History Main / MegaCorp

*** Then there's [-DevaCorp-], a Delhi-based international technology conglomerate with subsidiaries in everything to architecture to medicine. It also happens to be [[TabletopGame/DemonTheDescent the largest God-Machine cult in existence]] and is always looking for [[TheyWouldCutYouUp demons to use for raw materials]].

ScienceFiction, especially of the {{Dystopia}}n and {{Cyberpunk}} sorts, loves its massive corporations. These corporations are umbrella corporations, controlling dozens of smaller companies that manufacture [[AcmeProducts everything]] from clothing and pharmaceuticals to advanced information technology (such as smartphones, ArtificialIntelligence and [[{{Cyborg}} cybernetics]]) to military hardware. They can [[LawEnforcementInc be the police]]. Perhaps there is one company that is a PrivatelyOwnedSociety in its own right. This goes beyond the definition of "monopoly."

The term "megacorp" comes from the works of Alfred Eichner (an economist), who defined a megacorp as a large, corporate enterprise that places survival and growth as key objectives -- using its impressive resources to protect itself and its interests, but to also constantly look for avenues of expansion. He argued that such large corporate entities operated using different rules and could be expected to act in different ways from smaller corporations. With the removal of morality as a limiter for corporate actions in the 1980s Wall Street culture, the megacorp became more dominant than even Eichner predicted. And much of modern fear of corporations comes from predictions of what lines they might cross to meet their need for expansion.

'''RealLife''': Monopolies, monopsonies (only one ''buyer'' of goods in the market), duopolies (only two sellers in the market), and oligopolies (only a small handful of Mega Corp entities that are selling in the market) ''do'' exist in real life, and indeed, very large multinational corporations do exist. And yes, ''some'' of these corporations do engage in unethical practices or political influence, and there ''are'' historical examples of Mega Corps acting either as a state within state or as an semi-independent political entity, such as the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanseatic_League Hanseatic League]]. There have been huge corporations with their own armed forces, such as the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_India_Company East India Company]], which at one point had twice as many soldiers as the British Army. However, it is still an exaggeration to claim that ''all'' [[ThereAreNoGoodExecutives corporations act in this way]].

* In ''WebOriginal/OrionsArm'': The solar system was ruled by Megacorporations led by transapient AIs up until the [[GreyGoo Nanodisaster]]. Now [[DeusEstMachina Archailects]] control most of the population of Terragen space and have by and large displaced them, but Mega Corps still have a great deal of influence in the Non-Coercive-Zone ([=NoCoZo=]), a lack-of-a-country built on the principles of extreme libertarianism, and the Periphery.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'' features two budding Mega Corps:

* ''Theatre/{{Urinetown}}'': [[IncrediblyLamePun Urine Good Company]].

** The Masrani Corporation, the park's new sponsors in ''Film/JurassicWorld'', very much fit here, being large and lucrative enough to buy [=InGen=] outright after the events of ''The Lost World'' and Hammond's death. In fact, it's even implied that Jurassic World represents only a tiny percentage of the Corporation's annual revenue, as their main business investments are in oil, renewable energy, and telecommunications. Hoskins even remarks that the corporation is so big and diversified Masrani himself doesn't even know about everything he owns, [[spoiler:foreshadowing that elements within [=InGen=] want to [[LivingWeapon break into military applications]] without Masrani's approval]].

ScienceFiction, especially of the {{Dystopia}}n and {{Cyberpunk}} sorts, loves its massive corporations. These corporations are umbrella corporations, controlling dozens of smaller companies that manufacture [[AcmeProducts everything]] from clothing and pharmaceuticals to advanced information technology (such as smartphones, ArtificialIntelligence and cybernetics) to military hardware. They can [[LawEnforcementInc be the police]]. Perhaps there is one company that is a PrivatelyOwnedSociety in its own right. This goes beyond the definition of "monopoly."

ScienceFiction, especially of the {{Dystopia}}n and {{Cyberpunk}} sorts, loves its massive corporations. These corporations are umbrella corporations, controlling dozens of smaller companies that manufacture [[AcmeProducts everything]] from clothing and pharmaceuticals to military hardware. They can [[LawEnforcementInc be the police]]. Perhaps there is one company that is a PrivatelyOwnedSociety in its own right. This goes beyond the definition of "monopoly."

'''For the best experience, try listening to''' '''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzMt1A7yBIk this,]]''' '''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gs6yseO7f4w this,]]''' '''or''' '''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tokliS_6tFE this]]''' '''as you read this page.'''

** The Kronas Corporation was sufficiently big to ''buy up'' Roxxon and various others. It was [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything run by rogue Russians to finance a right wing populist US presidential candidate]].

* ''Series/TheBoys2019'': [[Characters/TheBoys2019VoughtInternational Vought International]] are a Type 2 EvilInc who are responsible for managing the country's superheroes and who are powerful enough to challenge the CIA. They have a ''ton'' of resources and all kinds of products and services despite technically being just a pharmaceutical company, and they're so powerful that in Season 2, they survive a series of scandals that would run any other company out of business for good. Their media empire is ''so'' massive that they own in-universe equivalents of everything you can think of including CNN, FOX, Disney, Amazon, Spotify, Lifetime, every streaming service and every other form of media down to Telemundo. By the end of season 3, they're on the road to making the [[PresidentEvil President of the United States]] their PuppetKing.

'''RealLife''': Monopolies, monopsonies (only one ''buyer'' of goods in the market), duopolies (only two sellers in the market), and oligopolies (only a small handful of Mega Corp entities that are selling in the market) ''do'' exist in real life, and indeed, very large multinational corporations do exist. And yes, ''some'' of these corporations do engage in unethical practices or political influence, and there ''are'' historical examples of Mega Corps acting either as a state within state or as an semi-independent political entity, such as the Hanseatic League. There have been huge corporations with their own armed forces, such as the East India Company, which at one point had twice as many soldiers as the British Army. However, it is still an exaggeration to claim that ''all'' [[ThereAreNoGoodExecutives corporations act in this way]].

The term megacorp comes from the works of Alfred Eichner (an economist), who defined a megacorp as a large, corporate enterprise that places survival and growth as key objectives -- using its impressive resources to protect itself and its interests, but to also constantly look for avenues of expansion. He argued that such large corporate entities operated using different rules and could be expected to act in different ways from smaller corporations. With the removal of morality as a limiter for corporate actions in the 1980s Wall Street culture, the megacorp became more dominant than even Eichner predicted. And much of modern fear of corporations comes from predictions of what lines they might cross to meet their need for expansion.

* ''Fanfic/InvaderZimABadThingNeverEnds'': Coathanger Electronics is evidently a rapidly rising technology company that has managed to earn Professor Membrane's interest, which should speak volumes about its capabilities. [[spoiler: They also seem to have a shady side, being the ones who created the mutant creature that Zim's team hunts in Chapter 3.]]

** The Weyland-Yutani Corporation. Famously evil enough to sacrifice squads of colonial marines, entire colonies, and the security of the Earth in its attempt to weaponize the eponymous alien critters... and in the [[Film/AlienResurrection fourth film]] eventually buys out by an even ''more'' evil rival, Wal-Mart. In most franchise spin-offs, Weyland-Yutani control every Earth government, have colonized many star systems, and have a private army with a bioweapons division. Note that Creator/JamesCameron did not make the mega corp, which was introduced in Cameron's franchise entry ''Film/{{Aliens}}''; it was already present and evil in the [[Film/{{Alien}} original film]], Cameron just fleshed it out.

** The problem is so bad that "Megas" all over the place that run much of the world in the place of national governments, partly because political corruption and corporate capture are quite commonplace. The Triple-As don't do much [[ScrewTheRulesIHaveMoney flaunt the law]] as much as [[ScrewTheRulesIMakeThem make their own for their own territory]] thanks to the concept of extraterritoriality, which makes that particular corporation a sovereign state of itself and makes every piece of land it owns count as part of that "nation", complete with their own "corporate citizens".

* ''Music/DougAnthonyAllStars'': In ''DAAS Kapital'' the world is run by the corporation-government Shitsu Tonka, which has declared history officially over and all art dangerous.
* The galaxy of ''Series/DarkMatter'' is dominated by several rival corporations who wield great influence with the corrupt Galactic Authority, possess their own fleets, and routinely hire mercenaries to do their dirty work (like stepping on rebellious mining colonies who are using land the corporations want). At the end of Season Two, the crew is unsuccessful in preventing the eruption of an all-out galactic Corporate War.

* ''LightNovel/DateALive'' has Deus.Ex.Machina Industries, or DEM, run by [[BigBad Sir Isaac Ray Peram Westcott]], who plans to seek and harness all Spirit powers, then plunge the world into chaos and destruction.

* ''Anime/{{Patlabor}}'': Schaft Enterprises is a multinational conglomerate specializing in Labors, from domestic, to military models. They even smuggle foreign models into the country and conduct illegal field tests, by targeting the [=SVU2's=] Ingrams, in order to gather live combat data.

* ''Film/BatalhaDeGuararapes'': The Dutch East India Company is the direct antagonists of the movie, representing the Dutch Republic's interest to take sugar plantations from Northeast Brazil.

* ''Anime/MobileSuitGundamWingTheWitchFromMercury'': The Benerit Group is a corporate group consisting of everything from relatively minor corporations like the Shin Sei Development Corporation and Ochs Earth, to massive groups like Jeturk Heavy Machinery or Grassley Defense Systems. The group appears to act as de facto government of the solar system (no other government is seen at least), and its president, Delling Rembran, doesn't deny the accusation that he acts as a king. It also runs the Asticassia School of Technology, where students are divided into houses based either on what planet they're from, or what corporation sponsors them. To give an idea of how wealthy the Benerit group is, Peil Technologies, one of its top three earners, is perfectly fine with taking a 120 ''billion'' credits loss as part of a gambit to take out its rival, and Delling Rembran himself can spend over 7 billion credits on what amounted to allowance.

[[folder:Alternate Reality Games]]
* ''ARG/OmegaMart'': It's based around a massive grocery store chain that doesn't exactly obey the laws of this reality. Everything is overpriced and is made with rare ingredients/materials that can only be obtained in a globalized, capitalist world. According to the mart's lore, Dramcorp has at least one big industry in every human industry conceivable. But that's not all, Dramcorp ambitions to be worshipped as a god-like figure.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Art]]
* The Creator/MeowWolf installation Art/OmegaMart is based around a massive grocery store chain that doesn't exactly obey the laws of this reality.
-->''"Oh-oh-oh, Omega Mart! You have no idea what's in store for you!"''

* ''TabletopGame/{{Netrunner}}'': One of the players controls an evil mega corporation that controls most of the world by force or by controlling the goods they sell the people. Haas Bioroid creates androids and new technology for robots. Wetland Consortium has built the space elevator which becomes part of the story line for the game. Jinteki works in the computer and Internet industry. And NBN controls the news showing.

* The Schnee Dust Company in ''WebAnimation/{{RWBY}}'', which is one of the largest producers and exporters of [[PowerCrystal Dust]]. It's so big that it has its own security force and fleet of airships. It used to be run in an ethical way, but became much more exploitative of its workers after [[CorruptCorporateExecutive Jacques Schnee]] took over such as forcing them to work in unsafe conditions and it's mistreatment of Faunus workers. Even it's human workers were mistreated by how easily be considered laying them off in order to make up for company losses after General James Ironwood placed a Dust embargo on the kingdom of Atlas. [[spoilers:Among it's victims were Illia Amitola's parents who died in a mining accident and Adam Taurus who has his face branded with the company logo which eventually led to both of them joining the White Fang.]]