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The 'Startup Boom' is a disguised jobs fair for big corporations

zdnet.com

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Re: The 'Startup Boom' is a disguised jobs fair for big corporations

#21

Post by patrickk »

nelsondooley wrote: post #15
patio11 wrote: post #9

This would be a very penetratingly insightful criticism if you had never heard of Airbnb, Dropbox, Twilio, etc etc. Some people at the current classes of YC and 500 Startups may well find themselves working for AmaGooBookSoft in 4 years, and may that be a happy outcome for all concerned, but you've got to torture the math to come to the conclusion that hiring acquisitions are where most of the money is changing hands…

It's an interesting point he makes, but you're right, he has no numbers to back it up. Doesn't anyone keep data startups and acquisitions?

Crunchbase has a section on acquisitions. Never used it personally though.

http://www.crunchbase.com/acquisitions?page=1

Re: The 'Startup Boom' is a disguised jobs fair for big corporations

#23

Post by hkarthik »

geofflewis wrote: post #7

This is one of the most ignorant, poorly written articles I've ever seen on Hacker News. it doesn't belong here.

I debated not submitting it, but I thought the idea warranted some discussion. Seems like every other day I read about a startup with a free service shutting down because they were bought by Facebook, Twitter, or Google.

Re: The 'Startup Boom' is a disguised jobs fair for big corporations

#24

Post by mechanical_fish »

patio11 wrote: post #9

This would be a very penetratingly insightful criticism if you had never heard of Airbnb, Dropbox, Twilio, etc etc. Some people at the current classes of YC and 500 Startups may well find themselves working for AmaGooBookSoft in 4 years, and may that be a happy outcome for all concerned, but you've got to torture the math to come to the conclusion that hiring acquisitions are where most of the money is changing hands…

Yeah, I was kind of enjoying this oddball view of the universe, however much handwaving it required, until we hit the last paragraph, where the author tried to address the phenomenon of startups that actually work out:

It’s from among those ugly ducklings that the swans of the new age emerge: FB, Goog, Twitter, Yahoo! and others — no one wanted them at first — then they couldn’t get enough of them.

There is only so much handwaving that one can get away with. "Ugly ducklings" that "no one wanted"? You just can't pretend that existing companies didn't, e.g., know that Facebook was worth serious money, pretty quickly. They offered Zuckerberg real money for Facebook. According to a book quoted by this extremely-irritatingly-formatted article at Business Insider, the buyout offers started four months after Facebook started:

http://www.businessinsider.com/all-the-companies-that-ever-t...

And Dropbox? Everyone and his brother has dreamed of buying Dropbox. The most famous rumored suitor is Apple:

http://www.macrumors.com/2011/10/18/dropbox-indeed-balked-at...

Re: The 'Startup Boom' is a disguised jobs fair for big corporations

#25

Post by lrobb »

drblast wrote: post #18

I fail to see the problem with this. Why is it bad to work for a large company? Do you know how ridiculously difficult it is to prove to an established business that "no, I don't have the specific experience you are looking for, but I can learn it in short order and I'll be one of your best employees," and then stand out from the 100 people behind you who say the exact same thing? It's also ridiculously difficult for…

Selling a business for a payout is one thing... Starting a business just to get a job is kinda nuts. You say "lose nothing", but there's always a tradeoff..

Re: The 'Startup Boom' is a disguised jobs fair for big corporations

#27

Post by jpdoctor »

nelsondooley wrote: post #15
patio11 wrote: post #9

This would be a very penetratingly insightful criticism if you had never heard of Airbnb, Dropbox, Twilio, etc etc. Some people at the current classes of YC and 500 Startups may well find themselves working for AmaGooBookSoft in 4 years, and may that be a happy outcome for all concerned, but you've got to torture the math to come to the conclusion that hiring acquisitions are where most of the money is changing hands…

It's an interesting point he makes, but you're right, he has no numbers to back it up. Doesn't anyone keep data startups and acquisitions?

> Doesn't anyone keep data startups and acquisitions?

Pretty much all of the M&A guys have a column in the table which lists $$/head.

The number is in the nosebleed sections of valuation lately, as near as I can tell. I doubt it will end well.

Re: The 'Startup Boom' is a disguised jobs fair for big corporations

#28

Post by AznHisoka »

drblast wrote: post #18

I fail to see the problem with this. Why is it bad to work for a large company? Do you know how ridiculously difficult it is to prove to an established business that "no, I don't have the specific experience you are looking for, but I can learn it in short order and I'll be one of your best employees," and then stand out from the 100 people behind you who say the exact same thing? It's also ridiculously difficult for…

Most people do a startup to get out of a large company.. not to get into a large company.

Re: The 'Startup Boom' is a disguised jobs fair for big corporations

#29

Post by DennisP »

curtisholmes wrote: post #22

> A giant Internet company such as Amazon can leverage the output of a software engineer far more efficiently than a startup Really? I doubt that. I would imagine software engineers could be much more efficient without the drag of a large company

I think he just means that code has more impact when you have ten million users than when you have ten thousand.

Re: The 'Startup Boom' is a disguised jobs fair for big corporations

#30

Post by batista »

patio11 wrote: post #9

This would be a very penetratingly insightful criticism if you had never heard of Airbnb, Dropbox, Twilio, etc etc. Some people at the current classes of YC and 500 Startups may well find themselves working for AmaGooBookSoft in 4 years, and may that be a happy outcome for all concerned, but you've got to torture the math to come to the conclusion that hiring acquisitions are where most of the money is changing hands…

This would be a very penetratingly insightful criticism if you had never heard of Airbnb, Dropbox, Twilio, etc etc.

i.e "if you had never heard of the 1% of exceptions to your rule...".

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