They recently acquired Meetup as well [1]. This doesn't bode well for its future. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38953242
IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired
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Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired
#12Obviously sucks to be one of those 330 employees, but I wonder if we really need all these junk apps that just harvest user data. Hopefully they can get work doing something fulfilling. Every time a data harvester moves operations to Europe for cheaper labor, it seems like a game of Russian roulette. When will the day come that the EU drives Bending Spoons out of existence? The US should adopt intent nationalistic la…
Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired
#13Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired
#14They recently acquired Meetup as well [1]. This doesn't bode well for its future. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38953242
Speaking of, is there a good replacement for Meetup if you just want to organize some informal activities, like a user group or going biking?
Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired
#15But reading the comments here, I get another impression of the company.
Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired
#16i'm not sure i quite understand the situation. is the implication that bending spoons is some kind of private equity firm but for apps that will suck the soul out of these 17 apps? i haven't heard of this company before but browsing their site at least the marketing speak points towards it not being the case... could someone explain?
They’re not private equity… they’re like a bottom tier tech conglomerate that’s been growing rapidly lately. They most famously bought Evernote. They buy apps/products that mature and don’t need a lot of work, fire all the workers and hire a skeleton crew to manage them in a cheaper labor market. They also harvest data from the apps and resell it.
Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired
#17i'm not sure i quite understand the situation. is the implication that bending spoons is some kind of private equity firm but for apps that will suck the soul out of these 17 apps? i haven't heard of this company before but browsing their site at least the marketing speak points towards it not being the case... could someone explain?
They’re not private equity… they’re like a bottom tier tech conglomerate that’s been growing rapidly lately. They most famously bought Evernote. They buy apps/products that mature and don’t need a lot of work, fire all the workers and hire a skeleton crew to manage them in a cheaper labor market. They also harvest data from the apps and resell it.
Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired
#18Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired
#19I guess this is what the exact opposite of acqui-hire looks like. Acquire only for the app's customers, and their currently ongoing subscriptions, and nothing else.
Does anyone know if they maintain these apps well over time, or they just rot?
Re: IAC sold 17 apps to Bending Spoons. $100M deal, all 330 employees fired
#20They recently acquired Meetup as well [1]. This doesn't bode well for its future. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38953242