[Column] Andy Mosmans: From IOS to AIOS

On capturing “market share” in a world that doesn’t exist, yet determines everything.

Intangible value

Something fundamental has shifted in our economy. Not slightly. Not temporarily. But structurally. The majority of corporate value no longer sits in factories, machines, or inventory. That world, tangible, measurable, comfortably accounted for, has been overtaken by something else: intangible value. And within that: brand value. This is not marketing talk; it is economic reality.

Look at the world’s largest companies. Their balance sheets don’t tell the full story. In fact, the most important part isn’t on them at all. It lives in minds. And hearts. In our brains. Our collective memory. In associations. In expectations. In trust. In what we believe to be true. And that’s where it gets interesting.

The Imaginary Order

As Yuval Noah Harari describes it, we don’t just live in a physical reality, but primarily in what he calls the Imaginary Order: a shared world of meaning. Money is one such construct. Countries. Religions. And yes: brands.

Brands don’t exist. But they determine everything. They guide choices. They justify price differences. They create loyalty. They build preference. They make someone pay €1 for water, or €3.50 for exactly the same water, simply because of a different label. A €10 white sneaker or a €100 one.

IOS: Imaginary Order Share & System

What does this mean for branding and marketing?

That the classic obsession with market share has become too limited. Of course, distribution share, shelf space, share of voice, and market share still matter. But they are no longer leading. The real battle is fought elsewhere.

In the mind. In the system. In what you might call the mental operating system: an invisible layer where choices are prepared, shaped, and often already decided before behavior becomes visible. Call it the battle for Imaginary Order Share within the Imaginary Order System: IOS. It’s no coincidence that this acronym feels like it belongs elsewhere, as if it refers to an operating system. Because it does. A mental OS in which brands are apps competing for attention, preference, and meaning. And as with any operating system, whoever holds a dominant position doesn’t just win usage, but dependency. That is IOS.

The idea of morphogenetic fields

But perhaps even that is still too limited. What if the Imaginary Order doesn’t only exist in our individual and collective brains? What if meaning isn’t only stored in neurons, but also resonates in something larger?

The British biologist Rupert Sheldrake introduced the radical idea of morphogenetic fields: invisible fields in which forms, patterns, and behaviors organize and repeat. According to his theory, systems—from organisms and species to habits—build a kind of memory outside themselves. A field that influences what becomes likely.

Controversial? Absolutely. But as a metaphor for branding, it’s uncomfortably accurate. Because brands do exactly that. They build patterns. They repeat codes. They create recognition that goes beyond individual memory. As if something emerges that is greater than the sum of all touchpoints. A field of meaning into which people naturally step. Where preference is not constantly rebuilt, but evoked.

Building mental infrastructure

The Imaginary Order then becomes not just a sum of minds, but a dynamic field of shared meanings. A cultural, perhaps almost physically tangible, force field.

And Imaginary Order Share? It becomes not just market share in the mind, but presence within that field. Not just mental availability, but resonance.

And that’s where many brands get it wrong. We keep talking about content, campaigns, creation. About more, faster, cheaper. About visibility as if it equals presence. But visibility is not ownership. And reach is not meaning. In a world where imagery is abundant, cheap, and increasingly machine-generated, it loses its scarcity and therefore its value. What remains is what cannot be endlessly reproduced: a sharp idea. A distinct language. A recognizable thought.

In other words: the power of wording. You don’t build IOS with noise. You build it with precision. With words that open something in people’s minds. With codes that stick. With consistent behavior that proves what you say. Branding is therefore not a creative game. It is system thinking. The building of mental infrastructure and, if you follow Sheldrake, the feeding of a field.

AI as an intermediary layer: influencing the operating system

And then there is AI. Not as a tool but as a layer in between. Where brands once competed directly for a place in people’s minds, something has now come in between: systems that select, summarize, and increasingly decide what is relevant.

We search less. We ask more. And what we get back is no longer a list but an answer. That answer is not neutral. It is a choice. And that’s exactly where the battle for IOS shifts. No longer just: am I mentally available to people? But also: am I even being proposed by the system that thinks for them? From IOS to AIOS. The Imaginary Order is no longer shaped only by culture, media, and marketing, but increasingly by models. By AI that begins to influence and mediate the mental operating system itself. By algorithms that determine what is visible, what disappears, and what feels like truth. IOS gains a second dimension: from mind share to model share. From presence in minds to presence in systems.

From recognition to resonance

And perhaps even further: from recognition to resonance in a larger field of meaning. Because those who don’t exist in the model, will soon no longer exist in the mind. And those who don’t resonate in the field, will never truly stick.

And so branding becomes what it always was, but is now unavoidable: not communication, but infrastructure. Not something you do, but something you build.In the mind.In the system.

And, perhaps, in something beyond that.

Andy Mosmans is the CEO and Founder of VENGEAN

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