What is vertical integration?
Vertical integration means a company owns a stage it used to buy. SpaceX shows what that changes, and what it does not.
Vertical integration blog
Vertical integration examples: SpaceX, BYD, Anduril, Harper, OffDeal, AllDigital and a steel factory, with posts on what AI-native means and what to own.
AI-native company examples: six cases and what each one owns
Six AI-native company examples, from an insurance broker to a carmaker, and what each one does differently from a competitor that buys its tools.
Own or buy? Which AI capabilities belong in-house
AI made building software cheap enough that companies now build what they used to buy, and four questions decide which capabilities to own.
What is an AI-native company?
An AI-native company is designed around AI in how it works and in what it sells, with a test you can apply to any function and the research behind it.
1872 vertical integration in a steel factory
1872 did not sell factory software to fabricators; it opened its own steel shop in Cincinnati.
AllDigital, vertically integrated underwriting
AllDigital is an AI-first managing general agent, not a broker tool: about 70% of submissions are decided without a human.
Anduril vertical integration and Lattice AI
Anduril builds on its own capital, owns Lattice and the hardware it runs, and sells off-the-shelf products instead of cost-plus contracts.
BYD vertical integration and in-house AI chips
BYD makes most of a Seal in-house, about 75% in a 2023 teardown, and in 2026 it builds its own driving chip.
Harper vertical integration, an AI-native broker
Harper did not sell software to brokers; it became the broker, with about $47 million raised and more than 160 carriers.
OffDeal vertical integration, an AI-native bank
OffDeal did not sell software to Goldman; it became a bank for businesses with $1 to $10 million of EBITDA.
Vertical integration for mid-sized companies
Vertical integration used to take the scale of a Tesla. AI lowers that bar, so a mid-sized company can now build what its business depends on.