Ask HN: Has any startup died due to idea being copied by a big company? - thewhitetulip
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mlejva
There was a company called Kiko[0]. They made it into YC back in 2007 I think.
They were basically building Google Calendar. After a year of work Google
unveiled their Google Calendar and they had to sold their business. PG wrote
about it in one of his essays[1].

[0]
[https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/kiko#/entity](https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/kiko#/entity)

[1] [http://paulgraham.com/notnot.html](http://paulgraham.com/notnot.html)

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thewhitetulip
It is sad to know that. Couldn't google have bought the company altogether.
Also how does this compare with imvu and snapchat (the two companies I know
which didn't get outright killed because big companies tried to copy their
product idea and failed)

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peter_retief
Go back a bit and you will see that corporations like Microsoft (and many
others) are built on stolen ideas. Its a very long list but Lotus123 and
Netscape spring to mind for me

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thewhitetulip
I came across this suggestion across the internet that "nobody is interested
in your idea". Hence the curiosity!

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sharemywin
you need traction first then they become interested. "Nobody is interested in
your unproven idea" should be the quote.

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mvpu
Snapchat (2011 - 2018). My its soul rest in peace in Instagram.

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thewhitetulip
Are you predicting that snap will fail in 2018?

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annmiller
yes, can't do anything but let it be.

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empressplay
Yes.

