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Zynga Shuts Down OMGPOP One Year After Acquiring It For $200M

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Re: Zynga Shuts Down OMGPOP One Year After Acquiring It For $200M

#31

Post by ilamont »

crimsonzagar wrote: post #3

Is there anywhere a list of investors who called Zynga a "big deal" two-three years earlier?

Valleywag put together the following list of luminaries who were hyping Zynga a few years ago(1):

- Michael Arrington

- Kleiner Perkins partner Bing Gordon

- John Doerr

- Fred Wilson

The NYT ("Will Zynga Become the Google of Games?") and San Francisco Chronicle ("[Pincus] was indisputably farsighted in recognizing the opportunity") are also on the list.

Sheryl Sandberg and Business Insider are named as well, but the quotes attributed to them don't seem to be in the same league.

1. http://valleywag.gawker.com/heres-everyone-who-hyped-zynga-b...

Re: Zynga Shuts Down OMGPOP One Year After Acquiring It For $200M

#32

Post by sdoowpilihp »

Freestyler_3 wrote: post #16
yesplorer wrote: post #8

I was surprised to hear 3000 people were making those Zynga games. Doing what exactly? Pls I'm genuinely curious. These social games seems so lame to me that I can't think of any reason why someone will even think of building a public company on top of it. You simply cannot meet investors' quarterly demand when your success is built on being "flavour of the month" business model. I don't have anything wrong against Z…

I am curious too, they can't fix a game in 6 days when it breaks..... The games they deliver are full of bugs and inconveniences (ie. game with quests; each new quests is automatically accepted, and there is a limited amount of quests that can be open, and you cant cancel quests) This is not an entertainment company.

The inconveniences are by design. The bugs are due to aggressive deadlines.

Re: Zynga Shuts Down OMGPOP One Year After Acquiring It For $200M

#34

Post by mnglkhn2 »

pavs wrote: post #12

I want to know what kind of thought process goes on company/individual's mind when they decide to do an acquisition like this, for $200M, which doesn't make enough money to justify it. You would think when you are throwing around that kind of money, they would do some rudimentary research? How much money was omgpop making at the time of the acquisition?

Zynga might have simply bought the userbase. Divide the paid $200mil to the number of users OMGPOP had at that time and then compare it to the amount you expect to gain per user once you have them consuming Zynga stuff. Of course, this thought is not always what actually happens, but Zynga might have been desperate already at the time for new distribution channels, that they agreed to pay a premium for that bundle of users.

Re: Zynga Shuts Down OMGPOP One Year After Acquiring It For $200M

#35

Post by at-fates-hands »

pavs wrote: post #12

I want to know what kind of thought process goes on company/individual's mind when they decide to do an acquisition like this, for $200M, which doesn't make enough money to justify it. You would think when you are throwing around that kind of money, they would do some rudimentary research? How much money was omgpop making at the time of the acquisition?

It seems a lot of these companies don't perform proper due diligence. As someone who went through the first dot com bust, I would've thought many of these companies would know better - I guess not.

Re: Zynga Shuts Down OMGPOP One Year After Acquiring It For $200M

#36

Post by Samuel_Michon »

crimsonzagar wrote: post #21
der3k wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Start your own company then and set an example instead of criticizing others. Edit: Thanks for all the upvotes/support. To those who see this as legitimate criticism, really? The OP elaborated on nothing - no constructive criticisms were made. Instead, it just sounds like pure anger and naïveté on my end, alluding to all entrepreneurs trying to make it/who have made it as "leeches" and "near-sighted execs" that have…

Criticism is extremely important for any cos. and its executives. Criticism can potentially save any Zynga from sliding away to nothingness ...

Given its products and business model, Zynga fading away into nothingness is probably the best thing for everyone.

Re: Zynga Shuts Down OMGPOP One Year After Acquiring It For $200M

#37

Post by [deleted] »

ianstallings wrote: post #14

I bet all the execs got well paid for their terrible efforts though and they will slide into new positions of power regardless of their merit. We need to take our industry back from the leeches. The near-sighted execs with nothing but paper accolades and networks of cronies.

[deleted]

Re: Zynga Shuts Down OMGPOP One Year After Acquiring It For $200M

#38

Post by sdoowpilihp »

smrtinsert wrote: post #20

That developer who opted out is looking like a genius right now.

Maybe. Then again, if the acquired individuals saw nice retention bonuses and pay outs on their equity that gave them some sort of (even limited) financial freedom, maybe they were the geniuses.

Re: Zynga Shuts Down OMGPOP One Year After Acquiring It For $200M

#39

Post by greenlakejake »

pyre wrote: post #5

| "but most of my team had new jobs lined up | by the time they left the building anyway." I've never experienced this. Does this mean that they were already looking, or that they were able to immediately call someone up and get a job offer on-demand? Edit: To be clear, having 'a job lined up' to me means that they already at least have an offer, rather than just a bunch of emails from recruiters and/or people lookin…

In any town with a lot of programmers (e.g. Bay area, NYC, Seattle, Boston,...) lots of people know each other and socialize. You'll go out drinking with your buddies and they'll say "company X just got a new contract - you to work with Alex at company Y didn't you? I'll bet if you called he'd be interested."
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