Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Must be a pretty nice sum for them to agree to it Not necessarily: if the investors don't agree to a reasonable amount, the wanna-be acquirer will simply hire the entire team with generous sign-on bonuses, and the investors will be left with a shell of a company. In this case, the core product is MIT-licensed, the team can quit on a Friday and pick up exactly where they left off under a new org on Monday.
In M&A's you usually sign non-competes.
The husk of a company would still be bound by whatever contacts were signed by its officers. However, non-compete enforcement against individuals have been declawed in California, where VoidZero is headquartered, and (I assume) where its investors are, and whose courts they've likely agreed to adjudicate disagreements.
This is an extreme measure not usually taken, but it's a nuclear option that sets a ceiling on how much investors may play hardball.