For a decade, the ambition of a software company was to own a workflow. Own the workflow, own the customer. That era is closing — and the founders who understand what replaces it will define the next twenty years of the industry.
From workflow to rail
The shift is from owning a workflow to owning a rail: the payments, data and identity layer that other companies build on top of. It changes how a company prices, where its margin comes from, and which competitors it should fear.
The workflow is where you start. The rail is where you become impossible to remove.
Elena Cho · Ledgerbase
This is structural gravity, not a trend — and it is already visible in the companies documented on the stage.