Joe Morrison had a great thread on Twitter yesterday about the future of earth observation.
In my opinion this can be abstracted up to the future of geospatial technology, and more successful companies will be built by people focused in vertical markets with clear problems and market pull.
There will always be a place for spatial services business and generalist GIS-departments within governments and large organizations in the same way that there will always be IT departments within these companies. However, the greater success will be driven by product focused companies who can solve a real problem for their customers.