My 14 year old grandson with his younger sister were in Chicago this fall for a visit. He and I went to lunch for his favorite food, snow crab legs, while my wife, Tricia, took the grand daughter shopping on Michigan Avenue.

While watching my grandson devour his second order of snow crab legs, I am trying to engage him in a conversation. Conversations with teenagers are always a challenge.  I cover one of his favorite topics, the latest super hero movies-is the new Thor (God of Thunder or something) movie the second one in the series? No, Grandpa Brad, he politely says, it is the third. Who would know? Are D.C. and Marvel movies and super heroes the same group? No, again. I should have known since decades ago, I read comic books!

I decide to try to teach him something about business using one of his other favorite subjects, Minecraft. For those of you not familiar with Minecraft, it is described, on the source of all wisdom, Wikipedia, as a sandbox indie game involving building structures in a 3D generated world. Like most video games it involves exploring, acquiring resources, combat and survival. Which really does sound like business or The Business Zoo! Any parent or grandparent with a teenage boy especially knows about Minecraft. It actually seems more civilized and almost educational compared to most video games which focus on zombies or flying birds attacking hungry pigs. It was originally developed by a Swede called “Notch” and has a cult like following.

The week before my grandson arrived in Chicago, Microsoft, the software giant of Bill Gates, agreed to buy Minecraft for a couple billion dollars. “Notch” will not be part of the new business but will walk away with a lot of marbles and a lot of swedish krona.

I, sadly, tell my grandson to enjoy Minecraft now because it will either become boring to its fans or it will disappear once Microsoft gets their hands on it. Why he asks me? I tell him the sad corporate truth. Big, sleepy giant firms like Microsoft love to buy smaller, trendy niche companies like Minecraft but they almost always destroy the unique Culture and Leadership the smaller company had. The big firms can not help themselves. They want to make the new, smaller firm just like them and by doing so they ruin it. Microsoft has been around almost 40 years and they believe they are much smarter than the people at 4 year old Minecraft. As I have written before, within three years of a takeover like this, two thirds of all the senior and upper level people at the acquired firm, Minecraft, will be gone. With the founder leaving here it will even be accelerated.  Sorry, grandson, that’s the way business and deals work.

My grandson shrugs and he goes back to explaining to me the difference between the Justice League (D.C. Comics) and The Avengers (Marvel Comics).

Happy New Year to all!