Disruption ‘26: A Framework for Differentiating Disruption Winners & Losers

Research evidence excerpt

Disruption ‘26: A Framework for Differentiating Disruption Winners & Losers

Equity Research

Equity Strategy

28 July 2026

U.S. Equity Strategy

Disruption '26: A Framework for SIGNATURE

Differentiating Disruption Winners

& Losers U.S. Equity Strategy

Venu Krishna, CFA

We develop a standardized, cross-industry approach to +1 212 526 7328

determine which software company characteristics venu.krishna@barclays.com

BCI, US

historically differentiate resilient incumbents during periods

Riddhiman Dass

of disruptive innovation, resulting in our new 'Resilient +1 212 526 0850

Software' basket. riddhiman.dass@barclays.com BCI, US

Rex Feng

Key Points & Highlights + 1 212 526 6114

• While software is among the first industries to be disrupted by AI, it will not be the last; rex.feng@barclays.com

AI-led innovations are making inroads in fields varying from industrial automation and BCI, US

transportation to robotics and healthcare. We seek to determine whether there are a set of Atharva Weling

generalizable characteristics that can help to differentiate those companies within an +1 212 526 3204

incumbent industry that can successfully adapt to disruption from those that cannot, and atharva.weling@barclays.com

offer a framework for how to evaluate a company's capacity to adapt to and ultimately thrive BCI, US

under a post-disruption paradigm relative to its industry peers. Tianqi Feng

+1 212 526 9179

• We examine five well-documented industry transitions (digital ads, shale gas, SVOD, tianqi.feng@barclays.com

iPhone, e-retail) and look for company characteristics that differentiated survivors from BCI, US

casualties in each of those instances. Metrics were ex-ante, smoothed and standardized

within-industry to enable cross-sectional comparison across industries and eras. Among 13