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

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

#331

Post by adgjlsfhk1 »

holmesworcester wrote: post #227
benreesman wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lengths people will go to to avoid the facts on this are fucking remarkable. I'll let Opus explain: "The Bottom Line A 73% annualized return would: Easily rank in the top 10-20 best-documented investment returns of all time if sustained for multiple years Significantly outperform virtually all professional fund managers and legendary investors Be 7x higher than the long-term stock market average Turn $10,000 into…

Then why did shareholders choose to sell? In choosing to sell they decided the risk wasn't worth the reward. If you were in their position, would you have sold or held?

The shareholders chose to sell because it was a decent/OK deal for everyone other than the users of the software/society at large.

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

#332

Post by missedthecue »

benreesman wrote: post #212
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…

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…

It doesn't prove it. Khan attempted very fiercely to block Amazon's purchase of iRobot and she, along with the EU authorities, succeeded in preventing it and now iRobot is about to file bankruptcy. We don't have the counterfactual and founders (nor regulatory agencies) can see the future.

Someone made a good analogy on twitter that Khan essentially cut off a genius pianist's right hand, the pianist persevered and somehow succeeded in retaining their talent in spite of having one hand, and now Khan is taking credit for the feat. In the same way, the fact that Figma still exists is not proof that she was right.

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

#333

Post by terminalshort »

benreesman wrote: post #212
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…

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…

> If you care about market cap? She was right.

None of the FTC's business

> If you care about employee comp? She was right.

None of the FTC's business

> Number of listings, new potential acquirers for your startup, more diverse office geography, right right right right.

None of the FTC's business x3

> If you care about consumer choice, she was right.

Ok, so this is the FTC's business. But does Figma compete with Adobe in any major areas? I'm not aware of any major Adobe products like that.

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

#334

Post by missedthecue »

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…

What problem does this solve? Then my small company is less likely to receive acquisition offers which is bad for me!

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

#335

Post by missedthecue »

cogman10 wrote: post #93
mattmcknight wrote: post #81

So blocking a sale at a $20B valuation so the company can IPO at a $19.3B valuation 3 years later (a loss of $700M in value over 3 years) is a success?

Remember when HP bought palm and them proceeded to lay off the entire palm staff and kill all the palm products? The market works best with competion. It's better for the workers, the customers, society and innovation in general. A giant monopoly buying potential competitors is bad for everyone other than owners of that giant monopoly.

Yep, and because HP did that, we now have no mobile smartphones. If only the government would have prevented that!!

Caplan said it best. The market is great at doing good things that sound bad. The government is great at doing bad things that sound good.

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

#336

Post by terminalshort »

benreesman wrote: post #304
scarface_74 wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It just happened with Windsurf and Google.

Windsurf getting "bought" such that the employees got nothing is a great recent example of why you want Lina Khan seeing to it that a healthy and well-regulated M&A market is in effect. That's precisely the kind of lowbrow shit you can thank her bought and paid for successors for bringing you the next decade's worth of.

No, it really isn't. It's not remotely the FTCs job to regulate that type of thing, and I really don't think you would want it to be. Would you rather have a system where competing companies have to get government approval before extending offers to you? You know who would love that system? Google.

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

#337

Post by terminalshort »

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

It makes perfect sense if you think about it from Thiel's perspective. Other than legal technicalities like marriage, the consequences of being gay are mainly determined by societal attitudes and not electoral politics. No legal changes that the Republicans would make do anything to stop a powerful billionaire from being openly gay. So it makes perfect sense that he would favor his business interests when he takes sides in politics.

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

#338

Post by maxbond »

terminalshort wrote: post #333
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…

> If you care about market cap? She was right. None of the FTC's business > If you care about employee comp? She was right. None of the FTC's business > Number of listings, new potential acquirers for your startup, more diverse office geography, right right right right. None of the FTC's business x3 > If you care about consumer choice, she was right. Ok, so this is the FTC's business. But does Figma compete with Adob…

> > Number of listings, new potential acquirers for your startup, more diverse office geography, right right right right.

> None of the FTC's business x3

> > If you care about consumer choice, she was right.

> Ok, so this is the FTC's business.

You don't think there's relationship between consumer choice and a large number of acquirers? These are basically equivalent statements, they're both saying "markets remain competitive".

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

#339

Post by terminalshort »

maxbond wrote: post #338
terminalshort wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you care about market cap? She was right. None of the FTC's business > If you care about employee comp? She was right. None of the FTC's business > Number of listings, new potential acquirers for your startup, more diverse office geography, right right right right. None of the FTC's business x3 > If you care about consumer choice, she was right. Ok, so this is the FTC's business. But does Figma compete with Adob…

> > Number of listings, new potential acquirers for your startup, more diverse office geography, right right right right. > None of the FTC's business x3 > > If you care about consumer choice, she was right. > Ok, so this is the FTC's business. You don't think there's relationship between consumer choice and a large number of acquirers? These are basically equivalent statements, they're both saying "markets remain co…

Only in the case where both the acquirer and the target have directly competing products, which is why I specifically mentioned that case and said it would be the FTCs business. (And even then sometimes it doesn't. Google bought Waze, which was a direct competitor to Google Maps, but still both products exist.)

And, no, they aren't remotely equivalent statements to each other or to "markets remain competitive." If there are 100 products in a market, and an acquisition reduces that to 99, it will have no effect on the competitiveness of a market, which is why such an acquisition is not typically any of the FTC's business.

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

#340

Post by AnthonyMouse »

scarface_74 wrote: post #292
dabedee wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

So now the monopolies are just hiring away all of the people they want from the startup and leaving the company as a shell of its former self - leaving both investors and the employees left behind high and dry.

> So now the monopolies are just hiring away all of the people they want from the startup and leaving the company as a shell of its former self - leaving both investors and the employees left behind high and dry.

If this was a viable strategy then they would have just done it regardless, right?

Meanwhile the solution to that is to break up the monopolies to begin with. You don't have trillion dollar companies monopolizing the labor pool if you don't have trillion dollar companies.

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