So I just bought Megacorps, and have 1 question.

[Zenopath]

Why can't you place branch offices in other mega corp government friendly aliens?

I started a game as a mega corp, made friends with aliens, then i go to the corperate tab and the big red X tells me i cant make a branch office because they are also mega corps. My game has, 4 alien mega corps a fanatic purifier, so feels like my mega corp isnt going to get any branches. Especially since, you also can't put branch offices in franchise vassals you might decide to make independent, because they are also mega corp civic.

Why wouldnt you be able to do branch offices in other corporations? Corporations buy each other's stock all the time, if anything, it should be cheaper to put a branch office a mega corp civic alien, they should also get a chance to do same back at you.

 

[Kaleth]

If you as a corporation, have managed to create a complete monopoly of your planet through various means, to the point you now control the whole government, why would you let a competitor establish themselves there? while competition is good for customers, a monopoly is a corporation's dream.

 

[Zenopath]

i think that when you sign a trade deal with another alien race, who is like minded enough to also be a mega corp, they might be, oh hey, let us put a branch office on your planet, we will do same.

Suppose in future we live in a world run by Google-Disney MicroAppleSoft Amazon-Walmart inc, and aliens offer to set up their equivelent of mc donalds on our planet in exchange for allowing GoDMAW inc to open stores on their planets, would GoDMAW say no?

 

[Archael90]

If you as a corporation, have managed to create a complete monopoly of your planet through various means, to the point you now control the whole government, why would you let a competitor establish themselves there? while competition is good for customers, a monopoly is a corporation's dream.

while monopoly is a dream it can never became true. But only real thing is top make money, if corp cant make money by monopoly, they try to work with eachother - you give something to me, and ill give something to you.

 

[Kaleth]

Maybe this has to do with difference in perception about what the megacorps are. In my mind they are a business that has managed to take complete control over all business on a world, every citizen works for them, every citizen sells stuff on their behalf, every citizen buys from them. All goods are produced, sold and consumed by their workers. and this gives them all their power, cause if you dont buy and work for them, then there is no other option, its the ultimate monopoly.
To then let some alien race, a competitor in business, open their own shop on their planet. suddenly their citizen might be able to buy stuff from somewhere else, work somewhere else, they got Options. This diminishes their power, looses the monopoly and control on their citizens.
The way I imagine the commercial pacts between corporations is basically just selling off cargo. Il sell these fancy phones to you, you then sell it to your own citizens, both profits.

 

[Zenopath]

Maybe this has to do with difference in perception about what the megacorps are. In my mind they are a business that has managed to take complete control over all business on a world, every citizen works for them, every citizen sells stuff on their behalf, every citizen buys from them. All goods are produced, sold and consumed by their workers. and this gives them all their power, cause if you dont buy and work for them, then there is no other option, its the ultimate monopoly.
To then let some alien race, a competitor in business, open their own shop on their planet. suddenly their citizen might be able to buy stuff from somewhere else, work somewhere else, they got Options. This diminishes their power, looses the monopoly and control on their citizens.
The way I imagine the commercial pacts between corporations is basically just selling off cargo. Il sell these fancy phones to you, you then sell it to your own citizens, both profits.

i visualize a mega corp as what happens when the major companies merge together into something global but not so much like Buy and Large from Wall-E, and more like Disney.

Its not that no one competes with them, its that they keep buying up all the competition and absorbing it. Less like a 19th century railroad tycoon forcing other railroad companies out of business and more like a 21st century Disney gradually owning all movie studios. Aquisition via merger is more productive.

For example, did you realize that pretty much all eyeglasses sold in the US are made by same parent company (google it)? But theres so many brands right? Yeah, but whenever a brand becomes popular, it gets bought out. That way companies can acquire innovation from smaller startups. Illusion of choice is what the consumer wants.

In the same way I would imagine two races with megacorp civics would trend towards merger or aquisistion. Both would try to aquire the other via economic pressure, and if they are evenly matched, they might just merge into a single mega corp, which would be like a Federation, but more money focused. Why own 1 species worth of markets when you can own two species worth of markets?

 

[Gratak]

Maybe this has to do with difference in perception about what the megacorps are. In my mind they are a business that has managed to take complete control over all business on a world, every citizen works for them, every citizen sells stuff on their behalf, every citizen buys from them. All goods are produced, sold and consumed by their workers. and this gives them all their power, cause if you dont buy and work for them, then there is no other option, its the ultimate monopoly.
To then let some alien race, a competitor in business, open their own shop on their planet. suddenly their citizen might be able to buy stuff from somewhere else, work somewhere else, they got Options. This diminishes their power, looses the monopoly and control on their citizens.
The way I imagine the commercial pacts between corporations is basically just selling off cargo. Il sell these fancy phones to you, you then sell it to your own citizens, both profits.

Most of what you say is absolutely true. But you are forgetting a few things:
1. A company always wants to expand. So if they are sure of themselves, they would allow other megacorps in, if that means they can also expand into those themselves.
2. We are talking about companies who work together. Possibly both being afraid of a greater evil. They could always throw the other out if they feel more threatened by the competition.
3. There would most certainly be products one company/species has perfected while the other company/species never though of them. Again, if that goes in both directions, there is profit to be made by allowing the branch offices.

 

[Zenopath]

while monopoly is a dream it can never became true. But only real thing is top make money, if corp cant make money by monopoly, they try to work with eachother - you give something to me, and ill give something to you.

Yeah, in real terms, a pure mega corp like Buy and Large (from wall-e) will probably never happen, its the process of multinationals fusing into ever more powerful corperations. Like my OP, if in the future, Google, Disney, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon and Walmart fused into one. You wouldnt see every single thing be all one brand, you would see all the same familiar brands as before, but the combined global lobbing power would be so massive, that no government would be able to control them. They would have GDP higher than even the largest contries, and pull all the strings.

And the process would accellerate, because with all the lobbing power, no government could force them to break up, and they would keep aquiring more stuff, like Exxon then Shell, then maybe Bayer and Coca Cola. It would just be such a massive interconnected corporate powerhouse that it would be a world government. But it wouldnt work via monopoly, it would work by sheer economic might. Competitors get bought, or convinced to merge, not forced out of buisness.

And if a local goverment complains, well, maybe you simply stop selling any of your products inside that country and watch their economy collapse. You are so massive that you can take the loss from shutting down every store and laying off every employee working in a given country, but that government sure as hell cant survive the sudden 95% unemployment and massive riots and total economic chaos.

Killing the incentive for startups is really dumb, because where would innovation come from. Instead, someone makes something cool, like minecraft, then Microsoft comes along and buys it. You encourage small startups by sending the message: Make something cool we will buy you out for a billion dollars. Not "Dont try anything original we will crush you."

That is why two mega corps would eagerly let each other open up branch offices, because they want to aquire anything new. How many new products would each mega corp bring to the other? Can we have franchising rights to make those new products ourselves? We will be happy to give you franchises for our products. Basically the 2 mega corps would jump for joy at the chance to start selling alien goods to their consumers, because anything that gets them to buy more is good for business. You didnt know you needed to own an alien furry creature that lives in your house and follows you around, but suddenly, you have franchise rights to sell dogs at your local Glo'ka'mi store and you are making even more money selling dog accessories and importing dog food. Companies live to find new things you didn't know you wanted to buy.

 

[Astelon]

It's easy to assume that a megacorp owning everything also produces everything you'd need. Why would Samsung allow Apple make a shop selling iphones in their own headquarters? Also, what would a megacorp really get from such an agreement with another megacorp? Risk losing power back at home for the chance to gain some in a foreign land? Importing stuff from another megacorp to sell yourself, sure, you could assume that's what commercial pacts are for, but allowing the other megacorp to sell stuff on its own is a straight loss from their home revenue.

 

[Zenopath]

It's easy to assume that a megacorp owning everything also produces everything you'd need. Why would Samsung allow Apple make a shop selling iphones in their own headquarters? Also, what would a megacorp really get from such an agreement with another megacorp? Risk losing power back at home for the chance to gain some in a foreign land? Importing stuff from another megacorp to sell yourself, sure, you could assume that's what commercial pacts are for, but allowing the other megacorp to sell stuff on its own is a straight loss from their home revenue.

Capitalism is built on consumerism. Sure, Samsung doesn't want iphones selling in their neck of the woods, but they recognize that if they want to sell Samsung in iphone's markets, they need to allow it. What happens in a megacorp civic, in my opinion at least, is that Samsung and Apple would simply merge together and offer both products in each others stores. Some people want samsung phones some people want iphones, but the consumer is happier and willing to spend more money if they can choose one or the other. Forcing consumers to buy one brand would actually mean less sales, because some people would just not be into one product or the other.

Monopolies are bad for what would happen to the price of both phones, they would probably both be more expensive. But realisitcally, the price of a given product isnt determined by how much competition there is or isnt, its determined by demand. High demand drives prices, more choices creates more demand. Sell too high, then customers might decide they simply dont need a smart phone once every 2 years, but rather once every 5...

You run into problems with products that have inelastic demand, like medicines that keep you alive. If you need a medicine to survive, there is no limit to how much you will pay, but even then, selling at absurdly high prices will just mean more people will die and not be around to buy your other products. You price medicine to maximize profits, selling exactly as many medicine as you can make a decent profit with, and maybe a few poor people die but you sell enough medicine that even if the price isnt as high as it could be, you still make bank. There is a price point for everything.

But going back to samsung and iphones, how do you convince someone to buy an iphone 10 or a samsung 12? Its not because you own both brands that you will be selling them like hotcakes. its because you have added some new feature that will convince customers to abandon their perfectly adquate iphone 9 or samsung 11 and get the newest one. Innovation drives consumption, and what could possibly bring more innovation than suddenly having an entire alien civilization's worth of products to sell at your stores? Suppose you encounter a species that doesnt use smart phones, they would either want to buy a ton of them, or they would want to sell you their wearable scarf communicators. Maybe both. You could sell wearable alien scarf communicators and iphones at your store, they can do same. Some aliens will switch to iphones, some humans will switch to scarf communicators. Either way, you make money.

Remember that every megacorp employee, which is basically everyone, is interested in also being a megacorp consumer. When that happens, decisions tend to favor consumers a bit more than you would expect, if every consumer wasn't also an employee. Why would you pay your employees crap wages? Who would buy your products if everyone is getting crap wages? In our world, corps feel free to pay their own employees shit wages because they know there are other people getting better wages elsewhere that can buy their product. But if everyone works for megacorp, then everyone needs to be well paid to afford megacorp products and be happy consumers or you get unhappy employees and no sales.

Not to say that the CEO won't be ungodly rich of course, but its just that, when you control the entire workforce, and that workforce are also your customers, why would you treat them like shit? A happy employee is a happy consumer, and vice versa.

Anyways, remember there is always taxes and retail markup. Maybe you lose money because people are buying alien scarf communicators instead of iphones or samsungs, but you charge a 20% tarrif on the goods and you sell them at stores you own. Guess what? Turns out its a lot more expensive to buy an alien scarf communicator in your iphone/samsung phone than it is to buy your iphone/samsung. Some people will still buy them though, because they are new and different, thats ok, you make profit anyways. Dont worry, megacorps will ALWAYS find a way to make profits, even on inported products made by aliens.

 

[Kaleth]

so reading the responses, it seems the issue is we have different imaginations about what a megacorp is, which I quite like since it gives more rp options. as a side note, can criminal syndicates not make branches either on different megacorps? cause I feel like that would be quite a lot more interesting.

 

[Zenopath]

so reading the responses, it seems the issue is we have different imaginations about what a megacorp is, which I quite like since it gives more rp options. as a side note, can criminal syndicates not make branches either on different megacorps? cause I feel like that would be quite a lot more interesting.

Thats fair, I guess maybe megacorps are more like Buy and Large, where you have to buy what they tell you to buy, because that is all there is. Doesnt make logical sense to me that is how it would play out, but who knows.

From a gameplay perspective though, which is more interesting?

Megacorps that refuse to let aliens setup branch offices because they are greedy monopolists who don't want their customers getting new ideas for products and stop buying their own products.

Or Megacorps that agressively try to consume each other via economic warfare and setup branch offices as a first step towards a full scale aquisition/merger, or possibly, they might just cooperate to improve each other's economy and peacefully merge into the mega corperate version of a federation.

Good or Evil, more gameplay options are opened up by letting mega corps branch office each other. Let the economic warfare begin.

Or maybe the game just doesnt let you explore those possiblities at all, and locks you out of other megacorps, meaning megacorps can only prey on other civics, and not each other, drasically limiting what can be done.

Imagine how cool it would be if instead of not being able to branch office other megacorps, the game instead gave you more gameplay options when dealing with other megacorps who are trying to beat you at your own game.

 

[Kaleth]

I would love if you could use branch offices on other megacorp planets to try and take over control off the planet, maybe buying out shares or something. would make a more interesting megacorp vs megacorp gameplay. maybe if you get enough control you could merge the companies to absorb them or something. but sadly I think that might become a bit to tricky to balance properly.

 

[Shermanator]

I don't see my megacorp empires (most of them) as having complete control of all production and ownership of all buisnesses, I see my megacorp as simply being the most powerful megacorp, and being the "provider" if you will, of the functions of a government. There can still be other privately owned firms, the megacorp just controls the government. This is arguably supported by the existance of the internal market of a megacorp government. Essentially, the fact that Megacorp is the government doesn't mean that say, Clothescorp, which sells clothing, can't still exist as a smaller corp within the Megacorp civilization.

Regardless of whether you see your megacorp as having a complete monopoly on everything or not, it should be noted that there are some corporate authority empires that are explicitly not a single firm, trade leagues, which you can play as by taking free traders perk. The flavor text describes the government as a league of corporeations and similar entities that work together to run the state.

So I personally think it makes sense to allow branch offices on corporate planets and would welcome the option.

Also, gameplay wise, I think it would be good. Currently megacorps can kind of get screwed if all of their friends are megacoprs, no branch offices. This would make that possible issue mute. And it makes no sense a criminal syndicate can't branch office on corporate worlds.

 

[Strangedane]

I always loved EVE-Onlines version of the megacorp gone stellar.

"A state built on corporate capitalism, the Caldari State is run by a few megacorporations which divide the state between them, controlling and ruling every aspect of society. Each corporation is made up of thousands of smaller companies, ranging from industrial companies to law firms. All land and real estate is owned by a company which leases it to the citizens, and government and policing are also handled by independent companies.

Although this gives the corporations dictatorial powers, they are just as bound by Caldari customs and laws as the individual, and the fierce, continual competition between the corporations ensures a healthy, consumer-based social environment, which benefits everyone.

While the Caldari State may not be nearly as big as that of the Gallenteans, let alone the Amarrians, they are still universally feared and admired. Their economy is strong, and their military might parallel to that of the larger empires. Coupled to the fact that they are more unscrupulous than the Gallenteans and more combative than the Amarrians, this makes them in many ways the most meddlesome of all the empires. As most Caldari trade is conducted by individual companies rather than the State itself, this makes it difficult for the other empires to deal with them at a political level. If a company is found guilty of unethical business dealings, it simply disappears into its parent corporation, and before long another one appears to take its place. But if a Caldari company is threatened, the whole corporation and often the whole State backs it up with full force.

The Caldari State stands for corporate capitalism in its purest form. There are eight great Corporations that together own more than 90% of all property within the State. Each of the corporation is made up of thousands of companies of various sizes and various sorts, ranging from simple mining companies to powerful police companies. There is no single, unified government as such, each corporation rules it's territories like their own kingdom with little or nor interference from the other corporations. In higher matters, such as in foreign policy towards the other empires, the Chief Executive Panel, which consists of the CEOs of the eight major corporations, has the highest authority. The Chief Executive Panel also makes sure that the social infrastructure of the State remains intact and settles all major quarrels between the corporations."

8 different competing companies unified ONLY in the quest for greater profits and a bigger marketshare for the people. (which just happens to be the corporations employees)