Watching an acquirer ruin your company • Hacker News Board

Re: Watching an acquirer ruin your company

#71

Post by spaetzleesser » Sun, Jul 03, 2022, 3:34 AM UTC

cjonas wrote: post #37

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #18

> As soon as Sphero completed the acquisition, bringing Kelsus in as an app developer, two things happened: 1) Sphero told us they needed fully revamped iOS and Android apps six months later with no schedule wiggle room. 2) Sphero spent the first two of those six months organizing a team on their side and hashing out requirements for the new apps. This exact pattern has preceded every mismanagement disaster I've ever…

Dealing with exactly 1 & 2 right now. #3 doesn't really apply in my case because 80% of the devs are budget staffing agency hires. But on that note, I'd add a 4th point: Management panics when they realize they won't make the self imposed deadline and start throwing bodies at the problem. In our case, we went from 2 teams to 8 over night. The very few engineers who actually were capable of shipping features became sw…

"start throwing bodies at the problem."

and to save money they hire some newbies instead of experienced people. I have had it multiple times where the project got looded with people who had no experience or they were in India 12 hours away so onboarding was really hard. the result was always that the added people slowed the project down.

Re: Watching an acquirer ruin your company

#72

Post by spaetzleesser » Sun, Jul 03, 2022, 3:35 AM UTC

illuminati1911 wrote: post #43

cjonas wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dealing with exactly 1 & 2 right now. #3 doesn't really apply in my case because 80% of the devs are budget staffing agency hires. But on that note, I'd add a 4th point: Management panics when they realize they won't make the self imposed deadline and start throwing bodies at the problem. In our case, we went from 2 teams to 8 over night. The very few engineers who actually were capable of shipping features became sw…

Classic. And when you tell incompetent management that 9 women can't deliver a baby in a month, they'll proceed to try with 10 women.

Just take 30 in another country, ideally with 12 hours timezone difference.

Re: Watching an acquirer ruin your company

#73

Post by aabhay » Sun, Jul 03, 2022, 3:35 AM UTC

pcmoney wrote: post #61

I honestly think the BB8 toy killed sphero. They mistook a flash of luck and a fad for PMF. It also made them cocky. Next thing I knew they were calling it a “robot” which while possibly technically true it was more of a neat remote control car that cost a fair amount of money. This was at time when you could by cheap rc helicopters that actually flew for $20.

I always understood the BB8 saga as Disney looking for a toy company to work with then designing a movie character that fit into the company’s capabilities. So it wasn’t luck as much as a single large enterprise contract that swallowed any other focus.

Re: Watching an acquirer ruin your company

#74

Post by spaetzleesser » Sun, Jul 03, 2022, 3:37 AM UTC

illuminati1911 wrote: post #40

gedy wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed, and while it's become fashionable to trash on "agile", this sort of thing is why I still prefer it to alternatives. Basically "what do you want next?".

Problem is not the agile, but useless sinecure managers trying to rebrand "agile" as something in which projects don't need planning, can be completely chaotic and any requirements can be changed at anytime without affecting the deadline. "Hey we don't really need to make any decision ever or even know what we are doing. That's the great thing about agile!"

I think the dream is "get precise estimate without defined requirements". Also "an estimate is a commitment"

Re: Watching an acquirer ruin your company

#75

Post by LurkerAtTheGate » Sun, Jul 03, 2022, 3:38 AM UTC

dqpb wrote: post #29

Maybe founders should stipulate that if the project ever gets discontinued, they get all rights back to the original product.

Founders can offer to buy the rights back later. I did this exactly - sold exclusive rights to software and team was hired onto acquiring company, years later acquiring company decides to shut down software arm and terminate existing service agreements. I offered to buy the rights plus our team back (for about 1% of the initial sale - they were going to just shutter it all), and immediately engaged the clients in new contracts. That purchase agreement was a doozy, spent more on lawyers than buying the rights back.

Re: Watching an acquirer ruin your company

#76

Post by AussieWog93 » Sun, Jul 03, 2022, 3:46 AM UTC

TameAntelope wrote: post #56

justin_oaks wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The joke at my previous job was "Months of development can save days of planning." The management in the company didn't plan anything and the meandering development process showed it. Please don't underplan. It's awful for morale to throw away work because of bad planning.

Being willing to throw away work is the single most effective way I've seen at running an engineering org, both in terms of promoting innovation and in being able to quickly adapt to evolving customer needs as they get revealed. If your morale is harmed by throwing away work, that's something you should work on.

This is something I've come across in my own experience. If you don't actually have any experience in the problem space, the best thing you can do is make something that just barely works, then scrap it.

Then all the unknown unknowns become known unknowns and you can actually create good solutions to it.

All planning is a waste if you don't even know where the speed humps will lie.

Re: Watching an acquirer ruin your company

#77

Post by nobody9999 » Sun, Jul 03, 2022, 3:47 AM UTC

I watched that happen from the inside during the "dotcom" bust,

Not a startup, but we'd grown to be a public billion dollar revenue organization when we were acquired by a much larger company (not using names here, as I'm sure there are folks on HN who were also there and would remember this and I don't want to doxx myself).

We were very profitable and had an excellent company culture, with almost everyone pulling in the same direction. It was one of the best jobs I've ever had. Until the acquisition.

After acquisition, as significant portion of our services were essentially given away to customers buying hardware from the acquirer, and our revenue plummeted.

New top management then proceeded to destroy the company culture in an attempt (a guess) to bring it more in line with the acquiring company's culture.

It was a disaster, and after a half dozen rounds of layoffs and 3-5 years, the division (that was the original company) was sold off for ~5% of the original purchase price.

I'm sure there are situations that make an acquired company better, but that wasn't the case here. And more's the pity.

Re: Watching an acquirer ruin your company

#78

Post by popcube » Sun, Jul 03, 2022, 3:51 AM UTC

ratww wrote: post #54

Ologn wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fred Brooks encountered a similar problem as a project manager at IBM in the early 1960s, working on the software for the System/360. In 1975 he wrote The Mythical Man Month about the experience. He said "adding manpower to a late software project makes it later". The increased communication needed was one reason. About half a century later, most businesses have still not learned these lessons.

I once on a company where a CEO did that 3 times in a row to an engineering team, and mentioned wanting that team to be 4x its current size in two years. In an interview, he mentioned The Mythical Man Month as one of his favourite books.

so they just hope company suffer

Re: Watching an acquirer ruin your company

#79

Post by AussieWog93 » Sun, Jul 03, 2022, 3:53 AM UTC

thejosh wrote: post #45

BMc2020 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reminds me a a company I worked at, I can't say it's name, let's just say it rhymes with Dewlett Dackard. 1) Start with a $55 billion dollar company... 2) Hire a new CEO and cronies that are going to make miracles happen with with a very expensive acquisition of another company. 3) 18 months later the miracles have not happened. CEO and cronies are invited to leave with very generous golden parachutes. 4) Start with…

I also love the excuse for the last 3 years for anyone who made massive f'ups. "The last few years have been unprecedented times".

I've always suspected that the primary reason so many small businesses shut down during recessions (or large businesses lay off huge amounts of staff) doesn't actually have anything to do with cashflow but instead the fact that management can save face by blaming the economy at large.

Re: Watching an acquirer ruin your company

#80

Post by vasco » Sun, Jul 03, 2022, 3:53 AM UTC

illuminati1911 wrote: post #43

cjonas wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dealing with exactly 1 & 2 right now. #3 doesn't really apply in my case because 80% of the devs are budget staffing agency hires. But on that note, I'd add a 4th point: Management panics when they realize they won't make the self imposed deadline and start throwing bodies at the problem. In our case, we went from 2 teams to 8 over night. The very few engineers who actually were capable of shipping features became sw…

Classic. And when you tell incompetent management that 9 women can't deliver a baby in a month, they'll proceed to try with 10 women.

So explain it properly.