README

Corporations & Commercial Entities – README

This directory contains canonical documentation for corporations, holdings, and other commercial entities in the setting. Use the template in this directory for all entries.

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Scope

Covers everything from family-run businesses on frontier worlds to interstellar megacorps. If an entity is economically or politically significant enough to affect state-level outcomes, it belongs here.

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Classification

Scope

Value	Meaning
Local	Operates within a single city, colony, or outpost
Regional	Operates across multiple settlements within one world
Planetary	Operates across the entire world, possibly with orbital assets
Multi-system	Operates in two or more star systems
Interstellar	Operates across multiple sectors or political entities

Type

Value	Meaning
Family business	Owned and managed by a single family
Private corporation	Closely held, non-public
Publicly traded	Shares listed on an exchange
Conglomerate	Multiple business lines under one holding
Holding company	Owns controlling stakes in subsidiaries; may not produce directly
State-owned enterprise	Owned by a government entity
Cooperative	Worker or member-owned

Sector

Broad economic sector. Use this for the company’s position in the economy, not for its exact industry.

Value	Meaning
Primary	Extraction, agriculture, raw materials, energy resources
Secondary	Manufacturing, industrial production, processing, construction, engineering
Tertiary	Services, logistics, finance, trade, media, administration
Mixed	Operations across multiple sectors

Industry

Specific business domain. Use one or more concise industry labels. This field can be narrower than Sector.

Value	Meaning
Agriculture	Farming, plantations, raw food production
Food processing	Industrial or cooperative processing of food products
Petrochemicals	Oil extraction, refining, fuels, plastics, fertilizers
Chemicals	Bulk chemistry, biomaterials, industrial chemical production
Armaments	Firearms, ammunition, ordnance, military systems
Energy	Power generation and energy infrastructure
Mining	Resource extraction from planets, asteroids, or orbital bodies
Heavy industry	Smelting, metal processing, industrial manufacturing
Logistics	Freight, transport, orbital/interplanetary shipping
Finance	Banking, credit, investment, reserve institutions
Media	Broadcasting, entertainment, information channels
Technology	Electronics, R&D, specialist hardware, advanced systems
Construction	Building, infrastructure, heavy civil works
Governance / Trade administration	Commercial-political bodies, trade unions, chartered consortia
Other	Any domain not covered above; explain briefly in parentheses

Strategic Status

How critical the entity is to state survival, military capability, or system-level stability. This is not the same as sector.

Value	Meaning
None	Ordinary commercial importance
Important	Economically meaningful, but replaceable
Strategic	Important to military capability, infrastructure, or political stability
Critical	Loss or disruption would seriously damage a state or system
Sovereign-grade	Entity approaches state-level power or controls state-like capabilities

Dominance

Market position inside the company’s named industry or market. Dominance describes market control, not absolute economic size.

Value	Meaning
Niche player	Specialized, small market share
Market participant	Competes in a broader market without leadership
Market leader	Largest player in its sector
Oligopolist	One of a few dominant players sharing the market
Monopoly	Near-total or absolute control of its market

Economic Weight

Absolute scale and systemic importance before exact revenue is known. Use this to distinguish a small monopoly in a narrow field from a planet-shaping hegemon.

Value	Meaning
Minor	Small firm; limited effect beyond its niche
Moderate	Noticeable company with regional or sector relevance
Major	Large company affecting a major market or political constituency
Systemic	Disruption would affect state-level economy, infrastructure, or security
Hegemonic	One of the defining economic powers of a single world or star system; local governments must account for it
Interstellar power	A major economic actor across several systems, comparable to a small interstellar polity
Sovereign-scale	Comparable in resources and influence to an established interstellar state; can sustain independent infrastructure, security, and diplomacy
Great-power scale	Comparable to a major interstellar power; can shape governments, strategic markets, and conflicts across multiple political entities
Civilizational	Operates at the scale of broad interstellar regions or civilization-wide systems; disruption would alter the balance of the setting

Examples:

Entity pattern	Dominance	Economic weight
Small specialist with near-total control of a narrow component market	Monopoly	Minor / Moderate
Large food company competing with peers across a planet	Market leader	Major / Systemic
Planetary mechanical-industrial monopoly	Monopoly	Hegemonic
Megacorporation comparable to a small interstellar state	Market leader / Oligopolist	Sovereign-scale
Megacorporation able to pressure major interstellar governments	Oligopolist / Monopoly	Great-power scale
Small defense startup bidding on tenders	Niche player	Minor

Scope and Economic weight are independent. A company may operate in many systems but remain economically modest, while a company confined to one system may be hegemonic within it.

Legal Status

Value	Meaning
Licensed	Standard corporate charter from a state
Charter-protected	Special legal status granting privileges or immunities
Stateless	Operates across borders without a single home jurisdiction
Sovereign-equivalent	Effectively exercises state-level power (territory, military, diplomacy)

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File Naming

• CORP_<SHORT_ID>.md — e.g. CORP_ZALEWSKI_HOLDING.md
• Use underscores, uppercase for the ID prefix

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When to Create an Entry

• The entity is a strategic industry (military, shields, cybernetics, shipbuilding, etc.)
• The entity has monopoly or oligopoly status in its sector
• The entity’s leaders are recurrent NPCs in the narrative
• The entity’s operations are critical to a state’s economy or political stability

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Cross-references

• Key people → canon/characters/CHAR_*.md
• Headquarters / Geographic Footprint / Key Facilities → canon/systems/SYSTEM_*.md (never individual planets — they have no canon ID and can’t be linked/back-linked); use canon/states/STATE_*.md instead where the political affiliation is the relevant fact, e.g. a single-system state or a footprint entry that’s really about operating under that state’s jurisdiction
• Political influence → data/politics/<STATE>_general.csv (actor type: corporation)
• Economic impact → data/economy/<STATE>.csv (corporate_sector_wealth_accumulation)