Just because Steve Jobs says it doesn't mean it's true. He's human just like everyone else.
The thing is, NOT every project, not every product, not every service can be grown into a full blown company. It just doesn't work that way. Go to any store and look at all the bottles of shampoo you can choose from, all those brands belong mainly to 1 or 2 companies, Unilever and Johnson. Same with food products. If every little shirt, and every brand of crackers where its own company with it's own marking, and distribution, and it's own packaging plant, it's own lawyers, it's own administration offices, it's own headquarters... We'd be paying triple for everything. (although we would have a lot more jobs... correction, the Chinese would have a lot more jobs...)
Some products just can't be monetized to support themselves so they MUST be acquired by a company that can integrate them into its own profitable services (or product line) and compete better with other competitors doing the same.
If nobody flipped it would screw over entrepreneurs by forcing them to commit themselves to one industry, one company, one product line their whole lives instead of being able to create companies, sell them, repeat. Thereby going in and out of numerous industries and markets instead of just one.
Can you really see every product becoming its own corporation? On the other hand, companies like Google and facebook (who's only difference from competitors were features) grew into their own massive companies. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.
Starting a company, growing it, and optimizing it are three different things. Very rarely are there people who are good at all three. Jobs is one of them, Zuckerberg another, but they're lottery stories. Their advice may not work for the majority of people.
- My 2 cents.