An acquisition is always a failure • Hacker News Board

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#71

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 6:22 AM UTC

mikeg8 wrote: post #27

alxbrun wrote: post #17

I recently sold my company and I agree with Jake. What most commenters don't understand, in my opinion, is that real entrepreneurs don't start their company to get rich. If getting rich is your priority, become an investment banker (If you really want to code, make some automatic trading algorithms and financial models for investment bankers.) In that regard, selling your company is, very often, a failure. In my expe…

You didn't describe failure, you described Regret. As a young entrepreneur trying to do the same thing you did in the past (establish a company that is strong, independent, has great values) I can see how "abandoning" those values feels like failure. But it really depends on your definition of success and also what you do after . An acquisition could provide someone with the financial freedom, knowledge, and business…

[deleted]

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#72

Post by drusenko » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 6:27 AM UTC

georgemcbay wrote: post #5

Pretty easy position to take once you've already earned your own "fuck you" money. I do sometimes wonder why these sorts of acquisitions remain so prevalent though when minus a few notable exceptions the life cycle tends to consist of a company paying many millions or even a cool billion for some tech in a stack they don't even use (only to kill it soon after) plus a handful of employees that tend to stick around bar…

Almost all popular Google products (other than search and Gmail) have come from acquisition: Maps, Analytics, Google Apps, Android, Blogger, Picasa, YouTube, Postini, reCAPTCHA, etc.

My good friends Robby & Wayne's company, Zenter, was acquired by Google in 2007. While Robby has since left, Wayne is now a very respected eng manager in charge of a very important project, so I would argue that acquisition was successful for them.

So while many acquisitions do not work out well (and usually loudly), it would be a big mistake to pretend that applies to all acquisitions.

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#73

Post by shalmanese » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 6:40 AM UTC

drusenko wrote: post #72

georgemcbay wrote: post #5

Pretty easy position to take once you've already earned your own "fuck you" money. I do sometimes wonder why these sorts of acquisitions remain so prevalent though when minus a few notable exceptions the life cycle tends to consist of a company paying many millions or even a cool billion for some tech in a stack they don't even use (only to kill it soon after) plus a handful of employees that tend to stick around bar…

Almost all popular Google products (other than search and Gmail) have come from acquisition: Maps, Analytics, Google Apps, Android, Blogger, Picasa, YouTube, Postini, reCAPTCHA, etc. My good friends Robby & Wayne's company, Zenter, was acquired by Google in 2007. While Robby has since left, Wayne is now a very respected eng manager in charge of a very important project, so I would argue that acquisition was successfu…

Same with Adobe. Everything in their creative suite except Illustrator was the result of an acquisition. They had a lot of botched and failed acquisitions over the years but there's no question they wouldn't be where they were today if not for a series of very smart acquisitions.

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#74

Post by DigitalSea » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 7:21 AM UTC

This article couldn't be any further from the truth. How is selling a failure? What if you're selling because your marriage is falling apart or family is suffering because you're never home? What if you want to persue other ventures? What if you're sick and tired of being responsible for a business?

Sometimes selling is the only option for some and I can sympathise with that. Or if you invested a whole heap of effort, time and money and want to cash out purely for the money, what is so wrong about that?

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#75

Post by lmm » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 7:52 AM UTC

mindcrime wrote: post #3

No, no, a thousand times no. This is complete bullshit. I'm sorry, but you lost me at: The proper ambition for a tech entrepreneur should be to join the ranks of the great tech companies, or, at least, to create a profitable, independent company beloved by employees, customers, and shareholders. Nobody, not you, not my mom or dad, not "God", not Linus Torvalds, not Bill Gates, not the Queen of England, not the Dali L…

>But you know what... maybe I need the money right now to do some things I always wanted to do. Maybe I want to buy my aging mother a new house, and I don't want to wait for a bloody IPO, I want to do it now. Maybe I have a family member who needs special medical care, or - fuck it - maybe I just want to cash out, fly to Scotland, and spend the rest of my life looking for a 6' tall, redheaded supermodel with a Scottish accent to marry.

Then either you've got into this situation unplanned - a failure of sorts - or you made a terrible choice of strategy for getting the money, and got lucky. There are far more efficient paths to that kind of cash if that's what you want.

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#76

Post by davidw » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 7:56 AM UTC

So, that would make Viaweb a failure?

I think the world is a much better place with PG & Company running Y Combinator than if they had slogged on and on with Viaweb.

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#77

Post by csense » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 7:56 AM UTC

I didn't get farther than the headline.

Such a blatantly false sweeping generalization...obvious troll is obvious.

Why exactly is this on the front page with 115 upvotes?

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#78

Post by Al-Khwarizmi » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 8:00 AM UTC

I'd like to fail like that too.

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#79

Post by gingerlime » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 8:07 AM UTC

Of course it depends on your own goals, motivation, and the thing that gets you out of bed. If you care about your product and your audience then I think whilst it might sound promising to sell to a bigger company, there are chances your product and audience will be both gone. There are also chances of being able to reach even wider audience with an even better product.

I can think of a couple of examples like Picnik and Posterous. I'm not sure what those guys wanted out of it, and I hope they are happy with the decision. For me personally they were both two great products that dissolved into nothing... I'm sure there are plenty of examples to the contrary (some people mentioned other successful google product that really became huge).

Re: An acquisition is always a failure

#80

Post by michaelwww » Wed, Apr 03, 2013, 8:21 AM UTC

jlodwick wrote: post #56

michaelwww wrote: post #31

The "older doofuses who didn’t understand the Web" seemed to have done pretty well with CollegeHumor and Vimeo without Jake. If they had run them into the ground, I imagine he'd write an article about how being acquired is always success.

The existing businesses were nurtured and optimized reasonably well. I was lamenting the loss of the creative spirit that generated those two businesses in the first place -- the larger, more valuable core of the company.

I kid because the title seems designed to be provocative. It's not always failure to sell out. Quite the opposite in my case, but I hear you. You "sold out" and lost something in the process. They have been good stewards of Vimeo. It's one of the quality sites on the web, so I wouldn't fret too much. You created something wonderful. That's more than most people.