15 Innovative Companies Disrupting Their Industries

The world of business is constantly evolving, especially when macroeconomic factors and unexpected events take place. 2020 has provided just that, giving companies a chance to pivot, innovate, and do what they can to adapt and continue thriving. For some companies, this has been a simple transition due to forward-thinking business models that were well poised to succeed during a time consumed by remote work responsibilities. 

Whether they are making traditional processes much easier, providing benefits to customers, or solving age-old problems, here are 15 companies disrupting their industries:

1. Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN): Love them or hate them, Amazon has proven to be a leader in direct-to-consumer e-commerce and has forever changed the landscape of how we shop. From their Prime services that offer same-day delivery to their successful foray into film and TV production, Amazon continues to dominate even in a global pandemic, with a share price of over $3,000. As more people presumably stay home for work and during the quarantine, Amazon will continue being one of the most used services. 
2. Zoom Video Communications Inc (NASDAQ:ZM):  Zoom is one example of a company that has thrived due to a business model that was perfectly positioned for the current situation. Zoom has even outperforming industry giants such as Skype, that have failed to capture the growing attention of remote workers around the world. Zoom has seen its share price skyrocket and its downloads explode over the last few months. Whether being used globally for education, entertainment, or business, Zoom has definitely made its mark.
3. TikTok: Few social media platforms have caused quite a stir like TikTok. The platform has launched thousands of content creators’ careers, changed the format in which video content is delivered, and has even caused controversy within U.S. politics, with President Donald Trump seeking to have it banned. Nevertheless, the platform is as popular as ever, with billions of users as of September 2020. Keep an eye out on what happens with the platforms’ proposed sale in the upcoming months.
4. nextmarkets: nextmarkets is a European neo-broker that recently launched an updated version of its platform, bringing the total number of tradable assets to 7,000 stocks and 1,000 ETFs. Most importantly, the platform allows its users to trade completely free of charge without any commissions. Users can also benefit from the market analyses of experienced stock market professionals - the so-called coaches - integrated in the platform. Since the company’s foundation in 2014, nextmarkets has grown to become one of the leading trading platforms in Europe and attracted investments from well-known venture capitalists such as Peter Thiel, Christian Angermayer, Founders Fund and Axel Springer.
5. Exporo: Exporo was founded in Germany in 2014 and is one of the leading crowd investing platforms for real estate investments. Exporo offers investors the opportunity to invest cost-efficiently in various real estate projects in 1 Euro units through token-based bonds. With Exporo, investors benefit from the entire added value of a property. From project development, they can participate at a fixed interest rate in newly built, high-yielding, and proven real estate projects as well as in selected existing properties, where they can receive quarterly distributions from rental surpluses. Additionally, investors can participate in the increase in value. By 2020 the platform has financed more than 345 successful projects with a total capital north of 650 million euros.
6. The Ticket Fairy: The Ticket Fairy, created by brothers Jigar and Ritesh Patel, has flipped the event ticketing industry on its head. Instead of just being a generic transactional web site, it is also sophisticated marketing and CRM technology that drives more ticket sales and fan loyalty, prevents scalping, and increases profitability for event organizers and venues. With $100 million in ticket sales so far, it’s backed by some serious heavyweight investors, including Y Combinator and the founders of YouTube, Twitch, and Reddit.
7. Revolut: This fintech unicorn has made headline after headline for the past five years. Revolut’s challenger banking app has taken off, with more than 12 million users and 2000 employees as of 2020. Among its key features is an EU-regulated banking account that offers extremely low currency exchange fees, cryptocurrency storage, and budgeting tools to both businesses and consumers. Although Revolut’s primary focus has been on Europe so far, the company is currently expanding into the U.S. market and is expected to grow significantly in the coming years.
8. ScienceSoft: The importance of companies keeping their data online had previously led to them having to spend a fortune on hosting and security fees. ScienceSoft has since solved this problem by offering innovative cloud migration services to businesses of all types. This has meant increased app performance, as well as a significant reduction in infrastructure cost. By solving such a massive problem for businesses online, ScienceSoft has definitely made its mark.
9. Mercuryo.io: Mercuryo.io is a cryptocurrency payment ecosystem that provides solutions for business payments, remittance processing, and mass payouts regardless of local payment methods and currencies, via its cross-border payments network. The company offers a native widget that enables users to buy and sell various cryptocurrencies and that business owners can seamlessly integrate into their websites as a novel form of monetization. Another key feature is a fully licensed Mercuryo wallet, that allows businesses to send, receive, and swap many popular digital currencies.  Mercuryo is constantly working on expanding its product range, currently preparing the launch of a Bitcoin-backed debit card and is thus undoubtedly worth keeping an eye on.
10. EZFunnels by Said Shiripour: In 2020, maintaining a professional website is a key element of almost every business. Although platforms like Wordpress and Shopify have already opened the world of web design to people without significant technical knowledge, these solutions still lack important aspects from a marketing perspective. With his novel, conversion-focused drag-and-drop website builder EZFunnels, founder Said Shiripour offers a straightforward and highly effective solution to modern problems of marketers, including hundreds of page templates for a myriad of niches.
11. New Horizons: True to their name, New Horizons is a global firm supporting businesses expanding into new markets and territories. They offer a full suite of expansion solutions, ensuring ambitious businesses can open a new international operation as quickly and cost-effectively as possible. As a global Professional Employer Organization (PEO) they are able to recruit and legally employ staff to work on behalf of your business. Following Covid-19, New Horizons has been in significant demand as businesses seek to capitalize on international market opportunities
12. Oxylabs: Oxylabs is a leading provider of premium proxies and data scraping solutions for large-scale web data extraction, and was the first company to merge Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) capacities to the largest proxy pool of over 100 million proxies. This innovative step has made all publicly available data accessible to large scale collection. What distinguishes Oxylabs in the data collection market is its strict standards regarding ethical and transparent business practices, which have resulted in hundreds of trusted partnerships with high-profile businesses, many of which are Fortune 500 companies.
13. CrowdOptic: The brainchild of serial entrepreneur and visionary, Jon Fisher, CrowdOptic is the “Zoom for Medtech”, which even has Zoom’s CEO Eric Yuan’s financial support. The augmented reality technology platform partnered with National Bioskills Laboratories which combines A.I. and bioskills, allowing for remote attendees like medical students, physicians, and trainers to watch ongoing operations in real-time. Currently, Stanford University Medical School and the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) have begun streaming procedures to its community.
14. eInvest: With exchange traded fund (ETF) investing soaring during COVID, eInvest has taken an innovative approach. While most ETF providers simply replicate the market index performance, eInvest actively aims to beat the market through a new style of ETFs called active ETFs. This allows everyday people to invest alongside professional investment managers from as little as $4. Founded by Camilla Love in Sydney, eInvest’s Active ETFs appeals to everyday people who want to invest smartly but don’t want to be day traders. 
15. One Hour Professor: OHP has disrupted the online business industry by using transparency to highlight the many legitimate ways to make money online. Ron Stefanski, the creator of the website, does this in a few ways. First, he shares his own Income Reports showing his business progress since 2014. Second, whenever he is exploring a business model (Ex. How to make money on YouTube) he cites practitioners that are sharing proof of income. This approach has proved very disruptive to the “scammy” culture of online business. But, before being able to monetize a YouTube channel, one must gain a following on the platform. While this can be a daunting task, (Ex. Media Mister) has some helpful tips on growing a YouTube audience.

Disclaimer: The author of this post does not hold any public or private positions in any of the companies mentioned. The companies sourced in this article were selected by various public sources, recommendations, and word of mouth. Please consult your financial advisor before investing in any cryptocurrencies, stocks, or companies as they can pose risks for the average investor. This post is informational in nature and does not constitute financial advice.