- Bonding Capital: formation of strong ties. There is a high degree of homogeneity, as individuals tend to reinforce shared practices, norms and similarities.
- Bridging Capital: formation of weak ties. This power comes from the ability to facilitate trust by providing transparency into the credibility of individuals.
- Linking Social Capital: formation of links between vertically/horizontally-separated groups. This is the transaction and value-capture side of the equation.

- Low-Cost Producer. The incumbents’ high fixed cost structure (which provides them with process and scale cost advantages) is becoming a competitive disadvantage as many travelers have grown tired of the impersonal experience of staying in cookie-cutter hotels and the inefficient and impersonal experience of traveling in taxis. In comparison, Social Sharing companies such as Airbnb and Uber are the ultimate low-cost producers as they have close to a zero marginal cost model as they have the potential to create infinite supply by empowering individuals to generate income from under-utilized personal assets (i.e. Property, Plant, & Equipment such as a house or car and Human Capital such as property management or chauffeuring services).
- High-Switching Costs. Customers are no longer held captive to the incumbents as Airbnb and Uber now present more attractive and personal alternatives.
- Intangible Assets. The value of a brand name is depreciating as Airbnb and Uber are creating long tails in travel by replacing artificial institutional trust with Social Capital by democratizing the tools of production and distribution and connecting supply and demand by capitalizing on the filtering efficiency of social network reviews and facilitating trust through dual accountability systems (i.e. both the hosts and the guests rate each other).
- Network Effect. Unlike hotel and taxi companies that seek to constrain supply to keep prices high, Airbnb and Uber are creating structural assets that appreciate in value as they attract more and more new hosts/drivers (i.e. supply) and travellers (i.e. demand) to their platform, leading to the ultimate network effect.