Mark Cuban has been warning some businesses for a few years that they’re built on shaky ground, and it seems like his predictions might be coming true.
The old setup
Cuban sees traditional media companies in the same way a lot of people do. They’re failing. In fact, he actually said it was ‘the worst industry in the history of industries,’ and that’s not exactly something worth investing in. The biggest issue for Cuban is how they’ve changed.
You don’t need a big media company anymore to share your thoughts. You don’t even need them to help you tell a story. Now, you can use AI tools to make videos and create audio for you. It’ll even write the content. The expensive part of media’s becoming way too costly now.
The crowded table
It might sound strange. But Cuban has said that anyone with money shouldn’t invest in restaurants because, apparently, almost anyone can open one. That’s an issue. There’s nothing stopping someone from opening another place right down the street from you.
No, Cuban isn’t saying the food industry itself is going to disappear completely. That’d be unrealistic. But he does think the restaurant business model’s going to be harder to protect. Maybe put your money into something else.
Someone else’s house
Some businesses look healthy enough, so then what’s the issue? It’s that they’re living on borrowed land, essentially. The companies that rely on sites like Amazon and Etsy are in grave danger, according to Cuban. You can’t depend on a platform you don’t own.
He’s said that the fees on sites like Amazon and Walmart are completely ridiculous. The platform can change fees whenever they want. They can make you invisible whenever they want. Then it’s bye-bye business because all your sales will have disappeared.
The bottle problem
It’s easy to buy into liquor brands and think they’re a smart investment. You know, the ones with a celebrity name or clean label, they seem to be good places to put your money. Cuban disagrees. He’s warned against investing in liquor companies because they’re ‘the death.’
Cuban says these businesses have similar issues with the restaurants. Another bottle can show up way too easily. Same story, same price, same customers.
The checkbook risk
You’d think businesses funded by the government are safe. They’re the companies supported by government contracts and grants, maybe public programs. They’re steady. But only for a short time. They’re certainly not safe.Â
Cuban warned about what he called a ‘Red Rural Recession’ in 2025, and he forecast a ton of cancellations. Grant cancellations. Company contract cancellations. The whole works. He’s said that these businesses depend on decisions made far away, and that’s not good news.
The slow lane
Cuban’s not the kind of guy to beat around the bush with AI. He made it clear. He believes that, over the next few years, companies are going to split. There’ll be the ones that are great at AI, and the ones that aren’t. Guess which ones go out of business?
But Cuban wasn’t exactly telling companies to occasionally use AI. He’s saying that they need to rebuild entire systems around artificial intelligence, rather than seeing it as something extra. It’s a lot of work. It’s worth it, though.
The AI limits
However, it’s not all good news for AI companies because Cuban also says some of them are going to disappear. Permanently. He compared it to the original fight between companies when search engines first appeared. Lots of them pitched in. Only a few survived.
Cuban thinks something similar will happen with AI companies, especially since so many of them are spending a lot at the moment. Now, we have OpenAI, Anthropic, Perplexity, Gemini, and so many more, but Cuban thinks we’ll only have a few in the future.Â
A lack of scale
Small-town businesses often feel safe because they’re familiar, and that’s mostly down to everything being basically the same inside. Cuban’s warned them about the money underneath. He’s worried about how some of these small-town businesses don’t have any scale.
Any canceled grants or company contracts are going to hit the small towns hard. It might be even harder than the big cities. He’s predicted that local-only businesses might have some serious problems in the future.
Sources: Please see here for a complete listing of all sources that were consulted in the preparation of this article.
