Lina Khan points to Figma IPO as vindication of M&A scrutiny

Post by malfist » Sun, Aug 03, 2025, 4:31 PM UTC

api wrote: post #255

benreesman wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I have heard that sentiment too. I've never heard so much as a second-hand anecdote that someone was on the track of an acquisition but got the vibe their 50 million dollar acquihire plus was going to just be too much trouble under an activist chairwoman though. It seems to me that the same weaponization of binary tribal thinking in red/blue social stuff has a corollary in "entrepeneur / commie" oversimplificat…

I agree except the part about the new oligarchs doing the manipulating. I think they are manipulating themselves, sucked into these brain rot machines as much as anyone. I heard a Thiel interview recently where he ranted about Greta Thunberg and the antichrist and used a bunch of very online Xhitter bubble terms like referring to low efficacy as “low-T” and I was like this guy needs to touch grass. It didn’t even mak…

Post by hashstring » Sun, Aug 03, 2025, 4:32 PM UTC

stephen_cagle wrote: post #246

I wonder if a simpler solution to all this regulartion would be something like imposing a tax (fee?) when larger companies acquire smaller companies? So something like, "For every order of magnitude difference between the acquirer and the aquiree, there will be a 100% tax on the acquisition price paid to the US Federal government." So this would basically encourage companies to either have their own IPO (no fee at al…

Post by benreesman » Sun, Aug 03, 2025, 4:36 PM UTC

malfist wrote: post #262

api wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree except the part about the new oligarchs doing the manipulating. I think they are manipulating themselves, sucked into these brain rot machines as much as anyone. I heard a Thiel interview recently where he ranted about Greta Thunberg and the antichrist and used a bunch of very online Xhitter bubble terms like referring to low efficacy as “low-T” and I was like this guy needs to touch grass. It didn’t even mak…

It's never made sense for me (as a gay man) how a gay man could get sucked into the fringe alt right manosphere. That whole ecosystem is antithetical to you

Post by benreesman » Sun, Aug 03, 2025, 4:43 PM UTC

dabedee wrote: post #260

benreesman wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It absolutely proves that she was right. If you care about market cap? She was right. If you care about employee comp? She was right. If you care about consumer choice, she was right. Number of listings, new potential acquirers for your startup, more diverse office geography, right right right right. The idea that there's a significant lobby on fucking Hacker News unhappy that a startup IPO'd for a zillion bucks and…

I think you're hitting the real divide here. Some people are so ideologically opposed to any regulatory intervention that they can't admit when it works, even when the evidence is staring them in the face. Also notable [0]: "[...] in any given year, we see up to 3,000 merger filings that get reported to us. Around 2% of those actually get a second look by the government, so you have 98% of all deals that, for the mos…

Post by aianus » Sun, Aug 03, 2025, 4:52 PM UTC

dabedee wrote: post #177

I think the Figma IPO proves Khan was right. $60B market cap today vs the $20B Adobe offered in 2023. There was some criticism about regulatory overreach when the deal got blocked. Now Figma employees are rich, the design tools market stays competitive, and we have another major independent tech company instead of just another Adobe product line. This is exactly why we need regulators willing to tell Big Tech "no" so…