Around the Net

Google, Uber Disrupter

"Business disruption," which requires incumbents to abandon core strategies for new ones, is the key premise behind recently successful business movements like Software as a Service, open source architecture, and the so-called "Freemium" Internet model, argues Benchmark Capital's Bill Gurley. In that context, Gurley takes a look at how Google is disrupting the navigation market by ditching the two big players in the space -- Tele Atlas and Navteq -- going it alone, and offering its navigation info for free.

Calling the move "a disruptive play of a magnitude heretofore unseen," Gurley points to the GPS stocks, which have tanked in the wake of Google's free navigation feature announcement. Also disrupted by the move are the smart phone makers, who now have to decide whether or not to offer free navigation themselves, and, obviously, Microsoft's flailing mobile strategy.

Read the whole story at Above the Crowd »

Next story loading loading..