Uber plays hardball with early shareholders
fortune.com
Uber plays hardball with early shareholders
1–10 of 100 posts
Re: Uber plays hardball with early shareholders
#2If you can't sell it, you don't really own it.
Re: Uber plays hardball with early shareholders
#3"This fear of being viewed as a startup enemy also is why none of the early Uber investors we spoke with would allow us to publish their names."
What is a "startup enemy" and how does wanting to recoup some of your investment make you one?
Re: Uber plays hardball with early shareholders
#4Isn't there a law that if there are more than 500 shareholders for a private company that the company must go public? Sounds like a totally reasonable reason for keeping a tight hold on the stock.
Re: Uber plays hardball with early shareholders
#5It seems like reforms are needed to protect workers from predatory stock option contracts like these. Workers have almost no negotiating power in these cases, since they usually have common shares and no board voting power.
Re: Uber plays hardball with early shareholders
#6Isn't there a law that if there are more than 500 shareholders for a private company that the company must go public? Sounds like a totally reasonable reason for keeping a tight hold on the stock.
Yes, but they should pay market rates for the stock. The article made it sound like they were trying to buy it up at $4 billion evaluation when they knew they'd be auctioning some off for $10+ billion.
Re: Uber plays hardball with early shareholders
#7Isn't there a law that if there are more than 500 shareholders for a private company that the company must go public? Sounds like a totally reasonable reason for keeping a tight hold on the stock.
There's no requirement to go "public" in the sense of listing on an exchange, and available for public purchase. What changes at that point is SEC regulatory compliance kicks in: earnings/revenue go public, SEC compliance paperwork has to be filed just like a public corp. That's really why people try to stay under that number - you have all the drawbacks of being public, except a floated share price, and it would effective crush any IPO pop that they would expect to get, as financials would be totally available, so offer price would have to reflect the company's financials.
Re: Uber plays hardball with early shareholders
#8I'm in what might be a very similar position: I'm employed at a startup and was just given an option grant as a performance bonus. I believe I can't sell the stocks, and we're not really looking to go public, so I don't know what use they are or what any of it means. Is there a certain class of lawyer I can take my paperwork to and pay some fee for them to go over it and tell me what my options are (no pun intended)?
Re: Uber plays hardball with early shareholders
#9"This fear of being viewed as a startup enemy also is why none of the early Uber investors we spoke with would allow us to publish their names." What is a "startup enemy" and how does wanting to recoup some of your investment make you one?
If you got into a legal battle with your employer, there would be consequences to future employment.
The same is true of investors. A legal battle with a company you invested in might close off access to future deals.
Now, a reasonable person might evaluate the facts of the case if they have time...but not everyone has the time and/or would agree that they should sue Uber.
It is alot like having worked on a porn site I think. Some people would go "Oh, cool, you worked on a big project there that had the kind of scale we hope to achieve."
Others would look at it and drop your resume directly into the trashbin.
I suspect there is a similar effect on VC/Angel access to startups that are popular enough to have a bidding war like Uber.
Re: Uber plays hardball with early shareholders
#10Isn't there a law that if there are more than 500 shareholders for a private company that the company must go public? Sounds like a totally reasonable reason for keeping a tight hold on the stock.
Yes, but they should pay market rates for the stock. The article made it sound like they were trying to buy it up at $4 billion evaluation when they knew they'd be auctioning some off for $10+ billion.
Is there any reason for them to pay more? I mean sure, it is a bit of a dick move but they seem like they aren't exactly trying to buy back the stock. They just don't want too many people selling. So either they get cheap stock or they block the sale. Win win for Uber, right?