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Dropbox CEO Drew Houston to step down

cnbc.com

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Re: Dropbox CEO Drew Houston to step down

#221

Post by babypuncher »

bhouston wrote: post #124

Dropbox's stock has been stuck at around $6B valuation for years with flat growth and income around $2.5B per year. It is just stuck. Box.com, which is quite similar, is not that different. Around $3B and $1.2B in income. Similar valuation. I think it is the market, not the leadership. It is a tough market that has cut off the consumer end because all the big players have their own deeply integrated solutions: Apple…

Are they profitable? Is there any reason they can't be happy just turning a regular profit? This "growth at all costs" mindset feels toxic.

Re: Dropbox CEO Drew Houston to step down

#222

Post by xyst »

bhouston wrote: post #124

Dropbox's stock has been stuck at around $6B valuation for years with flat growth and income around $2.5B per year. It is just stuck. Box.com, which is quite similar, is not that different. Around $3B and $1.2B in income. Similar valuation. I think it is the market, not the leadership. It is a tough market that has cut off the consumer end because all the big players have their own deeply integrated solutions: Apple…

only a hyper capitalist would think $2.5B/year is "flat growth". maybe instead of paying out shareholders, short term gains. maybe invest in their workforce or company itself?

just a thought for you people.

Re: Dropbox CEO Drew Houston to step down

#223

Post by AznHisoka »

runako wrote: post #153
Ekaros wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about a strange outdated idea. Stay where you are and start paying dividends? Well, somehow that is now unacceptable idea.

DropBox has been retiring shares fairly consistently. This is generally used as an alternative to dividends, and is done primarily for tax efficiency.

Where do those shares then go? Are they just gone forever?

Or do they then turnaround and give them to employees?

If its gone forever, then… why? They just bought something and burnt it? Isnt that like a waste of resources?

The stock market, still to this day is a very very strange thing…

Re: Dropbox CEO Drew Houston to step down

#224

Post by stringfood »

giancarlostoro wrote: post #219
bhouston wrote: post #124

Dropbox's stock has been stuck at around $6B valuation for years with flat growth and income around $2.5B per year. It is just stuck. Box.com, which is quite similar, is not that different. Around $3B and $1.2B in income. Similar valuation. I think it is the market, not the leadership. It is a tough market that has cut off the consumer end because all the big players have their own deeply integrated solutions: Apple…

I'm really not sure what Dropbox could even do other than have gone full swing towards a serious pivot or a new expansion into a new domain, but if they were going to do that they should have done that some years ago, if their current CEO stepping down alarms some of their existing customers, it might not end well. Dropbox is one of those companies that did something right, and its kind of sad seeing them in this wei…

Problem is most consumers and businesses would rather pay for 1 product that does 7 things ok than 7 products that do 1 thing great each. The former is cheaper and often is easier to cross-integrate - I'd rather just use AWS or GCP storage options than ever touch drop box

Re: Dropbox CEO Drew Houston to step down

#225

Post by mcgrath_sh »

HaloZero wrote: post #209

I really hope the next person in charge gives up on business deals and aims for more personal updates. I store all my photos on Dropbox. The fact that they don’t a have a good way to manage it is still painful

I too store all my photos on Dropbox. I used Hazel on macOS to move them into YYYY/YYYY-MM folders. I now use a bash script to do similar. This organization system has been rock solid for me for over a decade. I honestly don't want more than that. I dislike the obfuscation so many photo storage solutions use. I want my files and my folders.

Re: Dropbox CEO Drew Houston to step down

#226

Post by guhcampos »

bhouston wrote: post #124

Dropbox's stock has been stuck at around $6B valuation for years with flat growth and income around $2.5B per year. It is just stuck. Box.com, which is quite similar, is not that different. Around $3B and $1.2B in income. Similar valuation. I think it is the market, not the leadership. It is a tough market that has cut off the consumer end because all the big players have their own deeply integrated solutions: Apple…

Is that bad though?

Think about it. If you're paying all your bills, all your wages, and you have a strong product that people enjoy, and you're able to compete in the market - maybe not gaining any ground, but at least not losing any either - why change?

Of course I moderately understand the market pressures at work, but at some point in the human civilization journey we'll have to be content with something instead of chasing clouds all the time.

Re: Dropbox CEO Drew Houston to step down

#227

Post by maxbond »

nikkwong wrote: post #214
yesitcan wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this guy really replying with AI?

Not every use of the em dash is Ai. I’ve long used it and always am accused of using Ai in responses — though I never do.

No indicator of AI writing is going to last forever. We really shouldn't over index on the oldest indicator (which is liable to decay first). People are starting to say "delve" more in verbal conversations. This treadmill will keep moving. Unfortunately we have little choice but to keep up with it.

Re: Dropbox CEO Drew Houston to step down

#228

Post by VirusNewbie »

I've used for dropbox for the last 13+ years, was an early customer, and absolutely love the core product.

However, in the last handful of years, I've been incredibly disappointed in the stagnation of their products.

Dropbox was the first 'virtual desktop' I created that allowed me to hop into new companies and get going in a seamless way. Beyond just dotfiles, I was able to keep applications too, it was so easy to sync and get everything setup at a new company.

When repl.it came out, I wondered why Dropbox hadn't done that first. There's all sorts of room for innovation here - being able to install the right binaries, perfectly configuring a cloud command line setup, syncing configs, etc.

Photos - I have the majority of phots from my adult life stored on dropbox. But the searching is crap compared to google. It's not easy to share or make albums. Dropbox could have been a mini-social media site, a way to share photos, collages, albums easily with friends - but it has half the features of google photos!

Collaborative Editing - They probably could have done something here too, but I never saw a compelling attempt.

Dropbox is still a great product for file syncing, but I fear that they will slowly lose relevance if they don't get another hit product.

Re: Dropbox CEO Drew Houston to step down

#229

Post by xyst »

s_dev wrote: post #217
joshmn wrote: post #128

If there are any Dropboxers here (drew—I emailed you a few weeks ago, but I imagine you're busy): I went to prison for 18 months, my digital and physical life was stolen from me: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45451567 applies to my Dropbox account (and Apple but separate problem); I just received the "your account will be going bye-bye" email. I have very important dead-mom-club stuff in there, and support is…

>I went to prison for 18 months, my digital and physical life was stolen from me This is wild phrasing.

[flagged]
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