Platform Absorption
Meta absorbed a $2B AI startup. Figma turned code into design without designers. 99% of AI products will die by 2027. The survivors share one trait: identity.
Meta acquired Manus for its agentic capabilities. Figma integrated Anthropic to turn code into design. Salesforce built AgentForce to eliminate middleware.
The pattern is biological. Large organisms consume smaller ones that occupy the same ecological niche. In technology, platforms absorb features. The feature-as-product dies.
So what survives?
Not speed. Platforms are faster. Not features. Platforms replicate them. Not price. Platforms can subsidise.
What survives is identity!
A product grounded in a philosophy, a worldview, or a methodology that cannot be absorbed because it is not a feature.
It is a way of thinking.
The question for every AI startup is not “what do you build?” It is “what do you believe?”
Features get absorbed. Identities do not.