One strain could manufacture the amino acid tryptophan and the other could not. Both strains were put together in a medium containing tryptophan. The strain lacking the capability to produce the amino acid survived while the other strain died out. Dr. Pauling concludes that the burden of carrying machinery for producing tryptophan was enough to cause the synthesizing bacterium to be overtaken by its more efficient competition.
Businesses have a surprising amount in common with living organisms.
And they both learn, adapt, exploit and grow through consumption of information. Corporate information, on the other hand, is captured and maintained in databases. Legions of IBM salespeople ushered in the mainframe era by convincing organizations to build their electronic information systems in-house. Data processing rooms housed the equipment, and MIS departments coded the applications to meet specific operational requirements. Employees accessed information via dumb terminals or simply through distribution of computer generated reports.