1 DIGITAL DISRUPTION

Multibillion-dollar businesses have been made and lost in the last two decades. Contrary to well-established ideas about barriers to entry, new players have launched into businesses decades and even centuries old, and they have not only survived, but thrived and have become market leaders. We vaguely recognize the shifts that made this possible as caused by "the internet," "tech," or "digital," but most understandings of the reasons remain simple and crude. Whatever the causes, they enabled the creation of global companies such as Netflix and Spotify, while sounding the death knell for storied record label EMI and more newspapers and magazines than could fit on this page. The stories of these companies occupy the extremes. Hundreds of others have had their competitive playing fields radically altered, and they consequently endeavored upon extensive reorganization in an effort to continue to exist. These stories are often overlooked, although they are just as important.