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It's strange that the investors would agree to having the team and tech aquihired. What's in it for them?
Before he started Vidpresso, Randall was helping out my YC batch with feedback on their demo day pitches. It wasn't his job - he was just being helpful. The nicest guy you'd ever meet. Props to Randall on all the hard work building Vidpresso over the years - and congrats on the exit!
> By 2016, it was telling hiring prospects that it was profitable, but also that, “We will not be selling the company unless some insane whatsapp like thing happened. We’re building a forever biz, not a flip.” So either Vidpresso lowered its bar for an exit or Facebook made coming aboard worth its while.
Unfortunately there seems to be high incentive and little downside to claim 'we will not sell easy'. You get the upside adoption by any customer concerned with longevity, and when you decide to fold for pennies you write a blog post about your incredible journey. I get it. You get tired of a product, it doesn't do as well as you hope, but you still want to get acquihired and make sure your hardworking engineers don't…
> By 2016, it was telling hiring prospects that it was profitable, but also that, “We will not be selling the company unless some insane whatsapp like thing happened. We’re building a forever biz, not a flip.” So either Vidpresso lowered its bar for an exit or Facebook made coming aboard worth its while.
Hopefully they all just made a whole bunch of money.
Yet another example that if people want to put their money where their mouth is w.r.t not being bought out, only trust a not for profit organization.
1. Build a lasting private business (Mailchimp) 2. Go public (Facebook) 3. Get acquired (Instagram)
Obviously, I'm ball-parking here, but 99% of startups with "successful" outcomes happen via acquisition. For the vast majority of most startups, acquisition is the only viable outcome other than failure.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What does it mean by "bough the talent and the tech, but not the company"?
I think that's a poorly-worded way to say "the product will be built into facebook itself"
If Facebook buys the company's IP but not the company itself, and the company pays out that cash in dividends and winds down operations, people could get paid quite different amounts than if Facebook had purchased all of their outstanding stock outright.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Care to expand? Are there companies doing business while being a non-profit? I’m interested in starting a business but as a way to help a charity or foundation of some aspects close to my heart. Edit: thought about St. Jude’s hospital but it depends on donations.
You can have a social good corporation or a not-for-profit business and still make tremendous amounts of money. It just means it's not your goal as a business.
https://citationsneeded.libsyn.com/episode-45-the-not-so-ben...
You would be surprised how this works.
Yet another example that if people want to put their money where their mouth is w.r.t not being bought out, only trust a not for profit organization.
I'm confused by the idea that this is bad in some way. The point of business is to make money. For startups in particular, the entire commercial goal can roughly be broken down into one of three things: 1. Build a lasting private business (Mailchimp) 2. Go public (Facebook) 3. Get acquired (Instagram) Obviously, I'm ball-parking here, but 99% of startups with "successful" outcomes happen via acquisition. For the vast…