The incumbent advantage: corporate power in agri-food tech

Abstract

The agri-food tech sector is touted for its potential to disrupt established industry. Yet research reveals that incumbent agribusinesses are buying their way into the sector through startup investments and acquisitions. Drawing from extensive qualitative research, we show that incumbent influence also shapes agri-food tech in more subtle and pervasive ways. Startups rely on incumbents’ social and material infrastructure to achieve the rapid growth demanded by their venture capital funders. Incumbent influence, we argue, is ambient, continuous, and frequently indirect. It saturates the spaces where malleable startups take shape, influencing even those with whom incumbents have no direct contact.