how a gazelle company works
author and economist david birch developed the idea of gazelle companies in some of his early studies on employment and introduced the concept to a wider audience in his 1987 book job creation in america how our smallest companies put the most people to work birch contended that small companies were the biggest creators of new jobs in the economy estimating that gazelles comprised only 4 of all u s companies but accounted for 70 of all new jobs birch noted that the job creation pace of gazelle companies far outstripped that of the fortune 500 elephants large enterprises and main street mice mom and pop type businesses the pace of job creation eventually slows however as most gazelle companies struggle to maintain the rapid rate of growth beyond five years 2in a more recent business landscape a gazelle refers to any fast growing company and has lost some of its strict birchian definition what is still generally true based on recent studies and empirical observations is that gazelles are good job creators for open entrepreneurial economies such as that of the united states many are in the technology sector but numerous others are in food and beverage retail apparel and other growth industries examples of gazelle companiessome gazelles keep bounding along some get tired and slow down and some get eaten by big cats gazelle companies like apple aapl meta formerly facebook meta and amazon amzn seem like they won t get caught by competitors perhaps this is because they have become too large to be acquired or they became so big they have eliminated true business competitors the natural maturation process of their businesses also makes it difficult for them to remain gazelles as they grow larger in size other gazelles with their rapid and flashy strides in the open field may attract the attention of big predatory cats these larger cats could jump on them and eat them literally through an acquisition or they could enter their markets and claim market share for themselves using their existing infrastructure to shake up the landscape social media giant instagram makes a good example having been acquired by meta mobile messaging provider whatsapp and the virtual reality company oculus shared the same fate 