History of the component group
Kerry Irons said:
I think that a more entertaining pool would be in predicting how long these groups will last in the market. Back in the day, there were French groups (Stronglight/TA/Simplex/MAFAC), Spanish groups (Zeus), multiple Japanese groups, multiple Italian groups, and then there was the attempt by MAVIC to put together a complete group. Market forces drove all these guys out of business.
I you look a little closer to history, you'll find that a main reason many of the component companies you mention went out of business is because they
didn't produce groups (by the way, Stronglight and TA are still going concerns).
In the old days, long before indexed shifting, no manufacturer produced an entire component groups - not even Shimano or Campagnolo (I put Shimano first, because they've been in the bicycle component business a few years longer than Campagnolo). Manufacturers mainly concentrated on a few components. Examples:
Maillard - hubs and freewheels
Atom - hubs and freewheels
Huret - derailleurs and shifters
Simplex - derailleur and shifters
Stronglight - cranks and bottom brackets
Regina - freewheels and chains
Sedis - chains
Shimano started with freewheels, and then over the years added derailleurs and shifters, then only the last 3 years or so added hubs, cranks, bottom brackets, brakes, headsets and seatposts
Campagnolo started with hubs, and then derailleurs and shifters, and after that slowly added cranks and bottom brackets, brakes, headsets and seatposts.
Until about 20 years ago, derailleur bikes used friction shifting, and parts could be mixed and matched - you could use Maillard hubs and a Regina freewheel and Stronglight cranks, with Campagnolo derailleurs and Simplex shifters, for example, and everything worked together.
With the advent of indexed shifting, all the drivetrain components had to become part of a unified "system" - the shifters had to match the derailleurs, which had to be matched to a partcular freewheel. With the advent of cassettes, the indexing system had to be further matched to particular hubs. Only a company that could produce a complete "group" could create an indexed shifting system, and many companies with either caught out, or got left behind in the race to perfect the "system." After the first modern indexed shifting systems were introduced in 1984 (starting with Shimano Dura-Ace), but 1990 there were only 3 companies left that were major players in the market - Shimano, Campagno and Suntour - and all had already been making complete "groups", so they were able to keep up with the market's shift toward indexed shifting.