Welt, the Sydney Morning Herald, the South China Morning Post and the Miami Herald. He is also an associate editor of Spectator Business, and a regular contributor to The Spectator. Before that, he worked for the business section of the Sunday Times for ten years. 

He has written books on finance and financial topics, including Bust: Greece, The Euro and The Sovereign Debt Crisis and The Long Depression: The Slump of 2008 to 2031. Matthew is also the author of the Death Force series of military thrillers and the founder of Lume Books, an independent publisher.