Why was "into" used here, not "to"?
Native speaker’s answer
Rebecca
The word "into" is used here to show that the time when Disney rose ahead of its competitors was still within the early 2000s. You can use the word "into" when talking about a time period to show that something happened "within" a certain period of time. The word "to" could also be used in this context, but would imply that this success stopped in the early 2000s. The word "into" here implies that Disney's success didn't stop in the early 2000s, but possibly just slowed down after.