Buying out competition and throwing out the workers confident that investors won’t back a small dog against a big one
In an investor run economy, competition means you might lose a bet. For an investor its better to reduce competition than lose bets. This is originally why anti trust legislation was created: The market needs to be forced to compete or it will amalgamate into a giant blob of noncompeting assets.
High taxes exist to reduce accumulation of assets and slow down the snowballing effect of huge investors. This is what the trump tax cuts look like.
you can get most of the battery cell upgrades by opening chests from exploring (and where the chests are becomes obvious if you collected a few old maps) and following the main story. The problem is exploring the depths isn’t all that fun. I never even used duping to get battery in my original game- by the time I explored the depths fully I was maxed out.