Nearly every company led by a master P-type innovator like Trippe gets shocked. Some sudden change, whether from a regulatory agency or a new competitor, stops the music. The loonshot-franchise cycle stops working. The wheel turns one too many times, and suddenly there’s a fleet of 747s that no one wants to fly. Competitors who have been nurturing their own loonshots, one or more of which fit the newly changed world, race by.
