Managing in the Age of Superstar firms

By Jacques Bughin

Superstar firms are reshaping global markets through scale, innovation, and strategic agility. Jacques Bughin examines how these companies achieve and sustain dominance, offering lessons for today’s leaders. He explores the defining traits of corporate maturity, the economics of sustained growth, and the evolving playbook for CEOs in the age of market superstars.

1. Introduction

If one had to guess when superstar athletes are at their best, most would say mid-20s. They are right- for explosive power sports, it is a bit earlier – e.g., sprint swimming & track: ~21–25 or for gymnastics teens–early 20s for ladies; early–mid 20s for men. If there is a need for endurance, like in tennis, it is about ~24–30 (some outliers now winning in their 30s, and in football (soccer): attackers ~23–27; midfielders ~24–29; defenders/keepers ~26–32. Finally, for endurance/strategy heavy, such as marathon & road cycling: ~28–30 or Golf: ~30s (peak major-winning window often 31–36)

What this says is that a) it takes a few decades to become a superstar, b) the more endurance/strategy, the longer it takes, and c) performance curves are usually bell-shaped: a build-up, a short peak, then decline.

In a time where market power has grown significantly and accrued mostly to superstar firms, companies should at least try to emulate part of the recipe.

But what about companies? Superstar firms are now extensively talked about, such as the FAANGs, who lead markets in high tech, or those from a century ago in industrial manufacturing,  also have reached their superstar status in their 20s to 30s- but the key difference is that cycle is less smooth than sport athletes, and foremost some can-Superstar evidently involves luck but also entails a critical journey. In a time where market power has grown significantly and accrued mostly to superstar firms, companies should at least try to emulate part of the recipe. Not only as sports athletes, but also with the specifics of business.

Here is what an executive should know to emulate- or at least not fall into the trap of the long tail of insignificance.

2. Superstar Economics

Every superstar has an age. We define a superstar firm, not simply as a large or fast-growing company. It is a firm that meets three quantitative thresholds

1. Top-100 firms by market capitalization (measured annually, 1980-2025)
2. Persistent Top-100 presence for at least five consecutive years or cumulative Top-10 appearances in any period.
3. Above-sector profitability and shareholder return

With this definition, let’s look at the high-tech sector. While the list is no surprise, the top 10 superstars by 2025 are more than the FAANGS, with names from Nvidia to ASML. (Table 1)

Table 1: High-tech superstar firms, 2025.

Superstar Adulthood: The average age of Top-10 technology firms in 2025 is 31 years. The median age of Top-100 tech companies worldwide is 26 years. Only one of the current global top ten was founded after 2000 (Meta, 2004)

The average company of this list went on IPO after 8, 5 years, 6 years to become a unicorn (more than 1 billion revenue). Their revenue growth is, since IPO, 25% (and market cap growth just above at 25-27%, with a rule of 40 largely exceeded, at 55-65%.

Looking at their age, Meta and Tesla are the youngest-and still in their (early) twenties. When Microsoft turned twenty, it had just launched Windows 95. When Apple turned thirty, the iPhone was born. When NVIDIA turned thirty-two, it became the most valuable company in the world. Across four decades of technology history, the same pattern repeats: the world’s most powerful companies reach true maturity between 20 and 35 years of age. That’s the period when ideas become institutions, founders give way to systems, and growth becomes self-reinforcing rather than accidental.

This “age of the superstar” marks the point where a firm is no longer merely fast-growing — it becomes foundational. It is when the company stops chasing the market and starts defining it. We (used to) Google, not search.

The Journey to adulthood. We often celebrate the birth of innovation — the garage, the founders, the first million users —in one way, this is normal, winners are those that escape a sudden death experience: 50%+ close doors in a horizon of 5 years.

Superstar firms are of a different species – they are past the valley of death. By the time they’re competing for Top-100 seats, they’ve already cleared the early-life 5-year hazard that kills ~half of new firms. Their risk is different, but as risky, not as frequent bankruptcy, but more about losing the status. In fact, looking deep in the data, churning out of the superstar ranks is high, about 30-40 percent, but given their size impact on shareholder value evaporation is much larger than early death.

And the journey is not easy. Apple’s adolescence (1990–1997) nearly killed it; a decade of chaos ended only when Steve Jobs returned and reimagined the company around design and ecosystem control NVIDIA’s adolescence (2001–2008) was marked by a GPU glut and strategic confusion; its recovery, built on parallel computing and later AI acceleration, turned the firm into the infrastructure of the 2020s.

Three traits consistently appear at this stage:

1. Moats that deepen with scale: network effects, distribution channels, or data flywheels that make the company better the larger it gets.
2. Governance that stabilizes: leadership transitions, professionalization, and institutionalized culture, and ecosystem leadership play
3. Reinvestment discipline: a focus on cash flows and R&D, not just market share; reinvent quickly with guardrails.

Adulthood is not about slowing down; it is about compounding intelligently.

First key is innovation:  Microsoft in its forties is perhaps more innovative than it was in its twenties. Constant reinvention is necessary- Google, as much a king of search, is quickly reinventing as an AI darling.

Second key is ecosystem play- most of the players are not looking at typical JV or partnership- they are quickly investing in all forms of tightening, from M&A, to commercial deals, to secure the build-up of mega industries. For example, using multiple triangulations, we estimate that each $1 of NVIDIA revenue induces roughly $2.5–$4.0 of adjacent infrastructure revenue, and $5–$7 when including cloud revenue. The system may be fragile as claimed elsewhere, but this is also the virtue of a trusted ecosystem to co-evolve with everyone so that incentives are aligned.  In consequence, becoming a superstar takes time because building an ecosystem takes cycles of technology, trust, and talent. Startups can reach billion-dollar status in months, but credibility, supply chains, regulatory acceptance, and institutional memory accumulate over decades.  In that sense, corporate age is a proxy for earned leadership. Superstar is really not a hit or miss.

We estimate that each $1 of NVIDIA revenue induces roughly $2.5–$4.0 of adjacent infrastructure revenue, and $5–$7 when including cloud revenue.

Finally, adulthood does not mean stability—the third key is the agility for superstar firms.  When a new technology emerges, superstar firms jump into the foray of invention – but also add a few guardrails- they avoid full disruption by integrating innovators: they buy or finance start-ups.  Also, they anticipate disruption and create mobility barriers to have the time to react to disruption. Players such as NVIDIA and Apple consolidate their leadership p by creating closed technological ecosystems (CUDA, iOS, App Store) that standardize the industrial use of a technology, building de facto technical standards.

In 2010, the FAANGs — Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google — represented the apex of digital power. Their dominance was built on network effects and consumer data, and applications. By 2025, the script is changing – with more and more intelligent agents, the new superstars are not the apps of the internet but those of owning computation, more accurate data, and orchestration.  This evolution does not mean that FAANGs will do- rather, one should applaud their metabolic rate of change.  Google is migrating towards consumer and enterprise multi-agent tools (Gemini Agent Mode, Vertex Agent Builder),  Amazon (AWS) has built so far the most production-ready enterprise agent stack (Agents for Bedrock, AgentCore GA), and Meta is moving towards an aggressive consumer agent + wearables (AI app, Ray-Ban Display). Many companies should take examples from how quickly those superstars take direction and are able to mobilize organizations.

The Adolescence of AI Firms. Today’s AI darlings — Snowflake (13 years old), OpenAI (9 years old), Anthropic (5), or Cursor (3), are still in childhood. From the above, they have untested durability. Their adolescence will arrive soon —and they will need to survive a crisis at around age 15–20, not those unicorns that peak at 5. As discussed above, superstars are risky play—30% to 40% lose their status, likely to some of the new darlings above.  But remember at 30, a company has the assets and legitimacy to shape standards and influence policy. At 10, it merely challenges them. As said elsewhere: “ startups capture imagination; adults capture institutions”.

3. A Glimpse at the New CEO Playbook

In the age of superstar firms, the first and most crucial step for any CEO or leader is within the broader economic landscape. Not every company will become a superstar, just as not every athlete becomes a global champion. This acceptance isn’t a concession of defeat but a foundation for smart, sustainable strategy and leadership.

Accepting Your Potential—and Leveraging the Ecosystem. Successful CEOs begin by honestly assessing where their firm stands: whether on track to become a superstar, positioned as a thriving mid-sized company, or part of the long tail of specialized or niche players. This clarity enables firms to focus on realistic strengths and strategic roles, avoiding costly missteps chasing superstar status when it may never be attainable.

However, not being a superstar does not imply insignificance. Firms that recognize their limits often thrive by leveraging and integrating into ecosystems dominated by superstar firms. Just as in sports, where an athlete who does not reach superstar status may still contribute as a coach, trainer, or investor, companies can create substantial value by playing complementary roles in the broader economic ecosystem.

Superstar firms embody expansive ecosystems filled with suppliers, technology providers, service firms, investors, and talent developers. Firms acting as ecosystem specialists or strategic partners secure stable, ongoing revenue streams and opportunities for innovation by filling vital roles in these networks.

Luck opens doors, but it is sustained persistence through continuous innovation and agility that determines whether a firm transitions from startup to enduring superstar.

Examples include service providers and suppliers: Offering indispensable capabilities that superstar firms rely on; investors and strategic partners: Capitalizing on growth indirectly by financing or partnering with high-potential players; Talent and knowledge developers: facilitating human capital growth by training and consulting the ecosystem’s participants, or still innovation incubators: remaining agile and experimental, developing niche solutions that superstar firms may adopt or acquire.

The Lifecycle of Superstar Firms. If you have the superstar ambition, there are four elements of the recipe to have a chance to be in the game.

• The Role of Luck, Persistence, and Agility. CEO strategies must balance the element of luck—a critical early catalyst highlighted by Adler, where small initial advantages snowball into market dominance—with persistence and agility, which are indispensable for surviving and thriving past the early phases of high uncertainty and volatile growth. Luck opens doors, but it is sustained persistence through continuous innovation and agility that determines whether a firm transitions from startup to enduring superstar. Firms that fail to adapt quickly as technologies, competitors, and consumer behaviors evolve risk falling off the top-rank leaderboard—echoing the 30-40% churn seen among superstar firms.
• The Metabolic Rate of Change: Continuous Reinvention Superstar firms do not rest on past laurels. Instead, they maintain a high metabolic rate of change, continuously reinventing products, platforms, and business models. This requires a culture and leadership that institutionalize innovation beyond founder vision, balancing exploration with disciplined resource allocation. The CEO’s role is to embed mechanisms for sensing and integrating emerging technologies (e.g., AI, cloud computing) and new business models rapidly, while simultaneously harnessing scale advantages from existing ecosystems and intellectual property.
• Time and the Lifecycle: Building Through Stages. Superstar status is a trajectory, not an instant achievement. Typical timelines show that leading tech firms reach peak maturity between 20 and 35 years after founding, with unicorn or IPO status often achieved around 6-8 years. CEOs must therefore resist short-termism, focusing instead on long-term capability build-up, institutional memory, and ecosystem leadership.
• Anchoring vs. Reinvention: Navigating Existing Plays A core strategic tension in the CEO journey is whether to anchor the firm in existing plays (products, markets, technologies) or disrupt from within by reinventing the business model. This is nuanced: anchoring creates short-term stability and leverages accumulated assets but risks ossification; Reinvention demands risk-taking and can cause internal upheaval but is essential for circumventing disruption. Superstar CEOs typically manage this tension by integrating disruptive innovation at the edges, acquiring or financing startups, and creating internal innovation units—building guardrails that allow transformation without destabilizing the core​

Five checks for CEOs in the Superstar Era

• Superstars arise from a combination of luck, strategic persistence, and exceptional agility.
• Success is a long game—rapid scale is possible, but enduring dominance takes decades.
• The metabolic rate of change—continuous reinvention—must be institutionalized, not left to heroic founders.
• CEOs must carefully balance anchoring in existing plays with internal disruption, using ecosystems and acquisitions as critical tools.
• Leadership maturity parallels the firm’s lifecycle: early risk tolerance evolves into disciplined enterprise governance and ecosystem stewardship.

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