Its also possible that within a big company you can build stuff that no one uses. I've seen it many a time.
And in a big company you lose that other important thing ... whats that called ?? ... Oh yeah ... your soul.
As you ascend the ranks its just one big political game.
That's not an argument, it's a My Chemical Romance song. If your work doesn't mean anything, you change jobs.
You can do everything right at a startup and still fail. In fact, even if you do everything right, you're probably still going to fail. You have many more opportunities to correct in a bigco career.