Their entire reason for being is to sell out to Microsoft and disappear. Many of the companies at the show have gone the way of the Great Auk either by design or blunder. While there's nothing wrong with planned obsolescence, most companies don't actively pursue a strategy that leads to their own extinction. Making a fast buck may be a thrill, but nothing has cachet like staying power. They do evolve, adapt, change, learn and grow over time depending upon what's going on in their environment and what's going on with technology.
Companies also die, usually well before their time.
The reason they don't live up to their potential, de Geus argues, is because most companies have a heavy economic bent rather than an organic one. In other words, de Geus believes, companies are so focused on turning a profit that they effectively shut down any feedback mechanisms that could promote learning and growth. DuPont didn't achieve that kind of transformation by snoozing at the buckboard while frontier society gave way to an agrarian economy, which was itself surpassed by an industrial one. As befits one of the world's oldest continuously operating companies, DuPont has mastered the art of survival by adapting and changing. The Coca-Cola Co. decades longer than their virtual counterparts to achieve this magic benchmark.