As we slowly see news on the economy getting better and our president now talking up the economy (if only in very future oriented terms), perhaps a new trend will develop.

Business, for the last 15 years or so, has been merger crazy.  Banks, entertainment companies, tech firms have been buying each other up in alarming numbers.  So much so, that the banking industry alone has developed into the holdings of a very few banks that are now deemed “too big to fail.”

One of the other natural side effects of this trend is the loss of the entrepreneurial spirit.  There are very few Google’s in the world and more General Motors.  Most companies run by boards are very bottom line driven and tend to look at risks and returns more than innovation.

Yesterday it was announced that StumbleUpon (a social media site) was buying itself back from eBay.  From all appearances, it seems StumbleUpon was losing its creative edge while within the confines of the much larger eBay.  In addition, eBay apparently is having trouble developing other holdings that it recently purchased.

Could it be that the auction house should have stuck to what it knew best, instead of trying to compete with other business models that buy up unrelated companies to pad their bottom lines?

Maybe its time for the small entrepreneur to have his or her day again.