Union Square gets 5,000% return on Tumblr • Hacker News Board

Re: Union Square gets 5,000% return on Tumblr

#11

Post by pkmehta » Tue, May 21, 2013, 10:22 PM UTC

Worth noting that "A spokeswoman for Spark Capital disputed the accuracy of the report"

Privco were the same guys who did the LivingSocial hatchet job a while ago which was proven inaccurate. Privco's MO seems to be wild claims to generate interest in their private company data.

It seems even major publications think Privco's claims and data are not very good. Here's a tweet from TechCrunch and AllThings D editors questioning the integrity of the company and their data - https://twitter.com/MikeIsaac/status/336949975634296833

For those interested, I have found VCExperts data to be better for this type of shareholding info (not affiliated with the company) and definitely less sensationalist.

Unrelated to Privco, a big congrats to USV - disciplined, open and truly thesis driven - not just chasing what is the hot thing of the moment.

Re: Union Square gets 5,000% return on Tumblr

#12

Post by larrys » Tue, May 21, 2013, 10:29 PM UTC

""For Tumblr's employees, they will go on to start their own companies and create new jobs; David Karp and his co-founders will likely become active angel investors or VCs; and Union Square Ventures will reinvest much of its returns back into the next generation of New York City startups.""

So essentially the things that made the company "magic" will no longer be fully invested in it's future success. And the new hires won't have the lure of making loads of money either since there won't be any future payday to wish for.

Re: Union Square gets 5,000% return on Tumblr

#13

Post by [deleted] » Tue, May 21, 2013, 10:31 PM UTC

sgpl wrote: post #9

According to PrivCo [ http://goo.gl/AW7GD ], here are all the payouts of the 1,100 mn: $286 mn: USV $231 mn: Spark Capital $253 mn: David Karp $176 mn: Sequoia $88 mn: Greylock, Insight Ventures, DFJ $66 mn: Employees (6% of the 1,100 mn) The math adds up to 71% of Tumblr being owned by VCs. Also Bloomberg reported that David Karp asked for as much stock as Yahoo would give him, because he sees himself working on Tum…

[deleted]

Re: Union Square gets 5,000% return on Tumblr

#14

Post by hkmurakami » Tue, May 21, 2013, 10:35 PM UTC

jlgreco wrote: post #10

sgpl wrote: post #9

According to PrivCo [ http://goo.gl/AW7GD ], here are all the payouts of the 1,100 mn: $286 mn: USV $231 mn: Spark Capital $253 mn: David Karp $176 mn: Sequoia $88 mn: Greylock, Insight Ventures, DFJ $66 mn: Employees (6% of the 1,100 mn) The math adds up to 71% of Tumblr being owned by VCs. Also Bloomberg reported that David Karp asked for as much stock as Yahoo would give him, because he sees himself working on Tum…

The notion of 30 year old websites seems incredibly alien to me, but I suppose there is no real reason why that should never happen.

speaking of which, what are some of the oldest web services that are still prominent today? iirc Amazon is approaching 20 years.

Re: Union Square gets 5,000% return on Tumblr

#15

Post by larrys » Tue, May 21, 2013, 10:36 PM UTC

dot wrote: post #5

> Tumblr's employees will also do well. The company's first 10 employees will receive an average of $6.2 million in cash; the first 30 will receive an average of $3.3 million in cash, and the rest of the 178 employees will each receive $371,000. Is it usual to announce these numbers for all employees with acquisitions like this?

"the rest of the 178 employees will each receive $371,000."

Interesting to keep in mind for anyone working for a startup as a metric.

You work and have a chance, if the idea hits (to the tune of 1 billion) of making low to mid 6 figures.

$371k is certainly nice but considering the amount of startups that not only don't succeed but don't succeed to the extent that Tumblr did ...

Re: Union Square gets 5,000% return on Tumblr

#16

Post by noblethrasher » Tue, May 21, 2013, 10:38 PM UTC

hkmurakami wrote: post #14

jlgreco wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The notion of 30 year old websites seems incredibly alien to me, but I suppose there is no real reason why that should never happen.

speaking of which, what are some of the oldest web services that are still prominent today? iirc Amazon is approaching 20 years.

I enumerated several here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5740969. They're all between 14 and 20 years old.

Re: Union Square gets 5,000% return on Tumblr

#17

Post by vellum » Tue, May 21, 2013, 10:40 PM UTC

According to USV's blog, there were other investors in the first round: John Borthwick, Fred Seibert, and Jakob Lodwick

No mention of what they got.

http://www.usv.com/2007/10/tumblr.php

Re: Union Square gets 5,000% return on Tumblr

#18

Post by jbredeche » Tue, May 21, 2013, 10:43 PM UTC

Congrats to Spark Capital as well. They're our lead investor at Quantopian and their intelligence and helpfulness have been everything we could have hoped for.

Re: Union Square gets 5,000% return on Tumblr

#19

Post by krschultz » Tue, May 21, 2013, 10:46 PM UTC

larrys wrote: post #15

dot wrote: post #5

> Tumblr's employees will also do well. The company's first 10 employees will receive an average of $6.2 million in cash; the first 30 will receive an average of $3.3 million in cash, and the rest of the 178 employees will each receive $371,000. Is it usual to announce these numbers for all employees with acquisitions like this?

"the rest of the 178 employees will each receive $371,000." Interesting to keep in mind for anyone working for a startup as a metric. You work and have a chance, if the idea hits (to the tune of 1 billion) of making low to mid 6 figures. $371k is certainly nice but considering the amount of startups that not only don't succeed but don't succeed to the extent that Tumblr did ...

That said, being the 41st person at a startup is not exactly risky and I wouldn't expect you to be taking a below market salary in exchange for shares at that point. So market salary + $371k bonus isn't a bad deal.

Re: Union Square gets 5,000% return on Tumblr

#20

Post by josh2600 » Tue, May 21, 2013, 10:48 PM UTC

sgpl wrote: post #9

According to PrivCo [ http://goo.gl/AW7GD ], here are all the payouts of the 1,100 mn: $286 mn: USV $231 mn: Spark Capital $253 mn: David Karp $176 mn: Sequoia $88 mn: Greylock, Insight Ventures, DFJ $66 mn: Employees (6% of the 1,100 mn) The math adds up to 71% of Tumblr being owned by VCs. Also Bloomberg reported that David Karp asked for as much stock as Yahoo would give him, because he sees himself working on Tum…

Please note, PrivCo is super scandalous. Remember all the crazy crap they did to LivingSocial? http://pandodaily.com/2013/02/21/privco-may-be-wrong-but-liv...

I don't trust them at all.