"Successful people create companies.  More successful people create countries.  The most successful people create religions."

I heard this from Qi Lu; I'm not sure what the source is.  It got me thinking, though--the most successful founders do not set out to create companies.  They are on a mission to create something closer to a religion, and at some point it turns out that forming a company is the easiest way to do so.

In general, the big companies don't come from pivots, and I think this is most of the reason why.