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These 8 Pivots by Startups Changed the World

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These 8 Pivots by Startups Changed the World

These 8 Pivots by Startups Changed the World

How do successful companies get built? Is there a predetermined formula or ideal circumstances to get off on the right foot as an entrepreneur?

When it comes to the technology world, the truth is that the most successful companies come in all shapes and sizes. Once in a while, strategy and its execution go as planned – but more often than not, a company must change its entire basis to get its best shot at winning.

In the startup world, this is called a “pivot”. It’s a risky change of direction that could end up as a game-changing success or a resolute failure. Circumstances can change fast to prompt such a desperation move. With technological progress growing at an exponential rate, in many tech-focused businesses such pivots can even be the norm.

There are many reasons a company may shake up its strategy. Maybe the customer response isn’t what was expected, or perhaps intuition suggests that a product could be used another way with a few modifications. Sometimes a mentor or friend may have a different vision on how something can be used, and other times a competitor can apply pressure to an early-stage startup by offering a similar or better product.

I know something about pivots myself, as this website (Visual Capitalist) is the result of a few of them. We first started as a marketing consultancy, and then we gambled at the idea of using infographics to supplement the press releases of microcap public companies. Neither of those really were effective, but we still loved the idea of explaining the business and investment world with rich visuals – and eventually Visual Capitalist was born.

Similarly, many other companies that we cherish would not exist without these types of strategic pivots. Twitter, Paypal, Nintendo, and many others were born under completely different circumstances than we know them today. Nintendo built vacuum cleaners and made instant rice until they thought the video game industry could be an interesting market. Nokia, which in the late 2000s was one of the biggest mobile phone makers by market share, used to have a Finnish paper mill and manufacture rubber goods in its early stages.

Today’s infographic looks at eight of the startup pivots that have changed the world.

Original graphic by: WhoisHostingThis?

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Technology

Charted: The Jobs Most Impacted by AI

We visualized the results of an analysis by the World Economic Forum, which uncovered the jobs most impacted by AI.

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Charted: The Jobs Most Impacted by AI

This was originally posted on our Voronoi app. Download the app for free on iOS or Android and discover incredible data-driven charts from a variety of trusted sources.

Large language models (LLMs) and other generative AI tools haven’t been around for very long, but they’re expected to have far-reaching impacts on the way people do their jobs. With this in mind, researchers have already begun studying the potential impacts of this transformative technology.

In this graphic, we’ve visualized the results of a World Economic Forum report, which estimated how different job departments will be exposed to AI disruption.

Data and Methodology

To identify the job departments most impacted by AI, researchers assessed over 19,000 occupational tasks (e.g. reading documents) to determine if they relied on language. If a task was deemed language-based, it was then determined how much human involvement was needed to complete that task.

With this analysis, researchers were then able to estimate how AI would impact different occupational groups.

DepartmentLarge impact (%)Small impact (%)No impact (%)
IT73261
Finance70219
Customer Sales671617
Operations651817
HR57412
Marketing56413
Legal46504
Supply Chain431839

In our graphic, large impact refers to tasks that will be fully automated or significantly altered by AI technologies. Small impact refers to tasks that have a lesser potential for disruption.

Where AI will make the biggest impact

Jobs in information technology (IT) and finance have the highest share of tasks expected to be largely impacted by AI.

Within IT, tasks that are expected to be automated include software quality assurance and customer support. On the finance side, researchers believe that AI could be significantly useful for bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing.

Still interested in AI? Check out this graphic which ranked the most commonly used AI tools in 2023.

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