Why would you say yes or no?
Poll: Would you sell your startup for 5x to Google so they can kill it?
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Re: Poll: Would you sell your startup for 5x to Google so they can kill it?
#2Magnitude matters.
If my valuation is 50k, maybe not. If my valuation is 1m+, probably would.
Re: Poll: Would you sell your startup for 5x to Google so they can kill it?
#3Because the "I am a visionary that will change the world" is a game better played by people whose mortgage is paid off and who have enough savings to pay for their kids' college education.
Also, having a successful exit (and success in this case is measured by the return to your investors, not whether the product survived the acquisition) does wonders for your startup career.
Re: Poll: Would you sell your startup for 5x to Google so they can kill it?
#4Magnitude matters. If my valuation is 50k, maybe not. If my valuation is 1m+, probably would.
So does financial circumstances. Someone who already has a previous startup under their belt, or even a couple mil saved from a previous successful career, will be much less likely to sell out for the cash than someone who's been living paycheck-to-paycheck their whole life.
Re: Poll: Would you sell your startup for 5x to Google so they can kill it?
#5Keep in mind, if you can do your startup as OSS, it changes the game.
For example, look at Monty and MySQL. He sold to Sun, he didn't like the direction they (now Oracle) took it, so he forked his original codebase, and kept developing it in a new company.
There may be contractual reasons why this is difficult, but there are huge advantages to releasing your code if you can.
Re: Poll: Would you sell your startup for 5x to Google so they can kill it?
#6If I feel this is not my bestest ever idea and I can come up with better ideas in future, I will sell it for sure. Have done it twice before, not with google although, for the same reason.
Re: Poll: Would you sell your startup for 5x to Google so they can kill it?
#7I think another critical factor is, if you don't sell off, will Google ultimately supplant your relevance and kill your market in the long run. If so, it might be better to benefit from their investment than just be another forgotten casualty. How original is your idea? How easy is it to replicate? How common sense is your business model and if novel enough, is it protected and do you have the legal resources to defend it?
Re: Poll: Would you sell your startup for 5x to Google so they can kill it?
#8The only owners who would say no are the ones who started a company because it was the only way to make their product come to life. They treat the product and the company that forms around it like their baby.
Most owners are entrepreneurs or businessmen or visionaries who are in it because they enjoy(ed) the process and would gladly start over with a new project with a huge slush fund to fall back on or escape the stress and responsibility of the start-up world all together.
Re: Poll: Would you sell your startup for 5x to Google so they can kill it?
#9I certainly would consider it.
Re: Poll: Would you sell your startup for 5x to Google so they can kill it?
#10Doesn't matter what the financial situation is. Are they acquiring you because your product stinks but you and your team is awesome? Then what are they paying money for? Why would anyone pay 5x to shut it down?