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Squarespace to Go Private in $6.9B All-Cash Transaction with Permira

investors.squarespace.com

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Re: Squarespace to Go Private in $6.9B All-Cash Transaction with Permira

#261

Post by oldandboring »

kevinmchugh wrote: post #190
msoad wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most young folks don't understand URLs anymore? "Find us on App Store" or "Find us on Social Media" is the new internet. QR codes that takes you directly into a walled garden is the new web.

I see people using "linktree" to crosslink all their different social media accounts together and it really bums me out in a way I can't describe.

Seeing the proliferation of Linktree makes me feel bad for the folks like about.me who had this idea years and years ago and never caught fire.

Re: Squarespace to Go Private in $6.9B All-Cash Transaction with Permira

#262

Post by lotsofpulp »

dehrmann wrote: post #249
rchaud wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like Sears and Hertz?

There are different strategies. You can buy up dying companies and try to turn them around with management changes (and debt), you can sell off companies for scrap, you can buy up money printing machines and run them hotter.

Just to show that these bets are not without risk, the Sears bet failed bigtime. Lampert lost a ton of money.

Re: Squarespace to Go Private in $6.9B All-Cash Transaction with Permira

#263

Post by dewey »

avree wrote: post #227
nkotov wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just launched a site on Squarespace - $25 a month for a basic landing page.

That seems about right? I use Netlify to deploy my own 11ty static site, and it costs $19/month, plus there's no WYSIWYG editor like Squarespace.

What’s the reason for doing that? Can’t you host a static page for 5 dollars basically everywhere?

Even on expensive AWS it’s 5 dollars: https://aws.amazon.com/lightsail/pricing/

Re: Squarespace to Go Private in $6.9B All-Cash Transaction with Permira

#264

Post by toddmorey »

It’s like a huge if in statement:

Forward-looking statements often contain words such as "expect," "anticipate," "intend," "aims," "plan," "believe," "could," "seek," "see," "will," "may," "would," "might," "considered," "potential," "estimate," "continue," "likely," "expect," "target"

Re: Squarespace to Go Private in $6.9B All-Cash Transaction with Permira

#265

Post by mason55 »

xyst wrote: post #160
djbusby wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They gonna increase prices

not just increase prices but likely saddle the company with mountains of debt (which happens to be owned directly or indirectly by the PE firm). red lobster acquired by Golden Gate PE in cash deal in 2020 [1] red lobster subsequently squeezed for any value at all costs (cuts in labor, switching suppliers) [2] [1] https://www.restaurantbusinessonline.com/financing/asian-inv... [2] https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/03/food/r…

Yes, that is the core PE playbook.

1. Acquire loan to buy company

2. Take money that was being spent on growth and use it to make the payments on the debt

3. Try to decrease operating costs while maintaining revenue or increase revenue while maintaining operating costs (or some combination)

4. Sell the company for more than you paid based on the improved profit margins

The key is finding a company who's still spending on growth but isn't really growing. If the company is actually still growing then you're going to have trouble making your money back if you cut growth activities (because your initial price would be higher due to implied growth in the future).

The challenge is in step three. Can you increase revenue or decrease operating costs without sacrificing too much goodwill? If you do too much to scare away suppliers or customers then step 4 is hard and the whole thing blows up.

Re: Squarespace to Go Private in $6.9B All-Cash Transaction with Permira

#266

Post by orangesite »

I find private equity's enthusiasm adorable but the temporary hiatus on anti-trust enforcement that first gained momentum during the Reagan era is no longer in effect.

Some expensive lessons are about to be learnt.

(assuming democratic governance remains in effect, otherwise all bets are off)

Re: Squarespace to Go Private in $6.9B All-Cash Transaction with Permira

#267

Post by packetlost »

idontwantthis wrote: post #258
packetlost wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like making it easy to how your own website is something that can be solved with an ingress service (Tailscale funnel?) + DNS management and a small box that someone buys and leaves in their living room. It doesn't have to require any technical expertise, you just need to build a lot of things to make it that way.

I’ve thought about making my own homepage to replace my instagram/fb and share my life with my friends, but how would anyone find it? I guess I could email everyone and tell them. I’ve wondered if there is a way I could easily get that to the top of Google for my name, but there are a few famous people with my name.

I feel like Fediverse/Mastodon and/or Bluesky sort of solve this problem though. Fediverse in particular has a pretty rich ecosystem with niches for Twitter-like, Instagram-like, Reddit-like, and (I think) even Facebook-like.

There's also RSS feeds

Re: Squarespace to Go Private in $6.9B All-Cash Transaction with Permira

#269

Post by dheera »

renegade-otter wrote: post #60

The gold rush is over - private equity is going to squeeze every little drop from the companies that have been built and we will move on to Web 3.0 - which will be just like web 1.0 - self-hosting, link directories, newsletters, and guestbooks.

Publicly-held companies aren't any better. The only companies that care about customers are those where founders and employees hold most of the stock.

As soon as it is owned mostly by investors, everything becomes about shareholder value.

Re: Squarespace to Go Private in $6.9B All-Cash Transaction with Permira

#270

Post by manquer »

adtac wrote: post #124
insane_dreamer wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it has to be high enough to give the board enough cover that they're doing their fiduciary duty to existing shareholders

Maybe I'm missing something basic but that still doesn't explain why it's 30% and not 50%. I don't think purely qualitative arguments work here.

It comes from the Doft (2004) ruling in Delaware courts that attaches a 30% control premium
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