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by buying out the completion, e.g. skype. For the most part the triple "E" has not altered all that much with the time.

Alternative venues include the default installation of windows to (almost) every laptop in existence.

Do you have any recent examples? Skype acquisition was more than a decade ago ( during the Ballmar era).

video game industry - zenimax, activision blizzard

AI/speech recognition - nuance communications (the stuff behind apple's siri)

side note: does linkedIn count?

self reply since it's most relevant to "Teams", and I knew I had missed something. Microsoft did try to buy 'discord' but the price was not right.

Not an acquisition per se but: OpenAI

you identified it - Windows & Office.

These two products dominate every non-technical industry. I think MSFT makes mediocre software. But as long as those two gravy trains exist, they'll never lose.

Because capitalism is a lie, political power decides which tech companies get big, not innovation.